Indonesia. The roots of terrorism in Indonesia: From Darul Islam to Jema'ah Islamiyah. By Solahudin, translated by Dave McRae. Sydney: UNSW Press and Lowy Institute for International Policy, 2013. Pp. xx + 236. Notes, Index.

Abstract

The roots of terrorism in Indonesia: From Darul Islam to Jema'ah Islamiyah By SOLAHUDIN, translated by DAVE MCRAE Sydney: UNSW Press and Lowy Institute for International Policy, 2013. Pp. xx + 236. Notes, Index. doi: 10.1017/S0022463413000696 This is a valuable book by a well-informed author, translated well and presented in a style that non-specialists and specialists alike will find accessible. Solahudin is a senior journalist who has researched Indonesia's violent terrorist movements since the Bali bombings of 2002. His book was originally published in Indonesian in 2011. The translator, Dave McRae, is now with the Lowy Institute; he holds a Ph.D. from the Australian National University and spent several years in Indonesia with the International Crisis Group and World Bank. His own book on interreligious violence in Poso (A few poorly organised men) has just been published. Solahudin's principal contribution is to set out the ideological and family lines that lead from and link independent Indonesia's first Islamist terrorist movement--the Darul Islam of the 1940s-early '60s--to the extremist groups that have become more prominent since the end of the Soeharto regime in 1998. It is, as the author says, 'a history of the jihadi movement in Indonesia, from Darul Islam through to Jema'ah Islamiyah'. While these links are familiar to specialist scholars, there is, I think, no other book-scale discussion that sets them out as clearly as Solahudin does here. By following both the people and the ideas, Solahudin fills a gap in the literature. The book seeks the deeper roots of Salafism and jihadism in Islamic tradition, reaching back to Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328). In Indonesia, the story begins with the Padri movement in West Sumatra over two centuries ago, from which Solahudin quickly moves to the reformist movements of the early twentieth century. This earlier history is a small part of the book, but an important one, for it reminds readers that the ideas that motivate extremists are not something recent, that they have roots in religious thinking which is validated by a long history--as, of course, are the contending Islamic traditions that reject such interpretations. There are inherent risks in writing about such a topic, for this is a field plagued by secrecy, misinformation, and disinformation. Solahudin relies on a wide range of sources, including interrogations of captured individuals and interviews with major players. The book is about clandestine, violent movements that engage in criminality and mayhem, whose enemies include repressive governments and their agents (who sometimes infiltrate or befriend terrorist groups if it suits them)--including police of legendary levels of corruption and brutality--the records of whose interrogations are subject to grave doubts about their veracity and the likelihood of whose interviews being candid and reliable must be doubtful. …