SOUTHEAST ASIA AND THE U

Southeast Asia And The U.S. War On Terrorism

Sheldon W. Simon
Political Science Department
Arizona State University
shells@asu.edu

Introduction

Southeast Asia's political and economic variety covers the gamut from powerful and effective governments (Singapore) to the early stages of state-building, national identity and cohesiveness (East Timor, Laos, and Cambodia) and points in between where political pluralism is still fragile (the Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia). Although Southeast Asia's ten members-an 11^th, East Timor, is temporarily under a UN protectorate-form the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), this organization has been of limited utility in recent regional crises such as the 1999 secession of East Timor from Indonesia and the 1997-98 regional financial crisis, and the current U.S. war on terrorism in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

Southeast Asian states have displayed a range of reactions to U.S. President George W. Bush's call for international support for the war on terrorism. Enthusiastic endorsement characterized the Philippine response as well as more quiet backing from Singapore. Thailand's support was slower and more tentative. Both Indonesia and Malaysia, while deploring the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, tempered their sympathy with warnings that the U.S. not target Islam generally. Most of these reactions can be explained by the domestic politics of each state and the Muslim proportions of their respective populations.

While the Southeast Asian states declared their sympathy for the United States in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, their willingness to become a part of the U.S.-initiated global war on terrorism varied. The strongest response came from Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who fully backed the U.S. with the offer of Philippine air bases and troops. She also accepted U.S. advisors to assist the Philippine military in its hunt for the Abu Sayyaf kidnapper terrorists on the southern Philippine island of Basilan. President Macapagal-Arroyo undoubtedly hoped that her enthusiastic support would lead to substantial new U.S. military and economic aid. She has not been disappointed.

At the other extreme are Indonesia and Malaysia, both with predominantly Muslim populations. Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri, on a visit to the U.S. one week after the atrocities, denounced the attacks in the strongest possible terms. Back home, however, she tempered her remarks by warning that the U.S. war on terrorism did not give one country the right to attack another. The Indonesian president was repositioning herself to take account of the strong Muslim parties in Parliament and more general Islamic opposition to the U.S. attacks on Afghanistan.

In late August 2001, before the terrorist attacks on the United States, the heads of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Singapore held a series of meetings on how to deal with Islamic extremists. Of particular concern is the large number of Malaysian, Indonesian, and Filipino Muslim students who have been going to overseas Islamic religious schools where they come under the influence of hard line Islamic teachers. The attacks on the U.S. have accelerated efforts by the ASEAN members listed above to reduce the number of young men going abroad for religious study as well as to share intelligence on the activities of Islamist in their countries. These efforts are being undertaken independently of the U.S. backed global coalition so that Malaysia and Indonesia can participate without appearing to be under a U.S. umbrella.

While ASEAN leaders in Brunei signed a declaration on joint action to counter terrorism at the seventh summit in early November 2001, the declaration calls for little more than the exchange of information on terrorist activities. No operational coordination to seek out and hunt down terrorists operating cross-nationally was discussed, revealing once again ASEAN's limitations as a security mechanism.[1]

The Current Situation

As the war on Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan moves to a "mopping up" stage, the United States has turned its attention to terrorist activities in other parts of the world, determined in part by captured documents and video tapes found in Al Qaeda residences in Afghanistan. Southeast Asia has been a prominent location. Within Southeast Asia, the United States is concentrating' its military efforts in the southern Philippines with the dispatch of 660 military advisors to Mindanao to assist Philippine forces in the defeat of the Abu Sayyaf. In other Southeast Asian states, Washington has focused on intelligence exchange and the apprehension of suspected Islamic radicals who have targeted Americans and U.S. institutions in their countries. Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore are the most prominent. Cooperation from these countries has varied; and there is considerable sensitivity, particularly in Indonesia and Malaysia, that overt assistance for the U.S. war on terrorism can be used by Islamic groups and political parties to undermine the governments in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur.

The remainder of this paper will examine some of the characteristics of radical Islam in Southeast Asia, the goals and difficulties of U.S. involvement in the southern Philippines, and prospects for multilateral cooperation in dealing with terrorism.

Islamic Radicalism in Southeast Asia

Underlying any discussion of Islamic radicalism in Southeast Asia is the fact that in the two predominantly Islamic countries--Indonesia and Malaysia-Islam has been essentially moderate and tolerant; and governmental leaders fit the same category. The bedrock of Islam in Indonesia consists of a pair of moderate broadly based organizations, Muhammadiyah and Nahdlatul Ulama, which claim memberships that total one-fourth of the population. They advocate the maintenance of a clear boundary between politics and religion and in early November 2001 discussed the development of a joint strategy to counter small militant religious groups. One of its leaders, the rector of the Syarif Hidayatullah State Institute of Islamic Studies, stated that demonstrations by radicals against the U.S. and its Western allies tarnished the image of Islam in Indonesia as a tolerant and moderate religion that emphasized peace and harmony.

Since Sept. 11, U.S. media reported that Malaysia was one of the countries the FBI asked to hand over suspected terrorists. Prime Minister Mahathir responded by saying, according The New Straits Times, that although extremist groups exist in Malaysia, they "are directing their attacks at us, and we can take care of them. They are not attacking the United States." Mahathir is also concerned that the U.S. war in Afghanistan could destabilize the Islamic world and, by implication, make it harder for moderates such as himself to rule. To the contrary, however, the fundamentalism of PAS, Malaysia's primary opposition party, has fragmented the other members of the opposition coalition leading to its virtual disintegration and thus strengthening the ruling Barisan Nasional. More moderate Malays, who had been attracted to the opposition coalition, have become alienated by PAS's vitriolic anti-U.S. rhetoric and demonstrations in front of the U.S. Embassy.

Malaysia has also protested, as has Indonesia, against the U.S. State Department's November 2001 decision to place more stringent visa application procedures on Muslim men from Malaysia and 24 other countries, though the Malaysian press noted Secretary of State Colin Powell's statement that the new restrictions would be temporary. Even the head of Malaysia's opposition Chinese party, the Democratic Action Party, warned that the new visa restrictions would only strengthen the impression that the U.S. is waging war on Islam.

As for ASEAN, Mahathir opposed any resolution backing U.S. military action and argued that the group should only endorse a UN General Assembly resolution condemning terrorism. At its early November 2001 leaders' meeting, however, ASEAN rejected Mahathir's attempt to go on record against U.S. actions in Afghanistan and instead issued a statement condemning terrorism and the attacks on the U.S. as "an attack against humanity and an assault on all of us."[2]

Within Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines, radical Islamic groups exist. Their strength varies from country to country; and their ability to extend their operations beyond Southeast Asia, much less into the United States, is minimal. That said, however, a number of these groups such as the Indonesian Islamic Defenders Front (IDF) have threatened U.S. installations and Westerners in Indonesia. The IDF and the militant Laskar Jihad, which has fought Christian Indonesians in the Moluccas, may have received some financial support from Osama bin Laden, though both groups deny links to Al Qaeda.[3] Indeed, while these groups "talk the talk" of jihad, their activities are more akin to local terrorizing. The IDF ran protection rackets in Jakarta, while Laskar Jihad has directed its militance entirely against the Christians of eastern Indonesia.

Similarly, the 15 suspected terrorists arrested in Singapore in January 2002 were said to be part of a clandestine organization, Jemaah Islamiya. This group and a Malaysian counterpart, KMM, had individual members who were trained in Afghanistan, but as yet no institutional linkage to AI Qaeda have been established.[4] And, in the Philippines (discussed in more detail below) while there may have been some contacts with Al Qaeda in the mid-1990s, the Abu Sayyaf is viewed by most knowledgeable observers to be little more than a group of bandits and thugs who murder and kidnap for ransom.

In much of Southeast Asia, most Islamic activism is associated with local issues, particularly separatism: the Achenese in Indonesia and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the Philippines. When the Philippine, Indonesian, and Malaysian governments express support however limited-for U.S. initiatives, there is frequently a quid pro quo. That is, the U.S. must include each country's particular national terrorist challenge under the U.S. rubric of global terrorism.[5] Thus, for example, Malaysia's Mahathir can paint PAS with a terrorist brush for his own domestic political reasons in exchange for not having to worry about American human rights sensibilities.

Nonetheless, AI Qaeda members have moved in and out of Indonesia regularly over the past decade and have purveyed millions of dollars to radical Islamic groups there. Moreover, militants in Indonesia are found in both the police and military. To make matters worse, unlike Singapore and Malaysia, where the authorities are searching out and disrupting terrorist cells, Indonesia has chosen to deport rather than incarcerate suspects and has also declined to look for bank accounts linked to terror groups.[6] When, in December 2001, the director of Indonesia's intelligence agency announced that Al Qaeda had set up terrorist training camps in the country in an effort to persuade the government to become more active in the war on terrorism, several Islamic organizations denounced him; and the government backed off, probably fearing a nationwide backlash.[7] Still, the United States continues to invite Indonesia's participation in an anti-terrorist coalition, offering to provide helicopters and communications gear.

Even when fellow ASEAN members Singapore and Malaysia asked Indonesia to detain Abu Bakir Baasyir, an Indonesian cleric allegedly linked to the Jemaah Islamiah that was planning attacks in the island city-state, Jakarta has demurred saying it had no evidence Baasyir had committed any crime.[8] Mr. Baasyir, founder of a radical boys boarding school in Java where many of the 28 arrested Singaporeans and Malaysians had studied, stands apart from the mainstream of moderate Islam in Indonesia. Baasyir's school became a funnel for radical Islam in Java, including Laskar Jihad.[9]

The most surprising terrorist development in Southeast Asia was the discovery of an elaborate Islamist group in Singapore, plotting to bomb Westem embassies and U.S. military personnel on the island. Of the 15 arrested, all but one was Singaporean. Given the city-state's tight internal security, it is remarkable that such a large group had gone undetected for so long, though local officials claimed they had been monitoring the group for some time. Interrogation revealed that although the members of the cell had contacted A1 Qaeda about funding their plan, bin Laden's organization did not follow up. In addition to evidence of the cell's plans in Singapore, information about its plans was found in Afghanistan at the homes and offices of A1 Qaeda operatives who fled. Officials in Malaysia and Singapore agreed that the cells disrupted in their respective countries had been part of a network that included Indonesia and the Philippines.[10]

These Southeast Asian "sleeper "groups had been organized in the early 1990s and were activated after the American bombing of Afghanistan, possibly on orders from Al Qaeda leaders. Several of the Malaysian militants had been trained by A1 Qaeda in Afghanistan, repatriated, and told to avoid contact with Islamic organizations to prevent official suspicions. As one Western diplomat put it in referring to the Southeast Asian network: "These guys were not a rogue group. There was a management hierarchy and a functional breakdown. It was like a KGB cell." Singaporean authorities believe these cells are instruments of Al Qaeda. Others are not so sure, though they acknowledge Al Qaeda contacts with some members of the cells. Malaysia seemed to be the center for Southeast Asian militants because Kuala Lumpur does not require visas for citizens from Muslim countries.[11]

Subsequent investigations and arrests in Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines have reinforced the conclusion that at least two of the Sept. 11 hijackers had met in Malaysia and received cash from a Malaysian cell member. The United States has been negotiating with Malaysia for the extradition of the Malaysian army captain who allegedly served as a paymaster for the Sept. 11 hijackers; but Prime Minister Mahathir publicly rejects the suggestion that his country could have been used as a staging area.[12] While Malaysian authorities have shared the results of their interrogations of arrested militants with the United States, they resist extraditing them.

Indeed, as stated above, Prime Minister Mahathir has used the discovery of terrorist cells in his country to his political advantage. By painting his opposition, PAS, with the brush of radicalism, Mahathir has brought Muslim voters back to his parry, UMNO. Chinese and Indian voters, too, previously alienated by the prime minister's highhanded politics, are returning to the ruling coalition because they fear that PAS is bent on creating a theocracy.

U.S. Operations in the Philippines

In late January2002, the United States began to deploy what is scheduled to become 660 U.S. soldiers, including Special Forces, to the southern Philippines where Muslim resentment against the Christian central government is as old as the Philippine itself. Upon the invitation of President Macapagal-Arroyo, the U.S. contingent is participating in Balikatan 02, a joint training exercise whose predecessors always took place in Luzon or the Visayas out of harm's way. This time, however, the exercise will be carried out at least partly on the island of Basilan where a small militant group, Abu Sayyaf, is holding two Americans and a Filipino hostage. From a professional military perspective, Balikatan 02 offers U.S. anti-terrorist training, particularly in the use of up to-date equipment, including night vision capability and state-of-the-art communications. Small numbers of Americans are to be assigned to Philippine forces as advisors but not as combatants.

President Arroyo's invitation has led to considerable controversy within the Philippine Congress and vocal opposition from the country's political left, though it has elicited support from the country's Catholic Bishops Conference which, in the early 1990s, had been strongly opposed to an American military presence in the Philippines. The Philippine President has calculated that the political fallout is more than compensated by U.S. military and economic aid, which will improve the capacity of the armed forces to combat insurgencies and pump resources into the economy to boost recovery from the economic slowdown.[13]

From the American perspective, the deployment of U.S. forces to the Philippines, albeit under the guise of a training exercise, constitutes the next location for the U.S. war on terrorism after Afghanistan. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz stated that the destruction of the Abu Sayyaf "would be a small blow against the Al Qaeda network," though he went to emphasize that military action would be carried out by Philippine troops.[14] The exercise is scheduled to last until June 2002 with the possibility of an extension until the end of the year. Its American commander is Brig. Gen. Donald Wurster, the head of Special Operations in the Pacific, an indicator of how important Washington sees this deployment.

In fact, Abu Sayyafs current connection to Al Qaeda is problematic. While Abu Sayyaf was formed in the early 1990s and in its early days, proclaimed religious fervor, it has become a criminal gang engaged in murder and kidnapping for ransom, striking not only in the Philippines but also in Malaysia. The group's focus is the southern Philippines; it possesses neither the intention nor the capability to strike the United States. Although it may have had some early contacts with Al Qaeda operatives in the mid-1990s, there is no evidence that these have continued, especially since Abu Sayyaf now funds itself through kidnappings, which have raised in excess of $20 million. Rather than an Al Qaeda clone, Abu Sayyaf is more in the tradition of southern Philippine pirates.[15]

The main issues in the joint exercise, which in many respects is a search and rescue operation, are who commands the U.S. participants and what are their rules of engagement? The understanding appears to be that the Americans serve only as advisors, do not engage in combat, but can defend themselves if attacked. How all this plays out in the fog of battle, however is an open question. As for who commands, U.S. law and practice require that U.S. officers command American forces. However, the Philippine constitution prohibits the operation of foreign combat forces on Philippine soil-a major reason for the U.S. deployment being called a training exercise. Discussions between the two countries' defense and foreign policy leaders apparently led to an understanding that Philippine officers had "authority" over the forces they lead including U.S. advisors; but U.S. officers retained "command." (One wonders if this is a distinction without a difference!)

There are other risks for the U.S. forces in Zamboanga and Basilan. One is that the search for Abu Sayyaf not be confused with the MILF, a much larger dissident organization with armed forces which is engaged in negotiations with Manila. Moreover, some former rebels who had fought with the MILF and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), the latter now governing part of Mindanao, have defected again to the rebel side. If Philippine forces with American advisors clash with these groups, the whose basis of the U.S. presence is undenied.[16] Another possibility is that the Abu Sayyaf may try to seize a propaganda advantage from the U.S. presence by recasting the conflict as a fight by foreign Christians against righteous Muslim warriors.[17] An additional disturbing feature is the Philippine army's reputation in Muslim-controlled areas. It has employed some of the same terrorist tactics as its adversary. Since the Abu Sayyaf has no uniforms and can melt back into the civilian population, the parallel with the Vietnam War should be disturbing to U.S. armed forces.[18]

Multilateral Cooperation in the War on Terrorism

Because Southeast Asian radical Islamic terror cells communicate across national boundaries, collaboration among the region's governments is essential for their disruption. Tracking financing and the movements of members, weapons, and other lethal materials require cooperation among national intelligence services. This cooperation can be bilateral or multilateral; the latter is preferable because at least four states have been significantly penetrated-Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Singapore-while a fifth, the southern part of Thailand, may be peripherally involved.

Admiral Dennis Blair, the CINCPAC has called for the widest possible cooperation in the war on terrorism because the challenge "is beyond the resources and authority of any single country and its armed forces."[19] Yet he has also warned that some militaries have exacerbated these problems:

· Unfortunately, some countries send poorly trained and equipped units to the field to fight rebel forces. The result too often is indiscriminate shooting by inexperienced troops and has even included a complete loss of discipline by these units. Some have joined in the very violence they were sent to stop.[20]

Moreover, efforts to deal with regional terrorists on a unilateral basis can exacerbate relations between neighbors. In late January 2002, Indonesia sharply criticized Malaysia for its decision to deport half of the 900,000 registered Indonesian workers in the country-a move justified by Kuala Lumpur as part of a tighter security effort in the wake of Sept. 11. The rift represents growing tension in Southeast Asian relations over attempts by individual countries to handle terrorism by themselves.[21]

Attitudes toward Indonesia have become particularly strained in light of President Megawati Sukarnoputri's inability or unwillingness to detain terrorist suspects wanted by Singapore and Malaysia. Moreover, in July 2001, Indonesian authorities discovered Al Qaeda members who were planning to attack the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta. Instead of arresting them, however, the terrorists were merely pressured to leave the country.[22]

Nevertheless, some cooperation among the ASEAN states exists. Intelligence exchanges on terrorism take place leading to surveillance of suspected groups; and local coast guards have increased their protective watch over freighters and accompanying U.S. warships through the Strait of Malacca.[23] Most of this cooperation has been bilateral, however, with agreements to strengthen intelligence sharing occurring when heads o€ state visit one another. A positive result from these bilateral understandings occurred in January 2002 when Malaysia sent renegade Muslim leader of the Philippine MNLF, Nur Misuari, back to Manila after he had led a short-lived insurrection in Mindanao. Indonesia has also sent police specialists to the Philippines to assist in the investigation of suspected terrorist Fathur Rohman Al-Ghozi, an Indonesian with links to the militant Jemaah Islamia that was created in Malaysia in the mid-1990s. Its rather grandiose goal was to overthrow the secular governments in the region and establish an Islamic state linking Malaysia, Indonesia, and the southern Philippines. Some linkage to the Al Qaeda network exists, probably financial.[24]

Admiral Blair has emphasized that America's primary role in Asia is to assist countries in rooting out terrorist infrastructure. Along these lines, the Indonesian foreign minister, Hassan Wirayuda reported that the United States offered $10 million to train Indonesian police in anti-terrorist skills, including the control of illegal money transfers and interdiction of contraband.[25] It is unclear whether Indonesia accepted the offer. While Indonesian official talk of regional cooperation against terrorism, in fact, only Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines have actually detained suspects, several of them Indonesians. The U.S. ambassador to Singapore, Frank Lavin, expressed frustration with Indonesia's reticence, eliciting a reply that unlike Singapore and Malaysia, Indonesia cannot detain suspects without evidence. Jakarta's neighbors, however, are increasingly fed up with its political instability and internal security problems because they spill over into their countries.[26]

Conclusion

Southeast Asian terrorist groups are essentially home grown and not part of an international terrorist network, although individual members may have trained with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Some Islamist from Malaysia have gone to participate with Laskar Jihad in Indonesia; but for the most part, these groups are small, poorly armed, and stay at home. Embryonic efforts at intelligence sharing within the region have begun; but they must overcome local nationalism and some suspicions of sharing secrets with neighbors.

[1] For early reactions by Southeast Asian states to the attacks on the United States, see Sheldon W. Simon, "Mixed Reactions in Southeast Asia to the U.S. War on Terrorism," Comparative Connections-An E-Journal on East Asian Bilateral Relations, October-December 2001. For a general strategic overview of the region prior to the Sept. 11 events, see Simon, :Southeast Asia," in Richard Ellings and Aaron Friedberg, eds., Strategic Asia: Power and Purpose 2001-2002 (Seattle: The National Bureau of Asian Research, 2001). Pp.269-297.

[2] Simon, "Mixed Reactions in Southeast Asia..."

[3] Nyer Abdou, "The Asia Connection," Al Ahram Weekly On-Line (Cairo) January 30, 2002. p.2.

[4] Ibid.. pp.3-4.

[5] Satu P. Limaye, "Islam-Asian style," PacNet IA, (Pacific Forum, Honolulu) January 4, 2002.

[6] Raymond Bonner and Jane Perlez, "Qaeda Moving into Indonesia, Officials Fear," The New York Times, January 23, 2002.

[7] Ibid

[8] Ibid

[9] Jane Perlez and James Brooke, "Indonesian in Terror Inquiry Lauds Bin Laden," The New York Times, January 26, 2002.

[10] Seth Mydans, "Suspects in Singapore are Linked to Al Qaeda and Plans for Anti-U. S. Attacks," The New York Times. January 12, 2002. Also see18

[11] Raymond Bonner with Seth Mydans, "Sleeper Cells in Singapore Show Al Qaeda's Long Reach," The New York Times, January 26, 2002.

[12] Philip Shenon and David Johnston, "Suspect Calls Malaysia a Staging Area for Terror Attacks," The New York Times, January 31, 2002; and Raymond Bonner, `Itinerant Malaysian Cleric Suspected of Role as Terror Leader,: Ibid., February 3, 2002.

[13] Philippine Daily Inguirer (Internet Version) February 8, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Retort East Asia, February 11, 2002.

[14] Seth Mydans, "Muslim Separatists Terrorize Filipinos With Kidnappings for Money and `Marriages'," The New York Times, January 13, 2002.

[15] Eric Schmitt, "U.S. and Philippines Setting up Joint Command to Combat Terror," and James Brooke, "Unease Grows in Philippines on U.S. Forces," The New York Times, January 16 and January 19, 2002 respectively

[16] "Philippines: Rebel Presence in Military Endanger U.S. Troops," STRATFOR.COM, January 16, 2002; Philippine Daily Inquirer (Internet Version) February 12, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Rep2rt East Asia, February 13, 2002; and The Manila Times. (Internet Version) January 17, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Report East Asia, January 18, 2002.

[17] The Washington Post, February 7, 2002

[18] Jane Perlez, "Philippine Troops Eagerly Awaiting U.S. Gear," and Nicholas Kristof, "Sleeping with Terrorists," The New York Times. February 12, 2002.

[19] Speech by Admiral Dennis Blair, CINCPAC, to the Asia-Pacific Parliamentary Forum, Honolulu, January 8, 2002.

[20] Ibid.

[21] "Anti-Terrorism War Causing Southeast Asian Discord," STRATFOR.COM, January 29, 2002.

[22] Ibid., p.3.

[23] Mohammad Jawar Hassan, "Terrorism: Southeast Asia's Response," PacNet 1, January 4, 2002 (Pacific Forum, Honolulu); for an Indonesian expression of support for regional cooperation against terrorism, see Komp s (Jakarta) (Internet Version) January 9, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Repqrt East Asia, January 10, 2002.

[24] The Manila Times (Internet Version) January 29, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Report-East Asia, January 30, 2002; and "New Terrorist Group with Links to Sept. 11 Uncovered," Washington Post, February 3, 2002.

[25] Eric Schmitt, "Hurdle Leapt, U.S. Will Help Philippine Battle Rebels," The New York Times January 30, 2002; and Media Indonesia (Jakarta) (Internet Version) January 29, 2002, in FBIS, Daily_ Report East Asia, January 30, 2002.

[26] The Jakarta Post, February 5, 2002, in FBIS, Daily Report East Asia, February 6, 2002; and "Isolated Indonesia Eyes Australia for Support," STRATFOR.COM, February 11, 2002.