With some trepidation, as there had been no 5412 Group approval of an operation, Ulmer persuaded Dulles and Wisner to let him follow up. A meeting took place; the Indonesians wanted U.S. weapons. This left FE/5 in a quandary since it lacked approval. After an unsuccessful try at arranging a private arms deal, the CIA determined to seek appropriate authority.

  Sukarno helped the Eisenhower administration decide to support PERMESTA. In February 1957 the Indonesian president gave a speech asserting that “Western style” democracy had proved inadequate in Indonesia. Sukarno declared that political parties should disband in the interest of the nation, leaving a system of “guided democracy”—authoritarian rule by the president, assisted by an advisory council Sukarno himself would appoint. Washington read the speech as a thinly disguised initiative to bring the Communist Party into association with the president. To top it all, Sukarno then welcomed Soviet leader Kliment Voroshilov for a stay of more than two months in Indonesia. In May Eisenhower flatly rejected Sukarno’s request to visit.

  That fall Australian foreign minister Richard Casey came to Washington for alliance discussions. He held private meetings with both Allen and John Foster Dulles, and had both of them in some of the conference talks, the DCI at Casey’s insistence. The CIA director told the Australian minister his agency had secret contact with the rebels. Allen Dulles is reported as saying, “. . . the breakup of Indonesia should not be regarded as an objective, but only as something which might have to be accepted as a last resort.”

  Allen Dulles seems to have been ambivalent about this scheme. He kept in touch, sometimes at home in midnight phone conversations with Ulmer. But over time Dulles questioned the dedication of the Indonesians. The CIA director began acting more as commentator at the NSC and less the secret warrior wearing a bit in his teeth. Dulles increasingly delegated Indonesia to deputy Charles Cabell. In turn, General Cabell employed Richard Bissell as point man. Bissell arranged a few U-2 flights to gather data. The main center for planning moved to the State Department, where meetings of an NSC special interagency committee were chaired by State’s intelligence director Hugh S. Cumming.

  The Indonesia project is unique in revealing John Foster Dulles’s leading role in the secret war. The secretary, in New York for the UN General Assembly, learned of the final go-ahead from Allen on September 16, 1957. Only Foster’s side of the exchange has been recorded:

  “Then you got the green light otherwise?”

  “Is this the West and not the East end?”

  “Nearer us?”

  “OK.”

  Hugh Cumming’s committee paper on Indonesia became the lead item of business at NSC on September 23. It recommended that the United States “continue the present pattern of our formal relations, but so . . . adjust our programs and activities as to give greater emphasis to support of non-Communist forces in the outer islands, while continuing attempts to produce action by non-Communist elements on Java.” The council ordered new planning, a process that led directly to Project Haik, as the Indonesia operation would be called. The Joint Chiefs of Staff complained that the concept conceded Java, the most important part of the country. They advised extending a small amount of military aid, enough to drive a wedge between the Indonesian military and Sukarno without affecting its real capability against the rebels should they remain loyal to the government. But the Chiefs never followed up, and they grudgingly approved with those actions necessary to Haik. Before the end of September the formal policy logically entailed execution of the CIA’s covert operation.

  At Far East Division the mood became ecstatic. Al Ulmer exclaimed, “We’ll drive Lebanon off the front page!” The branch, FE/5, felt approval meant they could rely on the Pacific Fleet for arms shipped the right way. State imposed certain restrictions: there could be only one team of Americans on the ground—one officer plus his radio operator. Des FitzGerald thought such a tiny commitment portended failure. His doubts were not to be ignored since, as FE’s top paramilitary expert, he carried much of the load. Once colleagues saw Des, who loved being at the center of the action, blowing cold on Indonesia, that sent a distinct signal.

  When DDO Wisner hand-carried a simple voucher to the director’s office, authorizing $10 million for Haik, Allen Dulles, it is reported, signed with a flourish. The initial outlay would be $843,000 that CIA paymasters disbursed in November 1957.

  From that moment Foster Dulles spoke to his brother frequently about Haik. Foster overruled his own ambassador in Jakarta, John Allison, who had learned of CIA contact with the rebels and argued against involvement. As had been the case with the American ambassador to Burma during the Li Mi affair, Allison was then deliberately misinformed about the extent of CIA activity.

  Foster Dulles called Allen on November 29, though, to tell the DCI of an “extremely significant” cable from Allison that involved a “complete reversal”—the ambassador now advised action. Foster said, “What was happening there was that one by one they were gradually being eliminated. Our assets were gradually shrinking. Today we have substantial assets with which to deal. We will, however, have only half those assets six months from now.”

  The degree of Foster Dulles’s involvement again emerged the next day when hand grenades were thrown at Sukarno as he left a school fund-raiser in the company of children, an assassination attempt by Muslim fanatics unrelated to PERMESTA. Although Sukarno escaped, ten persons died and forty-eight children were injured. The question of sending condolences Foster resolved by telling Allen, “Probably the failure to do it would look suspicious, but the Sec[retary] said he wanted to be sure it was handled in a routine way.”

  In early December difficulties arose with the British. At Singapore, CIA station chief James P. Collins maintained liaison with British intelligence, headquartered at Phoenix Park. Rebel emissaries came to Singapore to meet Collins at the close of 1957, and the CIA officer had to sneak around, hiding from SIS. Singapore was the ideal arms conduit, but the British blocked CIA efforts. The agency had already begun preparing a weapons delivery to PERMESTA on Sumatra. This would be easiest if routed through Singapore.

  Allen Dulles went to Foster while senior British officials were in Washington for discussions. The secretary remarked, “If this thing goes on the way it is we will have something across there which will be pretty bad.” Foster then called his undersecretary, Christian Herter, and told him that the CIA chief was quite upset with the British. Foster wondered why London resisted action and whether the Australians and Dutch could be mobilized to bring pressure. Secretary Dulles said “what he would like to do is see things get to a point where we could plausibly withdraw our recognition of the Sukarno government and give it to the dissident elements on Sumatra and land forces to protect the life and property of Americans; use this as an excuse to bring about a major shift there . . . we may never have a better opportunity.” On December 12 Hugh Cumming told Foster he hoped the secretary “will get the British with us in Indonesia. MI 6 [SIS] wants to move and cooperate with CIA.”

  The Americans won their point. A few months later SIS officers were standing alongside CIA people at the Singapore airport control tower as the reception committee for aircraft returning from arms deliveries.

  Meanwhile the Americans moved big time but set up the action through bases in the Philippines. Eisenhower had mentioned “having some amphibious equipment,” as Foster Dulles reminded a Pentagon official on December 7, and the navy came up with the landing ship dock Thomaston. The vessel, loaded with a pair of barges bearing arms for eight thousand troops, sailed for Sumatra. Simultaneously Al Ulmer sent John Mason, chief of his air branch, to the Philippines to board the submarine Bluegill and watch the unloading, taking photographs.

  Allen Dulles, pleased at the successful delivery, told his brother on January 15, “Everything is going all right on the other matter on the other side of the world.” They seemed unaware that, due to poor coordination, bazookas (an effective heavy weapon) had been left out of the shipment, which would cost the rebels dearly when government troops attacked them later.

  The CIA now inserted observers on Sumatra. Political specialist James Smith handled one of the colonels. Dean Almy, with cover as U.S. consul in Medan, watched the fence-sitters. Fravel Brown, a China ops veteran, plus his radioman made up the team with the rebels at Padang. In a token of the changed British attitude, Brown reached his post through Singapore.

  Brown’s reports became the DCI’s basis for a last-minute appraisal on January 31 that mostly echoed the optimistic view. The fourteen-page paper argued that the “Padang group” seemed assured of backing from at least one major political movement, that the group believed Sukarno to be weakened and felt it could obtain “Western, particularly US support.”

  Intelligence declared that “the group, in present circumstances, believes it could successfully resist any military action by forces loyal to the central government.” The CIA knew in advance of a rebel ultimatum, which it predicted would be delivered “on or about 5 February,” but critically miscalculated in judging Sukarno would not pressure the outer islands; CIA assumed the Padang group would have the advantage there and that “at a minimum,” PERMESTA could launch “fairly widespread guerrilla warfare” on Java. The agency hedged only noting “we are unable to estimate the outcome” of a fight and in its observation that the conclusions applied only until Sukarno received substantial Soviet military aid.

  Secretary Dulles worried about the rebels’ long delay declaring themselves. “During the stalling period the present regime is going to get a lot of stuff,” Foster told Allen on February 4. With Indonesia up for discussion at the NSC, it is not surprising that “the subject of Archipelago” came up again on the 5th between the secretary and the DCI.

  On February 6 Allen Dulles told the National Security Council that matters were reaching a climax. The CIA now expected the rebel ultimatum in two days. It would actually be broadcast over the radio on the 10th. Director Dulles furnished forty-eight hours’ advance notice. At State, Secretary Dulles called Hugh Cumming to demand results. Cumming had two officials brief Foster in greater detail but stopped them before they could broach the CIA action. Indeed Foster Dulles and Cumming had mulled over operational aspects for months but they needed to keep the circle of knowledge tight.

  Events moved inexorably ahead in Indonesia. Sukarno left to travel overseas. While in Osaka, Japan, the colonels came into the open. They sent an emissary with the ultimatum to abandon “guided democracy” and a list of acceptable cabinet ministers, promising support if these persons were appointed. Sukarno refused. On February 15 PERMESTA proclaimed a rebel government comprising figures from Sumatra, Sulawesi, and Java, though the rebels had little strength on the latter island.

  Now the secretary of state developed doubts about justification, as he told Allen in a darker moment on February 21. The United States had no treaty or congressional authority to become involved in civil war. The CIA chief warned that the rebel colonels could not go on indefinitely. Foster ruminated that Washington could recognize PERMESTA as a belligerent and then sell it weapons.

  The CIA Far East Division had expected that 5412 Group approval would bring full cooperation, but the navy continued to drag its feet. Adm. Arleigh Burke, chief of naval operations, simply did not press the issue. The navy provided the landing ship and submarine for initial moves, then took weeks to send warships to Singapore to give the United States an intervention capability. Where an aircraft carrier and a heavy cruiser were envisioned as the core of the force, the navy finally dispatched just two destroyers. The CIA had repeatedly gone over cooperation with the sailors in December and January. The reality proved intensely disappointing. On February 22 both Allen Dulles and Christian Herter again raised this matter with Burke.

  About this time aerial reconnaissance disclosed Indonesian site preparations for a bomber-length airstrip on the island of Natuna Besar, north of Sumatra. At the Pacific Command, Adm. Felix Stump now feared Sukarno might allow Russian bombers use of the facility. Navy resistance suddenly melted. The navy began aerial photo missions to support Project Haik.

  Naval flights created a possibility for compromise of the project. Plausible deniability had begun to evaporate. In the field it finally did. The first airborne weapons delivery to Sumatra took place on February 23. Packed on Okinawa by CIA officer James McElroy, and coordinated from Clark Air Force Base by John Mason’s deputy, Garfield Thorsrud, plus Roger McCarthy, the loads were put aboard two Civil Air Transport C-46 aircraft. Both pilots—Paul R. Holden and William D. Gaddie—were veterans of the CIA airlift to Dien Bien Phu. When they landed to refuel in Thailand, Thai soldiers boarded the planes and started pulling apart the containers, a breach of security contained only with difficulty. Meanwhile the PERMESTA colonels arranged an arms deal with the Chinese Nationalists about this time, and a Chinese military mission appeared in Sulawesi.

  When word of arms shipments reached the American embassy at Djakarta, it embarrassed John Allison, who still advocated accommodation with the Indonesian government. Accounts differ on whether Allison asked for a transfer or was simply ordered out of the country. Secretary Dulles sent Allison to Czechoslovakia. The ambassador speculated in retrospect that Sukarno had “disgusted” Foster. Allison had his moment, passing through Washington en route to Prague. He stopped at the CIA for a debriefing. The intelligence officers listened carefully and were polite. Afterward, a senior CIA man walked the ambassador to his car and said, “You should know that several of us here agreed with your reports and recommendations from Djakarta. I think you will be proved right in the end.”

  Indonesia dominated talk around the table at the White House, with discussions at fourteen of the seventeen National Security Council meetings between November 1957 and March 1958; keeping talk of it out of the Cabinet Room proved almost impossible. In at least one instance, the NSC meeting of February 27, conversation skirted the thin line separating the overt and covert tracks of “Archipelago,” as Foster euphemistically referred to Project Haik. Allen Dulles opined that the colonels had moved too quickly. Although Sukarno’s forces had yet to make a major attack, and CIA speculated that he doubted his troops’ loyalty, the rebels had not evaluated their own strength very well. “The great problem confronting us,” the CIA chieftain told the NSC, “is how far we go into the matter.” If the rebels failed, Allen Dulles feared—he expressed fair certainty—that Indonesia would go over to communism. President Eisenhower responded that if a Communist takeover really threatened, Washington would have to intervene. John Foster Dulles then interjected that U.S. chances were better since there existed an “indigenous government” on Sumatra.

  The notes of a telephone call Foster made to Allen Dulles at 4:20 P.M. that afternoon are worth quoting at length:

  The Secretary said he does not know whether the talk this a.m. about the area should lead to greater activity. Allen said he is talking about it now. You reach a point where it is extremely difficult to do much more without showing your hand. The Secretary thinks if it is going to work we should take some risk of showing our hand. They agreed it is the last chance. The Secretary mentioned buying stuff in the Philippines. Allen said the question of delivery is difficult. They can get it in only the way we do it. Allen said they are going ahead. We are ready to give them a bird as soon as they can eat it. We are pushing ahead as daringly as we can. It is a vigorous program and they are very happy with it and cooperate very well. The Secretary just wanted him to know he has the feeling we can’t play too safely here and we have to take some risk because it looks to him it is the best chance we have. Allen is glad to hear it.

  Arms deliveries alerted Frank Wisner to leave for Singapore, there to command the archipelago operation in the field. The CIA station had been augmented for the project. Through Scott Breckinridge, its liaison officer in Australia, the CIA also pressed the Australians to do something about journalists writing on the U.S. role in Indonesia. The Philippines became prime base for Haik. Navy submarines left from Subic Bay while airdrops were staged from a CIA compound at Clark under Paul Gottke. The agency enlisted the services of several hundred Americans, Poles, Filipinos, and Nationalist Chinese to maintain and fly a small fleet of transport aircraft, P-51 fighters and B-26 bombers. Some of these planes and crews later moved forward to Manado on Sulawesi. Although only about a dozen aircraft were involved, this represented the International Volunteer Air Group in action.

  The Indonesian government now began taking strong measures. Chief of Staff Nasution dismissed six rebel colonels, and more discharges followed. Nasution declared that force would be used, and a week later a warship maneuvered ostentatiously off Padang. Radio stations were bombed by government planes. In another conversation, on March 4, CIA boss Dulles told the secretary of state of his terrible fear the United States would have to halt Project Haik. Allen assured Foster he had not as yet issued any such orders.

  John Foster Dulles attempted to prevent the American role in Indonesia from becoming public knowledge. In appearances before Congress in March and April he insisted that the United States had not intervened but had followed international law. At press conferences he described the rebellion as an internal matter and said Washington would not permit arms sales to either side. The revolt should be dealt with by Indonesians “without intrusion from without.”

  On March 6 Allen Dulles told the NSC that Sukarno had delayed in order to put his own forces into position to move against them. Allen dismissed his brother’s hopeful doubts as to whether Sukarno’s troops had the stomach for battle. The CIA had good access since the officer Nasution had put in charge happened to be close friends with an American attaché. A week later Sukarno troops landed on the Sumatran coast. On March 11, within hours of a CIA arms delivery, government planes struck the drop zone. Troops landed there and seized most of the weapons. The Sukarno forces briefly held CIA officer Brown, who insisted he was merely one of hundreds of Americans on Sumatra working for oil companies, and then made his escape.