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U.S. Imperialist Foreign Policy

Modern Communism continues its examination of U.S. imperialist activities around the world since the Second World War.

Indonesia

In 1950 Indonesia became an independent republic, after defeating the Dutch colonial power. By the mid-1960s it was the fifth most populous country in the world, a country with vast natural wealth, including mineral deposits, natural gas, fisheries, timber and oil.

The nationalist Sukarno government, wary of neo-colonial overtures from both the Dutch, and ever increasingly, the Americans and the Japanese, was cool to foreign investment, attempting instead to build internal capacity. At the same time, Indonesia had the world's third largest Communist Party, with three million members. Communists, who had played an extremely important role in the national liberation struggle, held leading positions in the trade unions, youth and student organizations and other mass movements. Indeed, Sukarno needed the support of the communists to continue to govern.

Outside the Communist Party, the most cohesive political force in the country was the armed forces. In the early 1960s, under an aid program Sukarno entered into with the United States, over 4,000 army officers received training from American military forces in South Asia. This would prove to be Sukarno's undoing, as it provided the basis for a highly organized military force with direct ties and allegiances to the United States. This influence was vital to the U.S., as it was in the process of escalating its involvement in the Vietnam war, and was lining up as many allies as possible in South East Asia.

In the early hours of October 1, 1965, an abortive coup against Sukarno took place. Without any evidence, the army claimed it was an attempt by the communists to seize power, and the army, led by General Suharto, effectively took control of the country. Sukarno remained as a figurehead leader, but with no real power, until 1967. Suharto, who sought advice from high-ranking American military officials, immediately began a purge of communists and sympathisers. This resulted, by conservative estimates, in at least 500,000 deaths, while others calculated that as many as one million communists were murdered. Meanwhile, under the banner of increasing foreign investment (almost entirely Japanese and American), Suharto outlawed all trade union and peasant organisations. In the five years immediately following the coup, Suharto received hundreds of millions of dollars worth of military aid from the United States, making his regime one of the largest military powers in the region.

American involvement and support for the bloody Suharto dictatorship also resulted in other horrifying massacres in the region. Following the liberation of East Timor from Portuguese colonial rule in 1975, Suharto's government immediately began eyeing the territory. The day after a visit from U.S. President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Suharto invaded the small nation. In the resulting civil war and brutal occupation an estimated 200,000 Timorese, or one-third of the population, were murdered by a military armed by Washington. Tens of thousands more Timorese were imprisoned and tortured.

Grenada

In 1979, the New Jewel Movement of Maurice Bishop won power in the Caribbean nation of Grenada. Strongly influenced by Cuba and the victory of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, Bishop pledged to build socialism in the Caribbean island. This was seen as a huge threat to American interests in a region where American companies dominated almost every aspect of economic activity. As well, American foreign policy was reeling from a series of defeats in the 1970s - the loss of the war in Vietnam and the crushing defeat in Iran, coupled with the overthrow of the U.S.-backed Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua by the Sandinistas.

The emergence of another challenge to U.S. hegemony in the Caribbean, right in their own backyard, was too much for the Americans. From the first days of Bishop's rule, the CIA became involved in financing and training opposition forces. Bishop was assassinated by CIA-backed forces in 1983. The Reagan regime used the instability that followed Bishop's death as a pretext for U.S. military intervention. Claiming they had to protect the approximately 1,000 Americans living in Grenada, 6,000 U.S. troops invaded the tiny island nation. (The Grenadian armed forces numbered only 1,000). After a lengthy period of American military occupation, a right-wing pro-American government was established, under the watchful eyes of U.S. troops.