Chapter 3. The establishment of democratic control over TNI
3.2. The national interests’ dominance within TNI
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article has also created heated debate between TNI and the Ministry of Defense over different issues related to defense policies and military organization issues.73
The main problem in these two areas lies in the deep involvement of active officers in defense bureaucracy and their domination over the making of polices related to military organization affairs. The latter is basically a consequence to the former.
There are various positions with the Ministry of Defense which traditionally have been held by active officers. The Secretary General of the Ministry of Defense is among those top leaderships position that for long belongs to the TNI (three-star general). The Inspector General position also belongs to active military officers (three-star general). In addition, the four Director Generals of the Ministry of Defense have always been held by military officers (two-star generals). Military officers also occupy several other mid-level positions within the Ministry of Defense which practically place the Minister powerless when he or she should face TNI establishment. With most products of the Ministry, especially those that are related to defense policies and military organization issues, are actually made by active military officers, it is understandable if the brass’
penetration to defense policies and military organization issues is quite significant. The operational-technical level regulations that deal with the Ministry of Defense itself did not come into being until 2015 when the President adopted Perpres No.58/2015 on the Organizational Arrangements of the Ministry of Defense.
3.2. The national interests’ dominance within TNI
The term national interest in this dissertation is defined as the interest of the nation with regard to the transition to democracy. It is basically the call for reform to establish democratic society in Indonesia. While the fall of Suharto represented a real action to implement this national interest, Tap MPR No.10/1998 on the Main Agendas of Reform provided the legal justification for implementing democratic values in governance. As part of this transformation, the armed forces were required to step out from politics to focus on defense assignment as suggested in Tap MPR No.6/2000.
As suggested in the previous parts, the progress of reform in the establishment of normative democratic control over the armed forces suggests a relatively good result.
There are, however, some remaining problems. First, there are only two laws related to
73 See for example the debate over the purchase of AW 101 helicopter in the next chapter.
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the armed forces establishment that have successfully been adopted. Table 3.2 shows that there are several laws related to the armed forces establishment that have yet to be adopted. Most of these laws, however, concern with the professionalization of the armed forces, instead of with the establishment of democratic control over the armed forces with the exception of the Law on National Security. These un-adopted laws are crucial in establishing culture of military submission to democratic control. Other words, in a generational approach of military reform point of view, it can be said that the reform has only successfully creating structural framework for establishing democratic control over the armed forces and it has not yet managed to produce the culture of the armed forces to not engage in politics.
Second, there is still a lack in operational-technical regulations to clarify the general principles listed in the already adopted laws. One particular example that shows the lack of operational-technical regulations is the organizational arrangements of the Ministry of Defense. While the Law on National Defense has clearly regulated the role of the Ministry of Defense, there are no operational regulations detailing the institutional capacity that this Ministry has to carry out their tasks and there are no operational regulations that regulate which positions within the Ministry of Defense that should be filled in by active officers and which should be given privileges to civilians or how these assigned-officers should pledge their loyalty to (Sukma in Prihartono, 2006).
Even when Perpres No.58/2015 was adopted it did not clearly regulate those matters.
Hence, while the Ministry of Defense has the full right in decision making, their policies are basically prepared by the brass. The lack of operational-technical regulations also takes place in the disbandment of military business, at least until 2009.
Third, the armed forces still have a strong influence in two areas, external defense and military organization, not only in the implementation of policies related to those two areas but also the decision-making process. In addition, they also tend to argue that civilian overt involvement in these two areas is a sign of intervention to military’s internal affairs which used to be the pretext for their involvement in politics.
As Welch and Smith (1976) had argued, the non-existence of inter-penetration is crucial in ensuring military’s non-involvement in politics. Many cases have suggested that the reason for military’s coup d’état is closely linked with civilian intervention in military affairs. Therefore, while this dissertation agrees that military autonomy in their internal
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affairs should be granted by existing regulations, the armed forces should also subject to multiple channels of oversighting. The armed forces have to give up their privileges in decision making and allow civilian establishment to take charge of decision making process to focus on their expertise. Hence, the armed forces should never consider civilian involvement in decision making of defense policies as intervention. When civilian leaderships jump into, for example, personnel’ tour of duty policies, the armed forces have the right to complaint. The limitation of the so-called military internal affairs, therefore, should be made clear.
Despite those loopholes, a careful reading through the already established regulations suggests that TNI basically conveys to the adoption of general principles of democratic control but they indicate a sign of resistance in the details, especially when they consider that those regulations would harbor their interests—military’s internal affairs is one of them. To clearly show that assessment, a careful tracking in the progress is made in the following paragraphs.
It is crucial to clearly differentiate the time-frame of the progress in the establishment of democratic normative control over the armed forces. The two adopted laws were passed by DPR in 2002 and 2004, which are four and six years after the initiation of the reform. The discussion of these laws within the Ministry of Defense took place as early as 2000. In late 2000, Propatria74 held a closed meeting between scholars and activists to discuss their stance against the new draft of Law on National Defense (Rancangan Undang-Undang, RUU).75 By the time of the meeting, this draft had yet been made available for public and only a handful of persons knew the existence and the content of this draft. The Propatria meeting, which then turned into Propatria Working Group, was intended to provide alternative to the draft developed by
74 Led by Hari Prihartono, Propatria is a leading NGO which specialized in security sector reform. In the later period, their involvement was matched by Pacivis. Unlike Pacivis, Propatria was not based in university and hence, their reputation was slightly declining within the defense establishment. Most key members of Propatria Working Group, will be explained latter, was also members of Pacivis Working Group. Pacivis Working Group, however, managed to set regeneration of scholars who engaged in defense/security affairs, probably due to the fact the members of Propatria Working Group who also members of Pacivis Working Group were based in academic institutions.
75 The transcript of the meetings ia not available for public. I have the pleasure of keeping these transcripts due to my close relationship with those who involved in the meetings and organizer of the meetings. However, Lorenz (2015) also used these transcripts in his dissertation manuscript. I do not know how Lorenz managed to have the copy of these transcripts, but he had personally interviewed Hari Prihartono, the director of Propatria for his research.
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the Ministry of Defense.76 Several members77 of Propatria Working Group involved in the drafting of the Ministry of Defense’s version of the Law on National Defense, while as a group they made several meetings with both the Ministry of Defense and DPR, or factions within DPR, to put forward their own version of the draft.78 During these meetings, members of the Propatria Working Group raised their concern that the Ministry of Defense’s draft version was not fully comply with democratic values. The debate revolves around different issues. For example, during one of the meeting between Propatria Working Group with officers from defense establishment, both the Ministry of Defense and TNI Headquarter which took place in late 2000, a high ranking military officer that attended the meeting raised his objection to the way Propatria Working Group formulated their proposed draft. He said the draft had a tendency to frame TNI as the guilty party and hence needed to be controlled when in fact the main problem is how to find the best possible way to set up the role of both TNI and non-TNI elements within the society to bring the country to prosperity.79 That kind of objections had been quite often raised in a meeting between Propatria Working Group and defense establishment. It basically indicates that the armed forces agreed to settle to the drafting of the law to the point that the draft would secure their interests. They, however, agreed that the call for democratic control over the armed forces pressured by civilian pro-democratic forces had to be established. The timing of the enactment of those laws plays a crucial role since this process took place during the early stage of the reform when the pressures for military to reform themselves were at its peak. The proposed draft of the Law on National Defense, for example, was brought to DPR with several important revisions after several members of Propatria Working Group managed to secure access to the Minister of Defense who represented National Awakening Party
76 It should be noted that clearly separating Ministry of Defense from TNI Headquarter was not possible at this time due to the fact that active officers within the Ministry of Defense remained loyal to the interest of the brass.
77 In one of my personal communications with Widjajanto, he mentioned that at least four members of the Propatria Working Group assisted the Ministry of Defense in the drafting of the Law on National Defense. He himself acknowledged that he assisted the Ministry of Defense in the drafting of the Law on TNI. One of these two members that Widjajanto mentioned to me acknowledged his involvement in our personal communication. These communications, however, took place before I decided to write this dissertation when I was working as their research assistant in one of Pacivis projects.
78 These meetings took place since 2000 to 2002 when the Law on National Defense was finally enacted by DPR.
79 Full record with the author.
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(Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa, PKB).80 Hence, they basically by passed the officers within defense establishment in the adoption of the Law on National Defense. In the case of the adoption of the Law on TNI in 2004, however, this Working Group was caught by surprise since they claimed that they never had information that the discussion of the draft within the defense establishment had been taken place. The draft had been highly criticized by NGOs and also scholars (ICG, 2004). Sukma (2004), for example, raised his concern that the draft of the Law on TNI contained several points which might jeopardize democratic control.
The above explanation suggests that the armed forces managed to maintain their interests during the drafting process and the discussion of the draft in DPR sessions.
They also managed to ensure that the draft would not go through significant changes in the entire process. Hence, while they worked closely with scholars and NGO activists they also maintained close contacts to members of DPR. As the transcript of the meetings hosted by Propatria Working Group suggested, contacts between members of the group with members of DPR also took place in several occasions. These contacts helped members of DPR to understand the issue properly. However, members of DPR also had their own interests in which not all of them agreed that full limitation to the armed forces would serve their political interests. Various academic works had been done to suggest that there were basically splits within civilian politician groups in which in order to win their political contestations they agreed to submit to the demand of the armed forces in exchange for support from the brass (Anwar, 2001; Mietzner, 2006;
Wibisono, Wardoyo & Kasim, 2008; Sebastian & Iisgindarsah in Rulland, Manea &
Born, 2013). The split within civilian camp resulted in a weak pressures toward the brass in the discussion of draft of the laws.
What is interesting from that process is the fact that the armed forces managed to maintain their unity. Scholars suggested that during the early phase of the reform, there were rivalries within the brass.81 Those rivalries, however, was not shown outside the brass. Sutarto (2017, interview) argued that it was normal to have different opinions between officers within the brass, but they had their own way of settling these differing
80 I gained this information from several members of Propatria Working Group during my involvement in Pacivis Working Group. I was a junior member of this Working Group which served mostly as research assistant to the senior members of this Working Group. At least three members of this Working Group with whom I had worked with conveyed similar information.
81 See Chapter 2.
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decision. Hence, he tended to downplay what scholars said as split.The case of the Law on National Security deserves different explanation since it was not only involved TNI and civilian groups but also Polri. The failed discussion to the draft of the Law on National Security was due to consistent refusal from Polri as they considered that this law would significantly limit their role and authority. In fact, DPR had been several times refused to include this law to their session due to the split between TNI and Polri. They argued that the executive bodies should be able to settle their own disagreements before the draft of the law can be discussed in DPR.82
Figure 3.2. Tracing for the first phase of the establishment of normative framework
The above explanation suggests that there had been a singular interest within the armed forces to support the new democratic arrangement. As a result, they chose to take side with public pressures for military’s withdrawal from politics in a sense that they should no longer taking charge of the governance but retain their role as influencer to important government decisions. TNI, for example, remained as key actor in the making of defense policies and military organization-related decisions through their heavy penetration to the Ministry of Defense. Hence, whenever the pressures from civilian group to these issues grew, the armed forces would not easily submit to these pressures.
82 Muradi (2014) provided a detail explanation on this issue.
Is there a split within
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In the meanwhile, the split within civilian groups led to their disagreement over certain issues. While these disagreement in most times did not related to military or defense/military related issues, civilian groups had the tendency to gain support from the armed forces to strengthen their political position (Mietzner, 2004; Haseman, 2006;
Wibisono, Wardoyo & Kasim, 2008; Sebastian & Iisgindarsah in Rulland, Manea &
Born, 2013). As result, it contributed to the lack of unity in discussing the laws supposedly set to weaken the political influence of TNI. Examples can be drawn from both the Law on National Defense and the Law on TNI which relatively beneficial for TNI.
Following the enactment of the Law on National Defense and the Law on TNI, little progress has been taking place. In addition to the passing of several operational-technical regulations, no other law, with the exception of the Law on Military Discipline, has ever been adopted. As explained earlier, there were loopholes in the making of operational-technical regulations due to the resistance from the armed forces to what they called as civilian penetration to military affairs. There was, however, additional factor which made civilian groups could not press the armed forces to adopt these required operational-technical regulations, which was the lack of civilian experts in defense and military affairs. Members of DPR, for example, were lacking of sufficient knowledge, even among members of Commission I, on operational-technical details of defense and military affairs. In the discussion of the laws, members of DPR received significant assistance from scholars through, among others, Propatria. Civilian authority within the Ministry of Defense also received similar assistance from scholars.
The numbers of scholars in defense and military affairs themselves were limited. For example, among those who involved in Propatria Working Group, there were only two scholars who hold degree, either master or doctorate, in defense and military studies.
Most of them were either political scientist (especially international relations scholar) or jurist.
Regardless of this situation, several normative frameworks in operational-technical regulations have been managed to create. The Ministry of Defense managed to produce Defense Policy, Defense Strategy, Defense Doctrine, and Defense Planning document. All of those documents were made with the assistance from civilian scholars.
Their involvement were basically due to the fact that during the making of those
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products, the Minister of Defense was held by Sudarsono, a professor in international relations with the University of Indonesia, and most members of Propatria and Pacivis Working Groups were his former students.83 Sudarsono’s long standing relationship with TNI, in which he used to serve as Vice Governor of National Resilience Institute (Lembaga Ketahanan Nasional, Lemhanas) during Suharto era, also provided access to these scholars to work closely with TNI. In addition, these scholars also had a long-standing relationship with most of officers due to their involvement in Command and Staff College (Sekolah Staf dan Komando, Sesko), either Sesko TNI, Sesko AD, Sesko AL or Sesko AU. In many cases, these scholars could not reach an agreement on the detail of certain issues which force them to use other channels, mostly through NGOs, to put pressures to the armed forces in those issues. Widjajanto (2017, interview) argued that the role of academics is basically a bridge between policy makers and society, including NGO activists, and one of the advantages that they had in the context of
products, the Minister of Defense was held by Sudarsono, a professor in international relations with the University of Indonesia, and most members of Propatria and Pacivis Working Groups were his former students.83 Sudarsono’s long standing relationship with TNI, in which he used to serve as Vice Governor of National Resilience Institute (Lembaga Ketahanan Nasional, Lemhanas) during Suharto era, also provided access to these scholars to work closely with TNI. In addition, these scholars also had a long-standing relationship with most of officers due to their involvement in Command and Staff College (Sekolah Staf dan Komando, Sesko), either Sesko TNI, Sesko AD, Sesko AL or Sesko AU. In many cases, these scholars could not reach an agreement on the detail of certain issues which force them to use other channels, mostly through NGOs, to put pressures to the armed forces in those issues. Widjajanto (2017, interview) argued that the role of academics is basically a bridge between policy makers and society, including NGO activists, and one of the advantages that they had in the context of