 |
| Densus 88 - Indonesian Counter-Terrorism Force |
By William Mackey
Indonesia’s restrained response to the recent Jakarta attacks is welcome.
It had been years since Indonesia had experienced an attention-grabbing terrorist attack. That changed on January 14. Early in the morning, four militants launched a brazen assault in downtown Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital.
Several of the militants were suicide bombers, and detonated their explosives near a Starbucks outside of Sarinah, a popular shopping plaza. Others threw grenades, and fired at police officers stationed at a nearby traffic post. Once the smoke finally cleared, eight people were dead, including the four militants. More than twenty others were injured.
Soon afterwards, the Islamic State (ISIS) issued a statement via social media, claiming responsibility for the attack.
The attack, according to some, was the opening of a new battlefront for ISIS – yet another signal of how dangerous the group was becoming, not only in the Middle East but also in Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim country.
But such claims – that ISIS poses a major danger to the peace and security of Indonesia – are overblown. Yes, ISIS sympathizers and militants are active in Indonesia, as they are in other countries in the region, such as Malaysia and the Philippines. But that does not mean that they pose – or are capable of posing – a major threat to the Indonesian state and its people. Indeed, most Indonesian militants are poorly trained and largely incompetent, and prior to the January 14 assault they had failed to launch any large-scale attack, despite several attempts.
With this in mind, the Indonesian government response to the January 14 attack should be careful and measured. An overblown reaction risks the government losing popular support, and driving more Indonesian Islamists into the arms of ISIS.
Read the full story at The Diplomat