Paying the price: East Timorese refugees flee the violence
Sentimentally, of course, Western leaders would like nothing more than to act decisively to end the pogrom in East Timor but sentiment seldom trumps geopolitics in the affairs of state, and geopolitics is a cynical business. Back in December 1975, the U.S. gave Indonesia a nod and a wink to proceed with its invasion of the tiny country, whose Portuguese colonial administration had collapsed. In fact, President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger had been in Jakarta the day before Indonesian troops went in. With South Vietnam having collapsed only eight months earlier, Washington wasn't about to see another Asian domino fall to the communists. The murder and mayhem wrought by the Indonesian forces may have been distasteful, but Indonesia had been the anchor of Western interests in Asia. So East Timor had to wait for the end of the Cold War and then some before democracy could be allowed to take its course.
Newsfile: East Timor