24 September 1999
Transcript: Special Defense Department Briefing on East Timor
(Order restored in Dili, peacekeeping effort underway) (3230)
The multinational peacekeeping force for East Timor led by Australia
has restored "a measure of order" in the capital city of Dili and has
started to provide humanitarian assistance to displaced Timorese,
according to the Commander-in-Chief of U.S. Pacific forces (CINCPAC).
In a special Defense Department briefing at the Pentagon September 24,
Admiral Dennis Blair said: "We are not leading the effort; we are
supporting it."
"This is exactly right thing to do," he added, "when you have an ally
like Australia that's close to the situation."
Blair said the United States has sent a team of experts trained to
work with non-governmental relief organizations to set up a Civil
Military Operations Center in Darwin, Australia which will coordinate
relief efforts between the peacekeeping force and the relief
organizations.
Asked whether the United States will move any other combatant troops
to the area, Blair reiterated the Administration's view that the
United States will provide additional forces upon request by Australia
only in the area of communication, transportation, and logistics.
The exit strategy for the peacekeeping force, Blair said, "is
completing the military tasks which primarily revolve around resolving
the initial situation, establishing a secure environment, and then
having a UN operation, UNAMET ... take over the really important
nation-building tasks ...."
Blair said that because the peacekeeping operation has been conducted
in a generally cooperative manner by the peacekeeping force and the
Indonesian armed forces, individual confrontations have been kept to a
minimum.
Blair said the peacekeeping operation in East Timor be a factor
affecting the overall stability of Indonesia, but not a determinative
one. "East Timor is not Indonesia," he said. "There are lots of
problems that (Indonesia) has to address throughout its 212 million
people and 17,000 islands and East Timor is one piece but not the
whole piece."
He rejected the idea that "Indonesia could fragment like Yugoslavia,"
saying: "The nationalist tradition in Indonesia is pretty strong. They
think of themselves as a people. That's the policy of our government,
is that that is one country. So I think that's how it's going to
continue."
Following is the Department of Defense transcript:
(begin transcript)
OFFICE OF THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
(PUBLIC AFFAIRS)
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20301
DoD News Briefing
Admiral Dennis Blair, Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command
Friday, September 24, 1999 - 12:25 p.m.
DOD SPOKESMAN KENNETH BACON: Good afternoon. I'm sorry we're a little
late.
We have two briefings. First, Admiral Dennis Blair who is the
Commander in Chief of our Pacific Forces is going to talk about East
Timor. He has to leave precisely at 12:45. Then he'll be followed by a
Senior Defense Official who will brief on background about the
Secretary's upcoming trip to the region.
Admiral Blair is here for the CINCs Conference, the Commander in
Chiefs' Conference, and he's agreed to spend 20 minutes with us here.
Just let me say that at the CINCs Conference this morning Secretary
Cohen gave a surprise citation, the Defense Distinguished Service
Medal to General Clark for the good work in OPERATION ALLIED FORCE. We
will have a picture and a copy of the citation soon, in the next hour
or so.
Admiral Blair?
ADMIRAL BLAIR: Good morning.
The operation in East Timor is going well in my estimate. The
Australians are doing a superb job in leading the effort. They moved
in very quickly after the UN Resolution. The day before they moved in
there was an agreement with the local Indonesian armed forces, the
TNI, as to how that turnover would be conducted. Since then the TNI on
scene has been carrying out their part of the agreement.
For our part, the U.S. armed forces, the Pacific Command are proud to
support our Australian allies and all the other nations that are
participating in this endeavor. The most important of them are the
Thais, New Zealanders, the
Singaporeans the Republic of the Philippines, the Malaysians, and
there is a list of others.
What we in the United States armed forces are contributing is what we
do uniquely and what is important to the overall operation. There's
not a big footprint of U.S. personnel on the ground. The flow so far
has been about right from my point of view. We've been sending units
and individuals to integrate into the force as the Australians request
them.
As of today we have in the mid-200 of folks down there; most of them
in Darwin, a handful of them in Dili. I anticipate that more of them
will be moving into northern Australia and into East Timor with the
follow-on multinational forces as the mission expands.
We'll provide these additional forces as we receive, understand, work
the multinational force requirements as given to us by the lead
country, Australia, and of course we'll be announcing those forces as
the decisions are made and as the forces are deployed.
As far as the success of INTERFET itself, it has restored a measure of
order in Dili, although the job is not yet complete. Its job of
establishing a secure environment takes time and it's working on it.
The trend is positive. And it's moving quickly into the next important
step, which is providing humanitarian assistance to the many refugees
and displaced persons in the East Timor area.
In that regard we have sent a team of experts who are experienced in
working with non-governmental relief organizations to set up what's
called a Civil/Military Operations Center, a CMOC, in Darwin. This
will build that close working relationship between the INTERFET force
and the relief organizations. The lead elements of that arrived today
and they'll be setting up within the next day or two.
So from my point of view this has been a solid operation and unique.
We are not leading the effort. We are supporting it in the ways that
we can do and cooperating with others as they each make their own
unique contributions. I think this is exactly the right thing to do
when you have an ally like Australia that's close to the situation,
that has a strong interest in seeing it solved, has the people and the
planning ability to take the lead, for the other nations in the region
and those of us from outside the region who have an interest like the
United States, to do the kind of mission that's involved there in East
Timor.
That's a quick look from my point of view and I'd be glad to answer
questions about it.
Q: Is the Civil/Military Operations Center, are the Americans going to
move into East Timor, or is this to teach the Aussies and the others
how to deal with civilian organizations?
BLAIR: No. This will be a part of INTERFET. It will be set up by
American forces because the Australians asked us to do it and we have
the people who have the experience and training to do it. It starts
out in Darwin because that's where the relief organizations are
organizing their headquarters. That's where most of the humanitarian
supplies are right now. Whether it moves forward into Dili or stays in
Darwin will be General Cosgrove's decision.
Q: How many people will that be?
BLAIR: There are about 20 Americans there. And usually the way it's
set up is each of the main relief organizations will have a
workstation in that same center. Maybe they have one person there,
maybe they have two. It's this center that compiles common databases,
hosts the meeting, calls the plays -- World Food Program, you'll do
this; INTERFET, you'll do that. We've found over the years that this
sort of a center really helps us to get the military and the civilian
effort going along well.
Q: You talked about the possibility of additional U.S. forces going.
What type of forces are you talking about and do you have any
estimates of how many might go and when?
BLAIR: I don't have an estimate of how many and when, but the types of
forces are the ones that you've heard announced by the President and
others. It's planning support, which we've had in there for a long
time and is continuing. It's communications expertise to both planners
and I anticipate that we'll be providing some of the gear. It's lift,
strategic lift. We have airplanes; we have C-130s that are part of the
air bridge right now as well as strategic lift, which are bringing
forces like our own CMOC into place. It's other logistics planning
support. And of course we have a maritime, we have a couple of ships
down there as well. So it's this sort of support that we anticipate
providing. That's what we can do that others can't do as well, and
that's what really adds to the team effort.
Q: Do you anticipate that we're going to have to deploy some force
protection troops if the U.S. footprint grows enough on the ground in
East Timor?
BLAIR: We'll have to see. Right now the Australians have the
responsibility for that headquarters and their units. They've got the
force protection responsibility, and we just have to evaluate as we go
along.
I anticipate that the Australians will certainly keep the lead for
force protection, and I anticipate that our forces will be within that
umbrella.
Q: Admiral, partly on force protection and partly on the question of
combatants even though nobody's talking about combatants here. Do you
have any plans to move the 31st MEU closer to East Timor after
OPERATION CROCODILE or even before? Or any other combatant troops into
the area?
BLAIR: I'm not going to talk about moving forces in the future. We'll
be responding to the requests as they come up.
Q: Could you tell us what benefit you think the U.S. military got out
of the military-to-military contacts in reference to this crisis? What
were you able to do with Indonesia that you wouldn't have been able to
do otherwise?
Admiral Blair: Well, we were able to talk to people in a common
language and use terms that we all understood based on our contact in
the past, so I think it was useful.
That gets into this whole question, which has been a lively one
lately, which is U.S. military engagement with various countries. I
think what you have to understand about TNI is that there's a long
history here coming from the Suharto years to the departure of
President Suharto here a couple of years ago.
The TNI operated at the time of the President's departure in a very
good fashion, saying that it was supporting the constitution not an
individual. Then there was an election in which the TNI as it was then
called provided the security for what was seen as, what was in fact
judged as a very free and fair election throughout the country. The
TNI separated itself from the police, which is an essential step in
the professionalization of an armed forces.
Then in East Timor in particular the record was much more mixed, and
frankly, there were some pretty bad chapters of it. In the lead-up to
the referendum order was barely maintained, and then after the
referendum there was a bad breakdown of order with some elements of
TNI contributing to it and not helping it.
Accountability for the TNI, there have been unprecedented
investigations into things that have happened in the past, although
some of them are not, have not been as thorough and as far-reaching as
many think.
So when you look across the spectrum of what TNI has done it's a mixed
picture.
Our involvement with it has been also mixed. There were officers
coming to train, coming to be educated in the United States before
1992, and it's many of those officers who did have training and
education in the United States who are leading a very strong reform
movement within TNI.
It was interesting, I was talking with an Indonesian general the other
day, about two or three weeks ago there was a meeting of all
Indonesian military flag and general officers and they handed out a
questionnaire: "Do you think that TNI needs a, no change; b, some
change; c, radical change?" Ten percent thought it needed no change;
65 percent thought it needed major change; and 15 percent thought it
needed radical change.
So there is a feeling in the Indonesian armed forces that they need to
form a new, more professional outfit. Our engagement is designed to
encourage those tendencies within TNI and while not encouraging and in
fact punishing those who are acting badly.
Right now we have the contacts suspended, as you know, and it's really
up to the Indonesian armed forces, in fact the leadership of
Indonesia, to get back on the right track so that we can continue a
good relationship.
So that's the sort of mixed picture that we're working. It's really
not a black or white one. It's one you have to work. But I don't see
how we can work it, from our point of view, unless we have tools and
unless we keep in contact over the long term.
Q: What about your involvement with General Wiranto? You went to meet
with him on several occasions. You've called him on the phone. There's
a story that's been written for The Nation that says that those
contacts publicly were described as being very forceful and urging the
TNI and others to restrain the violence in East Timor. But the piece
for The Nation says that in private the message was much softer.
Q: What actually happened, sir?
BLAIR: My interactions with the Indonesian armed forces across the
board and in fact with the other Indonesian leadership has been very
consistent. On the one hand, if the Indonesian armed forces continue
on a professional path, the good things that they've done are
continued and reinforced and we can have a productive
military-to-military relationship in which we can work with the
Indonesians towards the sort of armed forces that I think 75 percent
of the general officers that I talked about want, and it can be part
of a productive overall U.S./Indonesian relationship -- economic,
cultural and military. If they act badly as certain elements within
the TNI have certainly done, and if that is sustained and if that's
the way the TNI is going to conduct itself, then we won't, we can't,
and it will not only be the military-to-military relationship but it
will be the entire relationship between our two countries, and
Indonesia will end up in an isolated international position which is
not good for Indonesia.
That's been the message that I've carried publicly, privately. I'm not
going to characterize what was said between two people in a room, but
that's been the story that I've carried and that's really our overall
policy of which we're...
Q: Can I follow up? Could you at least tell us whether his response
was, General Wiranto, was one of denial? Did he say they lost
control...
BLAIR: I'm not going to characterize a private conversation.
Q: Are you confident that the peacekeeping force has a clear strategy
for what it hopes to achieve in East Timor, and an exit strategy?
BLAIR: I think it has a clear strategy for what it needs to achieve,
and I'd say the exit strategy, as in most of these operations, is
completing the military tasks which primarily revolve around resolving
the initial situation, establishing a secure environment, and then
having a UN operation, UNAMET Phase 3, Phase 2, the numbers are
changing around, take over the really important nation-building tasks
when the MPR gives the formal sanction to the results. So I think it's
got to be that sort of a transition that we've seen in other places in
which civil order has really fallen apart.
Q: ...Prime Minister is saying that this could go on for years. That
our commitment to East Timor could. They haven't actually put a
timeframe on it.
Admiral Blair: That's outside my area to comment on, but I think civil
order can be, I think a secure environment and order can be restored
much quicker that years and will have to be in fact.
Q: ...what you think the level of involvement of the Indonesian
military was in the violence? Whether it was something that came from
the top down, whether it was rogue units? How exactly was the military
involved?
BLAIR: I think the evidence on the ground was clearly that Indonesian
units who were in East Timor were both aiding the militias and taking
part in bad actions themselves. I think that's what we have to deal
with. We expect military forces to be under the control of military
leadership. So the TNI has to deal with the behavior of their troops
in East Dili. I'm not going to go into theories about whether it's,
who it is or what it is.
Q: Can you say whether you believe that they were out of the control
of the leadership?
BLAIR: I'm not going to say.
Q: A follow-up on that. There was confrontation I think two days ago
between Australian troops and the TNI people in, I believe it was in
Dili. These people that are in Dili, the TNI people, are they under
the control of the element that you would call not well disposed? Or
can you say?
And secondly, can you say what about, what does all this have to do,
bear on the stability of the government generally speaking?
BLAIR: You really don't want to get, look at one individual action in
East Timor. I'd say over the period of the week or so that that force
has been deployed it seems to me that the INTERFET forces have been
establishing a logical, secure area and expanding it. And that the TNI
by and large has been cooperating as their leader, General Syahnakri
said. So individual actions I don't think have upset that.
As far as East Timor's affect on the overall stability of Indonesia, I
think that it is a factor but not a determinative one. East Timor is
not Indonesia.
As you know, there are lots of problems that that country has to
address throughout its 212 million people and 17,000 islands and East
Timor is one piece but not the whole piece.
Q: Admiral, following up on that, are you worried that, some pundits
here in the States have been saying that Indonesia could fragment like
Yugoslavia. Long range are you worried about that?
BLAIR: The nationalist tradition in Indonesia is pretty strong. They
think of themselves as a people. That's the policy of our government,
is that that is one country. So I think that's how it's going to
continue.
Q: Admiral Blair, since the United States does have special
responsibilities for intelligence, can you give us an idea of how long
you think it will be before the militias themselves are under control?
That seems to be the source of most of the violence right now.
BLAIR: That's right. I think it will be within weeks.
Q: Within weeks?
BLAIR: Yes.
PRESS: Thank you very much.
(end transcript)
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