The palace is on ''sensory overload'' without the capacity to handle it, as one high U.S. official put it off the record. Even more pressing, escalating violence between Muslims and Christians in the Maluku islands has resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, with no end in sight. But Keith Richburg, a veteran Washington Post correspondent here, warned us to check with others on that promise, given Wahid's propensity for wild, meaningless statements. This past week, in fact, the army admitted that some of its troops there have taken sides, exacerbating the situation rather than making arrests. He listed territorial integrity as ''our most worrying problem.
Most people doubt that.
It was the foundation of the strength of both Sukarno and Suharto, the latter a general. One of the most important democratic reforms begun under Habibie was the separation of the army from politics and civilian control of the military, with the resulting loss of much of its power. At the same time, government commissions are investigating the role of the army in massacres in both East Timor and Jakarta itself. They really don't know how to operate in the new Indonesia,'' scholar Douglas Ramage of the Asia Foundation said. He added that the military is so discredited that any worry about a coup ''makes no sense.