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DE RUEHJA #2048/01 3101110
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O 051110Z NOV 08
FM AMEMBASSY JAKARTA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 0542
INFO RUCNARF/ASEAN REGIONAL FORUM COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUCNISL/ISLAMIC COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 JAKARTA 002048 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
FOR U/S GLASSMAN, U/S BURNS AND A/S HILL 
 
C O R R E C T E D  C O P Y  - SIPDIS CAPTION ADDED 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KPAO OPRC OIIP KISL KHLS ID
SUBJECT: WINNING THE "WAR OF IDEAS" IN INDONESIA 
 
REF: SECSTATE 114917 
 
JAKARTA 00002048  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1. (U) Post appreciates the opportunity to share our public 
diplomacy experience in Indonesia and welcomes the Under 
Secretary's thoughts (reftel).  Indonesians, while the 
largest Muslim-majority population in the world, look at the 
world differently from the way Middle Easterners do, and we 
need to tailor our message here. 
 
¶2. (U) Indonesia is a huge archipelago spread over three time 
zones, with a diverse population, a constitution and national 
ideology that enshrine tolerance, and a national motto "unity 
in diversity."  Islam spread here through skillful use of 
existing cultures, not violence or the imposition of outside 
cultures.  The tolerant and non-violent world view of most 
Indonesian Muslims is evident in two mass organizations, 
Muhammadiyah and Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), which boast 90 million 
members. 
 
¶3. (U) Indonesia is a young democracy and reliable partner in 
the war on terrorism.  Indonesia, therefore, offers unique 
opportunities to find allies and build support for 
international values of tolerance and non-violence.  Here is 
how we do it. 
 
POLL RESULTS 
------------ 
 
¶4. (U) Internal and international polls regularly show that 
most Indonesians reject violence, oppose terrorism and 
support GOI efforts to counter terrorism and extremism. 
Islamic piety is on the rise for sure, with Islamic dress 
spreading and recent polls showing that a higher percentage 
of Indonesians pray five times per day than in any other 
country.  But religious tolerance is still widespread and 
rejection of violence the dominant view. 
 
¶5. (U) Indonesian views of the United States are mixed. 
While on a people-to-people basis, Americans remain popular, 
views of the U.S. government and policy are far less 
favorable.  We have seen, however, a real increase in our 
favorable poll numbers in the past 12 months from 22% to 33%. 
 This increase represents about 25 million people, meaning 
that, on average, 500,000 Indonesians per week improved their 
views of the U.S. over the last year. 
 
WHY THE INCREASE? 
----------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) Positive changes in the international environment 
certainly played a part in our improved standing here, 
especially security improvements in Iraq.  But part of our 
higher image here was through creative and active public 
diplomacy events at post.  We use outreach events to create 
opportunities for dialogue with Indonesians on issues about 
which they care.  Rather than focusing on issues that divide 
us, we stress and demonstrate our broad areas of commonality. 
 Our message is more effective when Indonesians take 
ownership and when delivered with an Indonesian voice.  That 
is why expanding our educational and cultural exchange 
programs in a targeted and creative way is so important. 
 
¶7. (SBU) Specifically, we have undertaken a series of highly 
publicized (especially TV) events with popular institutions, 
mostly non-government, such as National Geographic, the 
National Basketball Association, the Eisenhower Foundation, 
Time Magazine, Star TV, News Corp, and Harley Davidson Motor 
Cycles to name a few.  We realize that U.S. influence and 
image cannot be improved by the USG acting alone. Business 
and other non-governmental partners are needed.  Our 
successful outreach campaigns focus on areas where we can win 
and where we look good, e.g., the U.S. elections, which are 
uniquely popular here, and ongoing bilateral environmental 
and educational cooperation. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Education is one area where we see growing win-win 
results with great potential for PD success.  President 
Bush's education initiative is popular and effective, 
channeling $157 million for basic education through USAID. 
It has improved teacher training, fostered creative thinking, 
and encouraged parental involvement.  Through our successful 
Fulbright Program ($10 million annually) hundreds of scholars 
in both directions have built long-term personal ties and 
human capacity here.  Young Indonesians want to meet 
Americans and to learn English.  Our YES exchange program 
enables Indonesian students to spend a year in U.S. high 
schools.  Our growing English-language programs help 
Indonesians receive messages from more sources and compete in 
the global economy.  These exchange programs are especially 
effective when we can expand and complement them via 
 
JAKARTA 00002048  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
public-private partnerships. 
 
¶9. (SBU) We seek more Washington attention to take 
educational cooperation to a higher level by linking U.S. and 
Indonesian universities.  Programs like Fulbright are 
incredibly useful.  But they are a "retail" approach to 
exchanges.  We need to develop a "wholesale" approach by 
attracting U.S. universities to set up shop - or at least 
feeder programs - here in Indonesia.  This would give a 
greater number of Indonesians access to the American way of 
thinking at a lower cost.  In addition, we are solidifying 
the foundation of this cooperation by renewing our Fulbright 
agreement, adding a bilateral MOU to optimize GOI university 
exchange funds, keeping in closer touch with our many Public 
Diplomacy alumni, pushing for the return of Peace Corps 
volunteers and pursuing a Science and Technology Agreement to 
deepen cooperation in the applied sciences. 
 
AREAS REQUIRING ATTENTION 
------------------------- 
 
¶10. (SBU) More resources - staffing as well as funding - are 
crucial if State's role in public diplomacy is to be up to 
today's opportunities and threats.  We recommend that special 
attention be given to the recent findings of the U.S. 
Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy.  Its report on the 
human resource dimension of public diplomacy had some 
excellent recommendations to enhance the effectiveness of 
America's efforts to influence Indonesians and others. 
 
¶11. (SBU) Specifically in higher education, the number of 
Indonesian students in the U.S. continues to decrease, down 
nearly 50% from the mid-1990s (from 13,000 to 7,000 
students).  Compare these numbers with the 600,000 Saudi 
Arabian visas obtained by Indonesians, including thousands of 
students.  Moreover, as the protector of Mecca and Medina, 
Saudi Arabia's favorable ratings here beat us by a long shot. 
 The implications of this disparity for the war of ideas are 
troubling. 
 
¶12. (SBU) The Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s, the 
relatively high cost of American schools, the increased 
competition from Australia and others, previous cuts in USG 
and private scholarship funds and, finally, post-9/11 visa 
and entrance requirements have all taken their toll.  In 
2008, we issued only 1,400 student visas here, down from 
6,200 in 2000.  Clearly, much needs to be done to attract 
more student visa applicants.  We have taken some steps, 
e.g., our Fulbright program is back to pre-crisis levels, but 
we need to take a hard look at the other areas, especially 
post-9/11 security requirements. 
 
¶13. (SBU) The Rice-Chertoff joint vision of "secure borders 
and open doors" is the right one.  Now is the time to 
recalibrate the security-openness balance to facilitate 
travel to the U.S. by bona-fide Indonesians.  General areas 
where we can do better include waiving some requirements for 
returning visa holders and repeat visitors, as well as for 
beneficiaries of USG exchange programs.  The U.S. image 
continues to suffer from stories of persons travelling to the 
U.S. being treated in a humiliating or disrespectful way. 
 
¶14. (SBU) As all posts in Muslim-majority countries, we have 
horror stories to recount: a top official of Indonesia's 
biggest bank with dozens of prior trips to the U.S. required 
13 months to clear Washington's security advisory opinion 
(SAO) process because of his common Muslim name; the Foreign 
Ministry's spokesperson accompanying the FM to New York for 
UN meetings was required to give us his entire travel history 
in the last ten years - for the second time - before he could 
get his visa; a female recipient of one of our International 
Visitor grants was forced by a male inspector to remove her 
head scarf in the public immigration line at the airport, 
contrary to DHS policy. 
 
¶15. (SBU) While much could be accomplished by simply applying 
more expeditious and respectful handling of Indonesian Muslim 
visitors at our borders, we also recommend two specific 
changes to the SAO process: eliminating categories that do 
not add value, such as the Condor requirement, and demanding 
that all agencies with access to consular data bases adhere 
to higher data entry standards to minimize the false "hits" 
that delay clearance of bona-fide travelers with common names. 
 
ISLAM 
----- 
 
¶16. (SBU) For Islamic outreach in Indonesia, we use our 
assistance, exchange and outreach programs to help moderate 
and tolerant Muslim groups here spread their message, which 
 
JAKARTA 00002048  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
at the same time reinforces our interests and message.  It is 
far better to have Indonesian Muslim groups articulate and 
demonstrate the benefits of peace, prosperity and tolerance, 
than for us to talk about it.  So we help NU and Muhammidiyah 
schools, pesantren, madrasahs, health clinics and other 
community service activities with our assistance and other 
activities.  This engagement makes these and other moderate 
Muslim groups more capable in delivering services which in 
turn makes their message (and ours) go farther. 
 
¶17. (SBU) We avoid separating local Muslim groups into good 
and bad Muslims, embracing the former and isolating the 
latter.  While we obviously ignore the most radical groups 
and treat the violent groups as objects of law enforcement, 
rather than public diplomacy, at the same time we try to work 
with the broadest possible range of Muslim groups here.  This 
effort includes regular outreach and exchange program grants 
for the major Islamic party here, the Prosperous Justice 
Party, which, while conservative, is by all accounts 
non-violent and committed to democratic principles.  We use a 
range of tools and programs, including American Corners on 11 
Indonesian university campuses, TV co-ops, the internet, and 
small grants to NGOs.  These enable us to increase mutual 
understanding and build trust, thereby sustaining a receptive 
climate for democratic change and policies that further U.S. 
interests. 
 
¶18. (SBU) One final point often heard from our Muslim 
contacts is that we should treat terrorism as a law 
enforcement issue, and terrorists as criminals.  We should 
not talk about a clash of civilizations or attribute a 
religious element to terrorist crimes.  These contacts 
believe that calling these criminals and murderers "Islamic 
terrorists" or "Islamic radicals" only serves to legitimize 
them in the eyes of some Indonesians by associating their 
crimes with Islam. 
 
SECURITY SECTOR 
--------------- 
 
¶19. (SBU) Our bilateral security cooperation has been so 
successful that it requires specific mention.  U.S. 
cooperation with the police and, to a lesser extent, the 
military has been effective, because it has been behind the 
scenes.  The many successes here against terrorism since 2004 
are Indonesian successes, not American.  In addition, our 
modest Pacific Command Military Information Support Team 
program operates entirely behind the scenes, giving the 
credit for all anti-violence activities and messaging to the 
Indonesian security forces. 
 
¶20. (SBU) Our programs to train and build police capacity 
here go way beyond counter-terrorism, although the Diplomatic 
Security/Anti-Terrorism Assistance Program training of 
Indonesia's special counter-terrorism force has been hugely 
successful.  Through International Narcotics and Law 
Enforcement Affairs-funded Department of Justice programs we 
have developed with the police new systems and policies on 
emergency management, the use of force, and (in the works) a 
major restructuring of Indonesia's criminal procedure code to 
change the system from a confession-based to an 
evidence-based system.  These programs have helped the police 
transform themselves from a security force that protects the 
state in an authoritarian system, as it was ten years ago, to 
a security force that protects the people in a democracy. 
This is a big deal and represents a huge foreign policy 
success both in concrete terms and the war of ideas. 
 
CLOSING 
------- 
 
¶21. (SBU) Our main conclusion is simple.  Indonesians tune 
out on verbal campaigns on issues that divide us.  We are 
most effective in Indonesia when we cooperate in concrete 
areas that are important to the Indonesian people, e.g., 
education, environment, good governance, and health.  This 
concrete cooperation should remain the focus of our policies, 
practices and public diplomacy here. 
HUME