Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958–1960, Indonesia, Volume XVII

206. Letter From the Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Robertson) to the Permanent Representative to the North Atlantic Council (Burgess)⁰

Washington, June 12, 1959.

Dear Randy: I appreciate the thoughts which you have set forth in your letter of May 18, 1959 on our Indonesian arms program and its effect on our relations with the Netherlands and on the NATO Alliance.¹ We have, as you know, thoroughly reviewed a number of these points during our discussions here in April, and I shall not comment again on all of them in detail at this time. As for responding to your points concerning the Dutch contribution to NATO and the psychological effects on the Alliance, I shall defer to EUR. I would, however, like to offer a few selected views, some of which I have voiced before but which bear repeating.

Concerning the current Dutch concern over increased Western arms sales to Indonesia, recent reports from Paris and other European posts indeed indicate a pick-up in such sales. I do not, however, regard this as an unfavorable development as far as our policy toward Indonesia and the achievement of free world objectives in that country are concerned. While these sales are perhaps substantially the result of commercial pressures, they may also in part reflect a growing confidence in Indonesia’s future on the part of these suppliers. I believe this is particularly true in the case of the United Kingdom. The participation of Western countries as suppliers to Indonesia in effect tends to broaden the base of free world influence there, which is much to be desired from our point of view. [2-1/2 lines of source text not declassified]

At no time during the discussions here over the past several months did we envisage that other free world countries would not furnish some arms to Indonesia. You will recall, I am sure, that the “sole supplier” concept (the United States alone or in concert with one or more other countries) of arms deliveries to Indonesia was firmly rejected by the Department. I might add that some of these countries which have recently announced their intention of furnishing arms to Indonesia are historical suppliers of Indonesia’s military requirements over the past several years.

I do not believe that the present flurry of Western arms sales to Indonesia can be considered unrestrained [2 lines of source text not declassified]. Furthermore, the weak Indonesian foreign exchange position is, I believe, a built-in restraint against promiscuous purchasing from Western sources.

But more important—and I cannot make this point more forcefully—a denial of Western sources of military equipment for Indonesia will lead to Indonesia’s turning completely to the bloc for these requirements. Since the beginning of 1958, Indonesia has purchased about $250 million of foreign arms, about three-quarters of which are coming from the bloc. Given this current imbalance and the possibility of continued Indonesian purchases from the bloc, I do not believe that we can reasonably say that continued moderate Western arms shipments will do much to tip the scales in favor of an Indonesian military action against West New Guinea. Military shipments by the United States and other free world countries to Indonesia have afforded the free world a foot-hold in Indonesia through which we have been able to exercise a considerable deterrent to any Indonesian aggressive action against West New Guinea. The removal of this free world foothold would weaken the deterrent and could easily open the way for a Communist-inspired drive against that island.

As for your suggestions on ways to reduce the dangers in this situation, I would offer the following views:

1) FE has posed no objection to Dutch purchases of United States military equipment at “surplus” prices provided in any such transaction it is not stated that such equipment is for use in West New Guinea. I do, however, continue to have serious reservations about the desirability (and the real necessity) of a large influx of United States arms into West New Guinea and the real possibility that this could undermine our accomplishments to date in Indonesia and create further tensions between the Indonesians and the Dutch which could readily lead to the precise incident which the Dutch fear.

2) As you know, our present military program to Indonesia is on a “limited and continuing” basis contingent on future developments in Indonesia. However, in the event of some markedly favorable change in Indonesia in the coming months (or even years), I would not rule out the possibility that we might wish to consider a substantial increase in the present limited level of our assistance. As for what are and are not “offensive” weapons, I am sure you are aware of the difficulty in trying to arrive at an acceptable definition of this term. There comes to mind the recent Danish decision to furnish 5,000 machine guns to Indonesia to which the Dutch offered no objection. In the view of some “military experts” machine guns might be considered considerably more “offensive”—as regards possible use in West New Guinea—than, for example, a World War II subchaser which the Dutch apparently consider in the “offensive” category.

3) Finally, I would not agree with you that we have not been adequately forthcoming in dealing with the Dutch. We have informed them in advance of our government-to-government sales and of the more significant export licenses issued. This is, of course, primarily Livie Merchant’s concern, but I cannot help but feel that in our sometimes precipitous and “bits and pieces” notifications to the Dutch, we have perhaps inadvertently tended to play up our arms deliveries to Indonesia out of all proportion to their significance, which has only led to increasing Dutch concern. Advance notification to the Dutch on the issuance of all export licenses would, I am afraid, only worsen this situation. For your information, over the past year we issued approximately 140 export licenses for shipments of Munitions List items to Indonesia—everything from a few dollars worth of aircraft parts to the ten C–130B’s. We have, in fact, issued hundreds of such licenses for Indonesia since 1950. Advance notification to the Dutch, in addition to the problem of overemphasis cited above, would be a highly impractical operation. I also have my doubts whether such detailed involvement of another country in the United States Government’s licensing operation would be desirable or appropriate.

I have tried to address myself frankly to the above problems and offer you my honest views on them. I am convinced that our present policy toward Indonesia is the correct one and the one most likely to lead to a realization of our objectives there. Progress over the past year has been heartening and there is a good prospect of additional gains although we cannot expect miracles overnight. Progress in countries such as Indonesia is better measured over a period of years or even decades rather than weeks or months. At the same time I wish to assure you that we in FE are most cognizant of the difficulties in NATO over this question of arms deliveries to Indonesia and I hope that we will continue to have the benefit of your helpful counsel in this matter.

I am sending copies of this letter to Foy Kohler.

Sincerely yours,

Walter S. Robertson

²

0. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 756D.56/5–1859. Secret. Drafted by Wenzel on June 2 and cleared by Mein and Parsons.
1. Document 200.
2. Printed from a copy that bears this typed signature.