December 6, 1995
introductory note from David Johnson:

On May 21, 1990 the journalist Kathy Kadane working for States News Service published an article in the Washington Post, "U.S. Officials' Lists Aided Indonesian Bloodbath in '60s."
On July 12, 1990 the New York Times published an article by Michael Wines, "C.I.A. Tie Asserted in Indonesia Purge." Wines' article contained criticism of Kadane's article by several of the U.S. officials that Kadane had interviewed and several other people.
In response to the New York Times, States News Service distributed a 20-page memorandum to newspaper editors defending the accuracy of Kathy Kadane's work and including excerpts from the interviews that Kadane had made with the top three U.S. Embassy officials in 1965: Ambassador Marshall Green; Deputy Chief of Mission Jack Lydman; and political section chief Edward Masters.

Reprinted here is the July 1990 States News Service memo to editors. Readers may be interested to compare the remarks of the U.S. officials here with their subsequent claims after attention had been drawn to their activities in 1965. For example, the News York Times article states that "Mr. Green...called the Kadane account 'garbage.'"

In his 1990 book (Indonesia: Crisis and Transformation 1965- 1968) Marshall Green devotes a footnote to the Kadane material.

B. Hugh Tovar, the CIA station chief in Jakarta in 1965, was not interviewed by Kadane but has commented on her work. Tovar published an article "The Indonesian Crisis of 1965-1966: A Retrospective," in the International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, 1994, volume 7, number 3. (We should note in passing that in this article Tovar states that on October 1, 1965, "The CIA didn't even realize who Suharto was at that time...He was a comparatively obscure officer." Remember that Suharto was the number two ranking officer in the Army, after General Yani.)
This is what Tovar states about Kadane's research.