Events are moving with great speed in East Timor. In the days after their defeat in a referendum on autonomy, pro- Jakarta militias organized by the Indonesian army have used murderous terror to force many East Timorese from their homes.
As devastating as these brutal tactics are for working people, they derive from weakness and desperation. The referendum results threw in the face of Indonesia's rulers their complete failure to gain acquiescence for their "integration" of East Timor. Four out of five voters cast a vote against it. This came after 24 years of occupation and 200,000 dead. And in spite of the superior weaponry and organization of the militias, the residents of Dili and other cities have organized self-defense against the massacres and burnings, along with mass political actions.
Citing the "emergency" and seeming "chaos," the imperialist powers are preparing to send in their troops. Two Australian navy ships carrying 500 soldiers are now in East Timorese waters, and up to 5,000 troops have been placed on alert. The New Zealand rulers have prepared as many as 800 troops to be involved. Other powers are also preparing to intervene.
In citing "emergency and chaos" the imperialists are fundamentally thinking of the independence struggle and its consequences. Working people in East Timor took up arms against Portuguese colonialism in a successful rebellion 25 years ago. Pro-independence forces then emerged victorious from a short-lived civil war.
It was then, in 1975, that Indonesian troops invaded. Behind the Indonesian invasion was the hand of Washington and its allies, including Canberra and Wellington. They feared the independence struggle as much as did Jakarta, and viewed the Indonesian government and military as trustworthy allies. The military won that trust with the massacres of the mid-1960s, which set back the struggles of working people in Indonesia for generations and established the Suharto "New Order" regime.
The alliance of these powers with the Indonesian government continues to this day. But Jakarta - weakened by a formidable economic crisis, the fall of the Suharto regime, and deepening social struggles - can no longer ensure stability in East Timor. That is behind the imperialists' preparation for intervention.
The East Timorese people, who have shown time and time again that they will accept nothing short of genuine independence, are not well served by those who call for imperialist intervention under the United Nations flag or on some other basis. They are not "defenseless."
Calls for economic sanctions against Indonesia itself are also misdirected. They place trust in the imperialist powers, who are the deadly enemy of working peoples' struggles. And sanctions would drive down even further the living standards of workers and farmers in Indonesia, who are waging struggles of their own on many fronts.
Today, supporting the fight for East Timor's independence starts with opposing both occupation by Indonesian forces and intervention by imperialist troops.