Sukarno
Sukarno was an Indonesian statesman, activist, and revolutionary who served as the first president of Indonesia from 1945 to 1967.
Sukarno was the leader of the Indonesian struggle for independence from the Dutch colonialists. He was a prominent leader of Indonesia's nationalist movement during the colonial period and spent over a decade under Dutch detention until released by the invading Japanese forces in World War II. Sukarno and his fellow nationalists collaborated to garner support for the Japanese war effort from the population, in exchange for Japanese aid in spreading nationalist ideas. Upon Japanese surrender, Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declared Indonesian independence on 17 August 1945, and Sukarno was appointed president. He led the Indonesian resistance to Dutch re-colonisation efforts via diplomatic and military means until the Dutch recognition of Indonesian independence in 1949. As a result, he was given the title "Father of Proclamation".
After a tumultuous period of parliamentary democracy, Sukarno introduced an authoritarian system known as "Guided Democracy" in 1959 to restore stability and suppress regional rebellions. By the early 1960s, Sukarno pursued an aggressive foreign policy and positioned Indonesia as a leading voice in the anti-imperialist Non-Aligned Movement. These policies increased tensions with Western powers and brought Indonesia closer to the Soviet Union, despite being a non-communist state. The culmination of this policy was CONEFO, Sukarno's plan for a new United Nations based in Jakarta.
Following the events of the 30 September Movement, a coup attempt, General Suharto assumed control of the government in a military takeover. This was accompanied by a large-scale anti-communist purge backed by Western intelligence agencies including from the United States and the United Kingdom. Between 500,000 and over one million people were killed in mass killings targeting members and suspected sympathisers of the PKI.
Suharto officially became president in 1967, while Sukarno was placed under house arrest until his death in 1970. He was buried in Blitar, East Java, next to his mother. During the first few years of Suharto's New Order regime, Sukarno's role in the country's independence and his earlier achievements were minimized, and his name was largely removed from public discourse. However, as opposition against Suharto increased with his eventual fall in 1998, public interest in Sukarno was revived in tandem to democratic reforms. Today, his legacy as the founding father of Indonesia and a symbol of national unity and independence continues to be widely respected by many Indonesians, often more so than that of Suharto.
Name
The name Sukarno comes from the mythological chief hero of the Mahabharata, Karna. The spelling Soekarno, based on Dutch orthography, is still in frequent use, mainly because he signed his name in the old spelling. Sukarno himself insisted on a "u" in writing, not "oe," but said that he had been told in school to use the Dutch style, and that after 50 years, it was too difficult to change his signature, so he still signed with an "oe." Official Indonesian presidential decrees from the period 1947–1968, however, printed his name using the 1947 spelling. The Soekarno–Hatta International Airport, which serves the area near Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, still uses the Dutch spelling.Indonesians also remember him as Bung Karno or Pak Karno. Like many Javanese people, he had only one name.
He is sometimes referred to in foreign accounts as Achmed Sukarno, or some variation thereof. A source from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs revealed that "Achmed" was coined by M. Zein Hassan, an Indonesian student at Al-Azhar University and later a member of the staff at the Ministry, to establish Sukarno's identity as a Muslim to the Egyptian press after a brief controversy at that time in Egypt alleging Sukarno's name was "not Muslim enough." After the use of the name "Achmed" began, Muslim and Arab states freely supported Sukarno. Thus, in correspondence with the Middle East, Sukarno always signed his name as "Achmed Sukarno."
Early life and family
The son of a Muslim Javanese primary school teacher, a priyayi named Raden who hailed from Grobogan, Central Java, and his Hindu Balinese wife from the Brahmin caste named from Buleleng, Bali, Sukarno was born in Surabaya, East Java, in the Dutch East Indies, where his father had been sent following an application for a transfer to Java. He was originally named Kusno Sosrodihardjo. Following Javanese custom, he was renamed after surviving a childhood illness.Education
After graduating from a native primary school in 1912, he was sent to the Europeesche Lagere School in Mojokerto. Subsequently, in 1916, Sukarno went to a Hogere Burgerschool in Surabaya, where he met Tjokroaminoto, a nationalist and founder of Sarekat Islam. In 1920, Sukarno married Tjokroaminoto's daughter Siti Oetari. In 1921, he began to study civil engineering at the Technische Hoogeschool te Bandoeng, where he obtained an Ingenieur degree in 1926. During his study in Bandung, Sukarno became romantically involved with Inggit Garnasih, the wife of Sanoesi, the owner of the boarding house where he lived as a student. Inggit was 13 years older than Sukarno. In March 1923, Sukarno divorced Siti Oetari to marry Inggit. Sukarno later divorced Inggit and married Fatmawati.Atypically even among the country's small educated elite, Sukarno was fluent in several languages. In addition to the Javanese language of his childhood, he spoke Sundanese, Balinese and Indonesian, and Dutch. He was also quite comfortable in German, English, French, Arabic, and Japanese, all of which were taught at his HBS. He was helped by his photographic memory and precocious mind.
In his studies, Sukarno was "intensely modern", both in architecture and in politics. He despised both the traditional Javanese feudalism, which he considered "backward" and to blame for the fall of the country under Dutch occupation and exploitation, and the imperialism practised by Western countries, which he termed as "exploitation of humans by other humans". He blamed this for the deep poverty and low levels of education of the Indonesian people under the Dutch. To promote nationalistic pride amongst Indonesians, Sukarno interpreted these ideas in his dress, in his urban planning for the capital, and in his socialist politics, though he did not extend his taste for modern art to pop music; he had the Indonesian musical group Koes Bersaudara imprisoned for their allegedly decadent lyrics despite his reputation for womanising. For Sukarno, modernity was blind to race, neat and elegant in style, and anti-imperialist.
Architectural career
After graduation in 1926, Sukarno and his university friend Anwari established the architectural firm Soekarno & Anwari in Bandung, which provided planning and contractor services. Among Sukarno's architectural works are the renovated building of the Preanger Hotel, where he acted as assistant to famous Dutch architect Charles Prosper Wolff Schoemaker. Sukarno also designed many private houses on today's Jalan Gatot Subroto, Jalan Palasari, and Jalan Dewi Sartika in Bandung.Later on, as president, Sukarno remained engaged in architecture, designing the Proclamation Monument and adjacent Gedung Pola in Jakarta; the Youth Monument in Semarang; the Alun-alun Monument in Malang; the Heroes' Monument in Surabaya; and also the new city of Palangkaraya in Central Kalimantan. Sukarno was also deeply involved in building the Gelora Bung Karno Sports Complex which includes him proposing the design for the roof of its main stadium.