Washington History Seminar
Historical Perspectives on International and National Affairs

“Indonesia and the World, 1965-66”
Bernd Schaefer
WOODROW WILSON CENTER

Baskara T. Wardaya
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY, YOGYAKARTA

Pro-communist coup, military counter-coup, and subsequent mass killings in Indonesia in 1965/66 represent one of the major dramas of the Cold War. The powerful domestic impact of those events continues to haunt Indonesia until today, while the role of foreign actors remains largely hidden. Basing their talk on the first international academic conference held on this subject on Indonesian territory (in 2011), the speakers will introduce their edited book, Indonesia and the World, 1965-66, discuss international complicities, and address the current state of debate.

Bernd Schaefer is a Senior Research Scholar with the Cold War International History Project at the Wilson Center and a Professorial Lecturer at George Washington University. He has published and edited books and articles on the role of communist states in Eastern Europe and East Asia during the Cold War.

Baskara T. Wardaya, S.J. is a Professor of History at Sanata Dharma University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. He was the director of the university’s PUSdEP (Center for History and Political Ethics), from 2004 to 2011. His publications include Cold War Shadow: United States Policy toward Indonesia 1953-1963 (2007); and Truth Will Out: Indonesian Accounts of the 1965 Mass Violence (2013).

Report from the Field: Thomas Boghardt, U.S. Army Center of Military History

Monday, October 21, 2013
4:00 p.m.
Woodrow Wilson Center, 6th Floor Moynihan Board Room
Ronald Reagan Building, Federal Triangle Metro Stop

Reservations requested because of limited seating:
mbarber@historians.org or 202-450-3209

October 28, 2013: John Prados on the regulation of intelligence agencies in a democratic society

The seminar is sponsored jointly by the National History Center of the American Historical Association and the Wilson Center. It meets weekly during the academic year, January to May and September to December. See www.nationalhistorycenter.org for the schedule, speakers, topics, and dates as well as videos and podcasts.  The seminar is grateful for support given by the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations.