Crisis, Self-Reflection, and Rebirth in Singapore's National Life Cycle

Southeast Asian Affairs 2003, pp. 241-58 CRISIS, SELF-REFLECTION, AND REBIRTH IN SINGAPORE'S NATIONAL LIFE CYCLE Kenneth Paul Tan The year was marked by economic and security crises on the one hand, and on the other by national consultation, self-reflection, and self-critique, all with the aim of remaking a nation that by most accounts has not even been made yet.1 But a nation-building project with a clear start and a conceivable moment of completion is little more than a fiction, though a useful one because it narrates (and so explains) past, present, and future in ways that orientate individual experiences and values to the needs, purposes, and destiny of the imaginary nation. But Singapore, as with all living nations, can only be alive if its meanings and purposes are the site of an inconclusive and dialectical relationship between conflict and celebration, a slippery and fragile balance that serves to re-enchant the national imagination within processes of globalization that curiously homogenize as much as they fragment. Dealing with Terrorism: The Strategies On 11 September 2001, explosions rippled out from the economic and political capitals of the most powerful nation on earth, and the rest of the unsuspecting world was stunned. Ordinary people reacted with sympathy, empathy, and righteous indignation, while the political élite grappled internationally with the difficult question, "What is to be done?" For Singaporeans, the answers were clear as an increasing stream of media images put real names and faces to the shadowy, and at one time faraway, world of international political violence. It was no longer just a story of an American tragedy that inspired, far beyond its shores, a sense of pity and terror. It had become a sobering realization that slippery, transnationally organized, and highly motivated networks brought the possibility of terrorist activity much closer to home. In less than three months, the Singapore Government detained under the Internal Security Act fifteen men suspected of terrorist activities that included drawing up plans to attack U.S. interests in Singapore such as the Embassy and other commercial buildings, and even American personnel who were known to travel by the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system from the station at Yishun, a public housing estate. Other Western diplomatic buildings Kenneth Paul Tan is Assistant Professor at the University Scholar Programme and Department of Political Science, National University of Singapore. 242Kenneth Paul Tan were also targets. The suspects, comprising fourteen Singaporeans and a Malaysian citizen who had once been a Singaporean, were also alleged to have attempted to procure materials for making explosives. Thirteen of the suspects were described as active members of the Jemaah Islamiah (JI), a clandestine Islamic organization said to have links with the Al-Qaeda, the powerful international network headed by Osama bin Laden who has taken full responsibility for the "September 11" bombings.2 Eight months later, another twenty-one people were detained for more terrorist-related activities including the surveillance of possible targets for attack. But this time, alongside a U.S. naval vessel, the possible targets included nonAmerican ones such as Changi Airport, chemical plants on Jurong Island, reservoirs, water pipelines, MRT stations, and the headquarters of the Defence and Education Ministries. The arrests were announced to the public in September, the following month. Nineteen of the arrested were suspected members of the JI, and the remaining two were linked to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, an Islamic rebel group operating in southern Philippines.3 It was becoming increasingly clear that the terrorist centre of gravity was shifting to Southeast Asia, and that this would become a regional problem. The Singapore Government, having identified up to eighty members of the JI operating within its own borders, has also named Abu Bakar Bashir as the Indonesian mastermind behind the JI regional networks that enjoy ties with the Al-Qaeda and that seek to establish by violent means an Islamic state linking Indonesia, Malaysia, southern Philippines, and southern Thailand. Bashir has denied any links with the JI and even the very existence of this organization, calling Singapore an anti-Islam ally of America that has made false accusations in order to give the superpower an excuse to intervene...