The workers, peasants, and youth of East Timor are not helpless victims who need a UN protectorate for "three or four years" or for a few months. For decades, they have shown an unbreakable spirit, even when forced to retreat.

They fought for independence from Portugal in the 1970s, defeating pro-Jakarta forces to bring to power a proindependence government in late 1975. They waged a struggle against Indonesian military occupation for the past 24 years through rural guerrilla resistance and mass mobilizations. Most recently the mass sentiment for national self-determination was registered in the landslide vote for independence in the August 30 referendum.

This struggle today has new potential allies among the workers and peasants inside Indonesia who have begun to take action in their own interests. Resistance to the employers and their government by the toilers in city and countryside throughout Indonesia over the past two years has dealt political blows to the military-dominated regime in Jakarta and helped the East Timorese to advance their struggle to a new stage.

The imperialist intervention in East Timor is not only aimed at containing the independence struggle but also at keeping in check the rising struggles of new generations of working-class fighters in Indonesia.

For decades Washington, Wellington, Canberra, and other imperialist governments have dragged working people into their wars, often using a humanitarian and progressive facade. Yet the stark truth is that in 1965–66 in Indonesia and 1975–79 in East Timor these same powers gave the go-ahead, and helped politically cover up, mass slaughters organized by Jakarta's military.

The evolution of events between the August 30 referendum and the deployment of imperialist forces in East Timor points to a similar collusion between Washington, Canberra, and other imperialist powers on one hand, and the Indonesian regime on the other, in carrying out the latest reign of terror against the East Timorese people.

For weeks the big-business press in the United States and elsewhere speculated that Indonesian armed forces chief Gen. Wiranto "had lost control" over some of his forces in East Timor. This was aimed at obfuscating the fact that it was the Indonesian military at the highest level — under the cover of the "militias" — that was organizing the widespread killing of independence backers, burning of houses, and massive expulsions of East Timorese.

At the same time the Clinton administration and other imperialist governments were stating they would not advocate sending a military force into Dili without Jakarta's approval. It served the interests of these imperialist powers to give time to the pro-Jakarta gangs to do their dirty work — dealing blows to the independence movement by physically eliminating thousands of its cadre and terrorizing East Timor's population. At the same time, Canberra, Wellington, and Washington helped prop up those in the independence movement favoring imperialist intervention to "save the day."

After a couple weeks of the rampage that was in effect organized by the imperialist-backed Indonesian military, and once it became clear Jakarta couldn't just do away with the independence movement, the imperialist powers cranked up the pressure to send in troops. Threats of sanctions were issued by Canberra and Washington, while Wellington floated the prospect of unilateral deployment of troops, once it was clear Jakarta would strike some kind of deal with the imperialist powers. At the start of the APEC summit, for example, Clinton implied the Indonesian regime would quickly accede to such demands, which did come about within a couple of days.

Likewise, inside Australia, New Zealand, or the United States, working people have no stake in supporting intervention. We have instead every reason to support both the East Timorese freedom struggle and the fight in Indonesia for land and labor rights.

The same capitalist rulers who are attacking our unions, working and living conditions, and democratic rights have adopted the mask of "peacekeepers" in East Timor and elsewhere. Their aim is to boost their military might and to strengthen their ability to deploy it to advance competing interests, to fatten profits for the handful of already wealthy families that rule each imperialist country.

"What can we do?" many supporters of East Timorese freedom are asking. But who is "we"? The "international community" is a fiction. Armies defend the interests of ruling classes at the head of nation states. The intervention forces will be used to try to create a neocolonial regime dependent particularly on Canberra and Washington.

Imperialist economic and trade sanctions against Indonesia are also part of the arsenal of reactionary intervention. Trade union boycotts and bans aimed at Indonesia serve only to boost the prointervention campaign of the bosses and their governments. So do the calls by the "left" in Australia and elsewhere to send troops. They tie us politically to the exploiters' war chariot, while deepening bourgeois nationalism and anti-Indonesian sentiment that cut across international solidarity with the struggles of working people in Indonesia and East Timor.

First and foremost, supporters of East Timorese freedom need to tell the truth about the real history, role, and goals of imperialism in East Timor — monopoly capitalist interests that are also behind this new military intervention — over decades.

Rather than get behind "our" governments as they seek to line us behind their latest military foray, workers and farmers need to keep our eyes on those who have put nation-time on the agenda in East Timor, and those across Indonesia who are fighting for space to stand up to the bosses, Habibie's regime, and the military.

Let's organize forums, speak-outs, and other protests demanding: No imperialist intervention in East Timor! Withdraw all foreign troops! Open the borders to the refugees! Independence for East Timor now!  
 
 
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