The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World

by Vincent Bevins

The Republic of Indonesia adopted a national slogan—Bhinneka Tunngal Ika, meaning “unity in diversity” in Old Javanese, the language spoken by the largest number of people, most of whom live in the middle of that central island. Pancasila, or Pantja Sila, is itself derived from Sanskrit, which was used in the pre-Islam days across the Nusantara archipelago, when much of the islands were strongly influenced by cultural and religious elements originating on the Indian subcontinent. (“Indonesia” itself simply means “Indies islands,” and is derived, like the name “India,” from the Indus River). It was under Sukarno’s watch that the young country chose to make Bahasa Indonesia the official Indonesian language. A leader of less wisdom might have been inclined to make his native Javanese into the official tongue, but this is a hard language to learn and easily could have been seen as a kind of chauvinistic or even colonial imposition from the strongest island. Instead, Indonesia picked an easy, seemingly neutral language, and most of the country learned it within a generation or two. This was a significant achievement; nearby countries in Southeast Asia still have not established truly national languages.56