1995-10-01a- CIA Conference Report: THE CHALLENGE OF ETHNIC CONFLICT TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL ORDER IN THE 1990S GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVES 01-Oct-95

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environmental/highland-lowland, ethnic, religious, Although it would be easy to suggest that the Govern-
border area, and ideological concerns have in the past ment of the United States follow a strict policy of non-
driven the engine of ethnic conflict in Southeast Asia. involvement in overseas ethnic disputes, such is not
my view. If the United States were to be totally unin-
Ethnic divisions and incipient tensions exist every- volved, then major rescue operations such as that
where in the world. The management of such conflicts in Somalia or refugee efforts such as that on the
is part-and-parcel of the business of government and Thailand-Cambodia border in 1979 would have been
increasingly the concern of a unipolar international of no concern to the American public. Given the
community. In the recent past agencies representing uniquely threatening nature of ethnic disputes and
world powers have intentionally inflamed and exacer- controversies, there is no choice but to actively moni-
bated such tensions in the process of furthering the tor and to intervene positively where necessary. Inter-
short term strategic concerns of their national capitals. vention in the cause of the exacerbation of ethnic
The consequences of such actions are sometimes trag- conflict should never be justified. Intervention, as we
edies writ in Homeric proportions. Did such involve- have seen in the recent case of Congressional action
ment occur in the physical annihilation of the on East Timor, can serve as a wake-up call to govern-
Indonesian Communist Party? Did the massacres of ments that once could cavalierly dismiss overseas
Vietnamese civilians living in Cambodia in 1970 at concerns about internal repression as the remonstra-
the birth of the Khmer Republic occur in a political tions of the political periphery. The nature of such
and strategic vacuum in the context of the Vietnam positive intervention might take the form of channel-
war? Some 70,000 tribal Laptians currently reside in ing foreign aid to rural regions with wide disparities in
the state of California; what'conundrum of political household income or constraining trade opportunities
and social policies conspired to transport so remote a for governments deemed repressive and insensitive to
people to so alien and unfamiliar a land? ethnic minority demands. Support could be provided
for indigenous NGOs equipped to mediate disputes
Governments have often endeavored to build national and negotiate issues that obtain between opposing
consensus on the basis of mijority ethnic loyalty and/ groups. The most important contribution developed
or justify foreign adventures on the basis of threats to countries can make to the amelioration of tension
ethnic security or purity. The exacerbation of what between ethnic groups is to address issues of social
anthropologist Clifford Geertz has termed "primordial inequality, which so often are the root cause of con-
sentiments" by agencies skilled at the manipulation of flicts and clashes. If a mountain tribal people is
media and the mobilization of mass organizations has awarded rights to permanent agricultural land, if
often unleashed forces difficult to subsequently con- schools are built for minority children and clinics are
trol (Geertz, 1973; 259-269). The modern history of built to address urgent health needs, and if roadways
Southeast Asia is rife with examples of such manipu- are constructed to facilitate commerce, then the root
lation of ethnic passions. In the wake of the Cold War, cause of resentment and rebellion will be effectively
somewhat more evenhanded concerns for human addressed. Resources that once were invested in heavy
rights are already emerging. That differences in ethnic armaments might in the present circumstance best be
identity, religious affiliation, ideological persuasion, invested in the tasks of reducing infant mortality,
or linguistic preference obtain in Southeast Asia is enhancing family incomes, and facilitating equity in
fundamental to the local social landscape. Southeast national development in Southeast Asia. With
Asians have formed nation-states of "imagined com- resources currently at hand, the tragedies of the past
munities" on the bases of colonial entities erected on need not necessarily serve as prologue for the future.
the ruins of ancient civilizations (Anderson; 1991).
The same passions that inflamed modern European Understanding the past role of intelligence agencies in
nations 100 years ago (or that are presently at work in directly influencing the ethnic conflicts during the
the Balkans) are liable to remain potentially threaten-
ing in the relative young national entities of Southeast
Asia.
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