In Djakarta, movie theaters were shut down and sirens screamed to herald the event. From one end of Indonesia to the other public-address systems were at the ready, and on Indonesian ships at sea crew members gathered around the radio. At long last President Sukarno was ready to announce his plan for converting Indonesia into a "guided democracy."
Nobody could deny that Indonesia's government needs some kind of rejuvenation. Large chunks of Sumatra. Indonesia's richest island, have been in open revolt. Deprived of much of the revenue from Sumatra's exports (oil, tin and rubber), the central government has been forced...