State of Turmoil
By Joshua Kurlantzick

While the U.S. military battles on in Afghanistan and diplomats scramble to create a post-Taliban regime, a second front in the global war on terrorism is developing in a region that has largely avoided the spotlight: Southeast Asia. For many counterterrorism specialists, success against al-Qaida and other terrorists in Southeast Asia, a region home to more than 300 million Muslims, will help determine whether America's military and law-enforcement agencies truly can shackle terrorist organizations' global ambitions. Yet experts on Southeast Asian Islam worry that, in cracking down on terror, the United States and its allies risk a kind of "blowback" similar to that in South Asia in the 1980s and 1990s, where American foreign policy actually abetted the rise of armed Islamic radicals.

Linked threats

That Southeast Asia has become a hub for Islamic terrorists is not news to the American military. Last year, a secret military document compiled by Philippine intelligence officers linked Abu Sayyaf, a Muslim terrorist organization in the southern Philippines, with groups such as al-Qaida. By working with foreign extremists, the document reported, Abu Sayyaf receives "training, logistics, expertise, and access to the international terrorist network." According to military sources, Abu Sayyaf members, who have vowed that "killing will not stop as long as religions other than Islam still exist," have studied in al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan.

The Philippine and American militaries believe Osama bin Laden is a financial backer of Abu Sayyaf. Meanwhile, according to Philippine diplomats, Arab donors have funded Muslim schools in the southern Philippines that preach armed jihad and promote the idea of Daulah Islamiah Nusantara, a merging of Malaysia, the southern Philippines, and Indonesia into one state governed by Islamic law.

The Philippines is not the only nation at risk. Malaysian police believe bin Laden has developed links with Kumpulan Mujahideen Malaysia, a group of Malaysian Islamic militants who have received training in Kabul, Afghanistan. Lakser Mujahideen, an organization that split off from Kumpulan, has been active in eastern Indonesia, allegedly bombing churches and "cleansing" Indonesia's Maluku Islands of Christians. Over the past three years, thousands of people have died in Muslim-Christian fighting in the Malukus.

Southeast Asian leaders also worry that Islamic militants based in Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Malaysia give foreign terrorists sanctuary, financial assistance, and other aid. Ramzi Yousef, who organized the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993, plotted his terrorist acts in the Philippines, while Mohammed Saddiq Odeh, who helped perpetrate the 1998 embassy bombings, was living in the Philippines when he joined al-Qaida. Bin Laden's brother-in-law, Mohammad Jamal Khalifa, resided in the Philippines in the mid-1990s. In the Philippines, Khalifa opened bank accounts for a charitable organization that allegedly were used to channel money to groups linked to al-Qaida.

On the rise

The terrorist threat has only increased in Southeast Asia over the past year. "Abu Sayyaf has become well-entrenched in the southern Philippines," says Carlyle Thayer, a Honolulu-based Asia expert. According to Philippine army officials, Abu Sayyaf has grown in number from fewer than 100 members five years ago to at least 800 well-armed fighters today. Meanwhile, Malaysian law enforcement has discovered dozens of armed Islamic groups hiding out in rural areas. A counterterrorism researcher advises, "The southern part of the Philippines might become an alternative [major hub for al-Qaida]."

Some Southeast Asian terrorists have zeroed in on Americans and American structures. During the past year, Abu Sayyaf has kidnapped more than 25 foreigners and beheaded several of these captives. Two of the Sept. 11 hijackers met a possible accomplice in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, last year, and Philippine intelligence believes bin Laden associates have been visiting the southern Philippines, recruiting young men to fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

Active involvement

Until recently, Washington did little to help Southeast Asian nations combat terror. But since Sept. 11, the United States has raised its profile in the region. "The global focus on terrorism is a ripe opportunity for Southeast Asian governments to crack down on militants," Thayer says. Derek Mitchell, an Asia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, agrees. The Pentagon "now seems very serious about Southeast Asia as a front in the war on terrorism," he says.

The United States already has begun upping the ante. U.S. officials have said that militant Islamic groups in the Philippines are among Washington's top counterterrorism targets; a recent Department of Defense review called for moving some American military assets from Europe to Asia.

With American backing, Southeast Asian states are using the global war on terror as an opportunity to move against Islamic militants. In mid-October, Indonesian police jailed 12 members of the Islamic Defenders Front, an organization that had threatened to conduct sweeps of Americans across the Indonesian archipelago. Meanwhile, Indonesian financial authorities announced they would step up efforts to freeze the assets of terrorist groups.

Future strategy

Over the long run, America's military and law-enforcement agencies probably will employ several counterterrorism strategies in Southeast Asia. One former diplomat who had been based in Southeast Asia predicts Washington will pressure Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, and Bangkok to examine Islamic charities more closely and detain militants suspected of links to terrorism.

Washington also may initiate military action in Southeast Asia or drastically step up aid to the Philippine and Indonesian armed forces. Because the Pentagon already has close ties with some elements of these armies, the U.S. military could capably execute strikes in these countries. Going into Indonesia or the Philippines, two non-Arab states, probably would be less likely to anger America's Arab allies.

Several Southeast Asian leaders have welcomed the Pentagon's advances. "The antiterrorist war has come as a boon to the Philippines, which stands strongly behind the [United States]," says Andrew Tan, a Singaporean defense analyst. Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has offered the United States use of two military installations; the Pentagon recently sent military advisors from Pacific Command in Hawaii to the Philippines; and the United States currently is shipping roughly $100 million in weaponry to the Philippine military.

Walking a fine line

Some analysts, however, are less optimistic about the chances for combating terror without adding to the region's pool of radical Islamists. In Indonesia, "the armed forces have purposely prolonged conflict with militant groups in order to retain the army's influence over the country, in the process committing many abuses," says Dwight King, an Indonesia specialist at Northern Illinois University. King believes abuses by the Indonesian military could push moderate Muslims into the fundamentalists' camp, just as abuses committed by the United States-backed mujahideen fighters turned the Afghan population against the mujahideen and abetted the rise of the Taliban.

Already, Indonesia's crackdown on radical Islamic groups may have backfired. Some militants have attained hero status: The Indonesian police are unpopular, and anyone jailed by them is likely to be looked upon favorably. Across the archipelago younger Indonesians - particularly internal refugees - increasingly are siding with the radical Islamists. "There are lots of refugee camps in Indonesia filled with angry young men," says Bambang Harymurti, editor-in-chief of Tempo, a respected Indonesian magazine. "These camps could be breeding grounds for more terrorism."

Some former U.S. military officers worry that increasing aid to the Indonesian military will increase the number of weapons washing around the archipelago, since there are Indonesian army officers who funnel weaponry to Islamic radicals. In this scenario, American weapons might one day be used by terrorist militias against the United States - which is exactly what happened in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where American weapons sent to the mujahideen in the 1980s contributed to a culture of anarchy. After the Taliban came to power amidst violent chaos, the fundamentalist militia inherited whatever U.S. weapons hadn't already been used in Afghanistan's civil war.

A similar kind of blowback might occur in the southern Philippines, where polls show Muslims resent any military presence in the area. Days after the Pentagon sent its first advisors to the southern Philippines last fall, a bomb exploded in the town where American officers were billeted, killing at least 10 people (though no U.S. soldiers).

American pressure on Southeast Asian leaders like Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri also could backfire. A secular leader in a country with several Islamic political parties, Megawati walks a political tightrope. Her vice president, Hamzah Haz, who leads the biggest Islamic party, would love to use the president's ties with Washington to score political points and possibly even bring down Megawati's administration. (Indonesia's vice president and president are elected separately and often are competitors.) If the administration were destabilized, Asia experts say, the region could face an enormous crisis: a nation of 210 million people potentially ruled by Islamic parties, some of which have ties to radical groups.

In fact, Megawati herself recently warned that Indonesia was in danger of disintegrating into anarchy - the kind of chaos that, in Afghanistan, led to a fundamentalist takeover. Some Indonesia specialists believe a Jakarta Taliban is unlikely, since the archipelago is known for its diversity of faiths. But as Karim Raslan, a columnist for Singapore's Straits Times newspaper, notes, "Afghanistan in the 1960s and 1970s ... was a complicated patchwork of tribes and peoples - including Jewish, Parsi, and Hindu minorities."

Signs of progress

The Philippine military has scored recent victories against Abu Sayyaf, and Malaysia's government has been relatively successful in combating radical Islamists. More important, the majority of Southeast Asian Muslims do not yet follow extreme ideologies. "The goal of turning Indonesia into a state based on Islam is far from achievement," says a memo by the International Crisis Group, a nongovernmental organization that focuses on politically unstable regions.

Still, to combat Islamic terrorism, America and its allies must fashion not only a military strategy but also a socioeconomic solution. Simply providing guns for Southeast Asian armies, without addressing causes of popular anger, would be repeating mistakes made in South Asia, where Washington funneled military aid without minimizing popular sympathy for extremists or questioning the behavior of its proxies, the Pakistani military and the mujahideen.

Instead, the Pentagon and the White House must pursue several simultaneous goals in Southeast Asia. Dana Dillon, an Asia analyst at the Heritage Foundation, says the United States should encourage regional initiatives against terrorism, including intelligence sharing and possibly even a multinational military force. By boosting regional initiatives, Washington would help avoid an anti-American backlash throughout Southeast Asia and bolster support for embattled leaders like Megawati. Dillon further advises the United States must be careful about how it distributes military aid, to ensure that guns are not transferred to extremists.

In addition, Southeast Asia analysts say, the United States must focus on developing impoverished areas - areas such as the southern Philippines that are breeding grounds for militancy. Even if Southeast Asian militaries, backed by the United States, successfully eliminated terrorist cells, if Washington, Jakarta, Manila, and Bangkok ignored the need for development, they only would be delaying the rise of extremism. "Poverty in the southern Philippines is giving terrorists large pools of ready recruits," says one Philippine diplomat. History is a guide: In South Asia, Washington essentially abandoned the region after the Soviets left Afghanistan, cutting off aid. In the 1990s, as Pakistan's poverty rate rose precipitously, Islamic radicals gained a foothold in both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Some Southeast Asian leaders understand the need for development. During a visit to Washington in September 2001, Indonesian technocrats told U.S. officials that Indonesia's "educated unemployed" - young people graduating from college but unable to find work - are as responsible for popular discontent and extremism as any other factor. The technocrats suggested the United States offer Indonesia at least $600 million in trade and investment assistance.

Thus far, Washington has not warmed to the idea of boosting aid and trade incentives for Jakarta; many U.S. lawmakers believe Indonesia's government wastes aid money. Still, the alternatives to not helping Jakarta are worse. "You think Afghanistan is bad?" asks one former U.S. diplomat. "Imagine an Islamist Indonesia."