The country’s largest Muslim organization had a youth wing and an armed wing, the Ansor and Banser. These were acronyms, but the founder of the Banser said that he wanted the word to sound like Panzer, Hitler’s famous tanks. He also said he had been studying Mein Kampf, starting in 1964, in order to learn how to deal with the Communists.18 These groups participated in the killings in Central and East Java. In Aceh, the military press-ganged and threatened suspicious civilians, politically suspect individuals or outcasts, into carrying out the murders. Afterward, they would often down alcohol
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