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Below is the text from an article by Greg Sheridan in The Australian. Hardjono (talk) 15:47, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

The Australian

Edition 1 - All-round Country

THU 01 JUL 2004, Page 016 "Artificial intelligence" By Greg Sheridan

Wild conspiracy theories emanating from parts of our intelligence gathering community underline the need for a shake-up, argues Greg Sheridan

THE notion that somewhere, mysteriously embedded in the heart of Australian national security, there is a sinister pro-Jakarta lobby that undermines Australia's national interest is one of the great, enduring fictions of Australian intelligence. What the new controversy surrounding the unsuccessful attempt by some junior intelligence officers to smear Kim Beazley as an alleged member of this lobby shows is that, even among the junior ranks of our uniformed intelligence people, this crackpot theory, for which there is absolutely no evidence, has gained currency. The new allegations originate from people formerly in the Defence Intelligence Organisation. The DIO is the most troubled of our mainstream intelligence organisations and will be the subject of some recommended changes when former diplomat and intelligence chief Philip Flood presents his report on the intelligence community to the Government some time this month.

DIO exists primarily to provide actionable intelligence to the Australian defence forces. Flood is likely to conclude that it has moved too far away from that core function and become too ambitious in trying to make broad intelligence assessments. The two functions, though both travelling under the label "intelligence", are not remotely connected. Being able to discern where a hostile platoon is in the hills of East Timor does not equip you to make a broad judgment about the trend in Indonesian politics, and vice versa.

The big strategic, political, economic assessments should be the function of the Office of National Assessments. Unfortunately, ONA has been far too small to do this job effectively. As a result, DIO stepped into the vacuum, with dolorous consequences. When Iraq started to become a serious issue, ONA at one stage had only two analysts working full-time on it. DIO had dozens of people because there was likely to be an Australian military commitment and therefore there were specific military intelligence requirements.

However, DIO is not intellectually equipped to get into the business of vital strategic, political, national assessments. A string of recent intelligence "scandals", such as the latest set of bizarre allegations by a former captain, Andrew Plunkett, and an earlier series of statements by Colonel Lance Collins, amount to nothing much more than uniformed people making dotty political judgments beyond their depth.

It cannot be emphasised too often or too much that there is absolutely nothing in the Plunkett allegations against Beazley of any substance whatsoever. According to the Bulletin magazine, Plunkett alleged in the lead-up to the 2001 election that Beazley was part of the pro-Jakarta lobby. He further alleged that Beazley was compromised by his friendship with a prominent Indonesian with intelligence links. It transpires that the Indonesian in Plunkett's fantasies was former journalist Ratih Hardjono. This kind of trashing of reputations is a serious and disgraceful matter. Hardjono was for many years the Australian correspondent of the Indonesian newspaper Kompas.

She was an active and effective journalist well-known to many Australian politicians and journalists. She later went on to become spokeswoman for Abdurrahman Wahid in his presidential campaign and then served him in a senior executive capacity for part of the time he was president. She is a person of the highest integrity and repute. There is not the slightest shred of evidence that there was ever any untoward connection between her and Indonesian intelligence. But merely to make these bizarre accusations is to harm people.

When senior Labor people learned of Plunkett's allegations they referred them to ASIO, where director-general Dennis Richardson investigated and quickly concluded they were nonsense. Labor figures were told Beazley was not the only senior person to be slandered in such far-fetched documents.

The whole fantastic notion of a pro-Jakarta lobby seems to have been imported into junior and mid-level ranks of DIO from two sources. One is the usual suspects of conspiracy-theory journalists who, since the invasion of East Timor by Indonesia in 1975, have been trying to find a way to blame East Timor's ills on Australia, and to attribute every bad thing Indonesia has ever done to Australia. A moment's reflection suggests the absurdity of this. I once asked Gough Whitlam about the Indonesia lobby conspiracy theories and he replied pungently: ``Comrade, we can't even bend Vanuatu to our will. How do they imagine we could ever control Indonesia?''

The high point of the relationship occurred under Paul Keating and Indonesian president Suharto, who negotiated a mutual security pact.

Whether this was good policy or not, there was nothing sinister in it. It proceeded from Keating's view of Australia's national interests and Keating's policies were tested at the next election.

The second source of the conspiracy theory in marginal parts of DIO is the particular experience of 1999 and the East Timor operation. Australia, like virtually every other nation in Asia, recognised Indonesian sovereignty of East Timor but had always pressed Indonesia to grant greater autonomy to East Timor and to treat its people with greater respect.

In December 1998, John Howard, in a fundamental change of policy, wrote to then Indonesian president B.J. Habibie suggesting once more the autonomy option but also adding for the first time the idea of a referendum on independence many years down the track.

We will never know what, if any, influence Howard's letter had, but Habibie subsequently set in train a process that resulted in a referendum in 1999. Australia was intimately involved in the diplomacy leading up to the referendum. This was a very difficult period for Canberra. DIO and other Australian intelligence agencies got information that showed Indonesia was setting up militia movements and there was a great danger of violence.

Canberra urged Jakarta to rein in the militias and explored the idea of an international peace-keeping force going in before the election. The Indonesians were adamant that they would not have international peace-keepers. When the referendum went so heavily for independence there was indeed terrible violence for several days and Australia quickly organised an international peace-keeping force. Canberra got the US to put maximum diplomatic pressure on Indonesia to accept this force, which put an end to the violence.

Some DIO people were unhappy that the Howard Government did not make more of a fuss in the lead-up to the referendum, and did not campaign internationally for a peace-keeping force before the vote.

However, no Government takes actions purely on the basis of its intelligence agencies, especially reports from mid-level officers. It was exceptionally difficult for Canberra to know what was the best way to proceed. There is no evidence that anyone in the Government was acting in bad faith -- that is, putting the interests of Indonesia above those of Australia, or for that matter the East Timorese.

A difficult political conundrum about the best way to try to avoid violence is not the same as conniving in violence. Similarly, any responsible Australian policymaker will take into account the importance of Australia's relationship with Indonesia. That does not constitute being part of a pro-Jakarta lobby.

The only real worry out of all the recent so-called scandals is that so many eccentrics, who wrote such strange and undisciplined reports, have worked for DIO. Greg Sheridan is The Australian's foreign editor.

Caption: Timor terror: Clockwise from top, smoke rises from burnt-out shops in Dili, East Timor, in 1999; Indonesian soldiers at Dili airport; prime minister Paul Keating with Indonesian president Suharto; and members of the pro-Jakarta militia Illus: Photo