the power and influence of the anticommunist Indonesian military, in constant coordination with US officials with Washington, rose steadily in the background. Kennedy’s positive engagement took the form of a “civic action program” (CAP) in Indonesia, which included the covert training of “selected personnel and civilians” and a range of anticommunist activities whose nature, more than fifty years later, is still a classified secret.41 The CAP proved crucial in the creation of a negara dalam negara, a “state within a state,” led by the generals. The process had begun when the military got
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