ABSTRACT
Few Americans believed that Sukarno would regain power, but his rhetoric and doctrine seemed deeply embedded in the Indonesian consciousness, and suspicions of the United States ran high. Angered by Suharto’s banning of the PKI and Marxism-Leninism, Sukarno successfully derailed two attempts to purge the cabinet of leftists. Ambassador Green applauded the Javanese approach and asked for Washing-ton’s continued patience. Instead of muzzling Sukarno, the army was exposing policy differences. General Suharto’s mandate to ensure security, calm, and the stability of government came only from Sukarno, who could conceivably withdraw it. The military’s principal weapon was the court calendar—carefully scheduled trials of those implicated in the October 1, 1965, power play, which produced steadily mounting evidence of the misdeeds of the Sukarno regime. Sukarno remained for a short period in the Presidential Palace in Jakarta but was soon placed in what Suharto called “political quarantine” at the palace in Bogor.
