Executive summary
There is, I think, a tendency for
us all to forget the self-evident truth that you cannot look forward with
certainty, only backwards. Knowing an end point, it is easy to interpret, or
reinterpret, the past.[1]
Introduction
The Bali bombings of 12 October 2002 drove home to Australian citizens the nature
and extent of the terrorist threat to Western interests in SouthEast Asia, and in Indonesia in particular. As this Report conveys, it is
not as though a terrorist action of some kind was entirely unexpected. There
was, however, no clear warning in the form of specific intelligence which, if
identified and acted upon, would have provided an opportunity to prevent the Bali bombing or to act to protect those there at
the time. Intelligence agencies had reported that Indonesia-based terrorists
had the intention and capability to mount attacks against Western interests,
and that Australian interests could not be regarded as exempt from such
attacks. For several years the rise of extremism in Indonesia and SE Asia more broadly had been reported by the
intelligence agencies of Australia and its allies. It had been examined,
disputed and discussed by academics; it had been a topic for conferences and
seminars; articles had been appearing in journals and in the press. By
September 2001, ASIO had raised the assessed level of threat to Australian
interests in Indonesia to HIGHa setting at which it remained
thereafter.
In December 2001,
from the interrogation of operatives involved in the Singapore bombings, emerged the unequivocal presence
in the region of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) as a terrorist organisation, certainly
inspired by and probably with substantial links to alQa'ida. Within six
months, few people with an interest in regional security were in any doubt that
JI cells were active in Indonesia, that the US and its allies, including
Australia, had been declared the enemy, and that JI strikes could include 'soft
targets'.
During 2002,
Australian intelligence agencies intensified their efforts to secure better
information about the structure, capabilities and intentions of JI and other
militant groups. In Australia, ASIO, ONA, DIO and others reported
regularly on the progress of their understanding. While there was some
variation in these assessments, the overall picture was consolidating rapidly
around a high threat level, a domestic security situation in Indonesia that was
becoming increasingly violent, and the existence of terrorist groups with both
the capacity, resources and intention to target Western interests, both 'soft'
and 'hard'. Australian interests could not be considered exempt.
Meanwhile, tens of
thousands of Australian touristsroughly 20,000 per monthcontinued to flock to
Bali, the vast majority of them ignorant of the assessed level of threat, with
very few of them apparently having consulted the DFAT Travel Advices pertaining
to Indonesia, and probably not one of them aware of ASIO's view that the level
of threat across Indonesia was 'high', and that Bali could not be separated out
from that assessment.
The Committee has
not had access to classified intelligence material, and has relied on the
evidence provided in public by agency officials, and on the publicly-released
findings of the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (the Blick
Report).The Senate Committee's Report attempts to deliver an account of this
period which is faithful to the record of activities of Australian agencies as
they presented it to the Committee, that is fair to both the intelligence
services and to DFAT in its analysis and critique, and which avoids as far as
possible the risks of judgements made in hindsight.
This is not to say
that there is no wisdom to found in hindsightotherwise any examination and
reflection after the event would be redundant. The Committee scrutinises
judgements that were made; it compares and contrasts advice produced by
different sources and considers carefully the interpretations and emphases
conveyed in that information and advice. The Report presents these in order
assist with an appreciation of how the agencies acted and why, and whether the
reasons were sufficient and the decisions robustly grounded. The comments do
not imply or infer blame, let alone apportion it.
The Senate Committee
has endeavoured to discharge its terms of reference thoroughly, and believes
that it has done so to the full extent of the evidence presented to it. The
Committee has made every effort to ensure that the relevant government agencies
were given every opportunity to place their views and judgements on the public
record, and to respond to the array of questions, concerns and allegations that
have animated the public debate since Bali.
That Bali was a disaster is a cruel but simple fact of
contemporary history. It was not so as a result of some culpable lapse by
Australian government agencies or individual officials. Yes, there was a
'failure of intelligence' but it is important not to regard limitations on
intelligence as necessarily implying limitations on the skill and integrity of
intelligence agencies. Australia's intelligence agencies did not know, before
December 2001, of the existence of JI as a terrorist organisation. If there was
any notable omission thereafter that contributed to the disaster it was the
incapacity, or lack of political will on the part of the Indonesian government
at that time to fully acknowledge JI's presence on its soil and to act
decisively against extremists. Today, of course, the Indonesian government is
an indispensable ally of Australia's in the fight against regional terrorism,
and there is unprecedented collaboration on counter-terrorism between the two
neighbours.
The Committee is
satisfied that important lessons have been learned from the tragic events of Bali, and hopes that this Report will illuminate
and extend those lessons.
Travel advice and threat assessments
At the time of this
Report going to print in August 2004, the official ASIO threat assessment for Indonesia remained at high, and the official DFAT
Travel Advice was that Australians should defer non-essential travel to Indonesia as a whole, including Bali. Despite this persistent advice, Australians
have continued to flock to Bali in
their thousandsaround 15,000 per month since mid2003.
The Committee makes
this observation by way of affirming that official advice can only ever be
that; Australians will continue to make their own decisions about how that
advice impacts upon their personal choices and circumstances. This does not, of
course, diminish the absolute requirement that our intelligence agencies and
DFAT must always ensure that the advice they give is as accurate, meaningful,
relevant, accessible and intelligible as possible.
The Committee is
completely satisfied that, on the basis of all the evidence arrayed before it,
there was no specific warning of the Bali
attack. ASIO had, from September 2001 onwards, assessed the threat to
Australian interests in Indonesia as high. From December 2001, Australia's intelligence agencies expended substantial
effort to come to grips with the structure of terrorist groups in Indonesia, particularly Jemaah Islamiyah, and their links with international terrorists, notably alQa'ida.
Throughout 2002 there was a persistent escalation of advice as agencies came to
better appreciate the capacity and intent of JI. This advice was variously
conveyed in widelydisseminated formal written 'product', through direct
briefings, in discussions at toplevel security committees, and through almost
daily contact between officials of the relevant agencies.
For DFAT, threat assessments
produced by ASIO were a key consideration in the formulation of travel advice.
Prior to Bali, however, ASIO was not itself involved in scrutinising or
clearing DFAT travel advice to the extent of ensuring that threats were
adequately reflected in that advice. Since Bali, ASIO has been systematically involved in
the Travel Advice process.
During the year
before the Bali bombings, DFAT Travel Advice contained
generic threat advice, with particular attention being paid to those areas of Indonesia where domestic ethnic and religious
political violence posed serious risks to travellers. They included reference
to explosions and bomb threats in Jakarta and elsewhere. For the first half of 2002
there was no notable warning about the deliberately antiWestern terrorist
threat of the kind being discerned by the intelligence agencies during that
period. The advisories tended to highlight the risks to foreigners arising from
demonstrations and protests, and from harassment and opportunistic physical
assault by militants. They did, however, warn that Australians should take
seriously any bomb threats made against them or the premises they occupied. The
advisories also stated, in response to persistent questions from travellers,
that Bali was 'calm' and that tourist services were
'normal'.
In July 2002, the
Travel Advices were strengthened to convey to travellers the need to 'monitor
carefully developments' and to 'maintain a high level of personal security
awareness'. The Advice also now warned that bombs had been exploded 'including
in areas frequented by tourists' and that 'further explosions may be
attempted'.
From 10
September 2002, each
Travel Advice headline summary began with the words: 'In view of the ongoing
risk of terrorist activity in the region ' and concluded with the words:
'Tourism services elsewhere in Indonesia are operating normally, including Bali.'
In the Committee's
view, the information and warnings contained in the travel advisories for
Indonesia during the month or so before the Bali attacks, while warning of an
increased generic terrorist risk, nonetheless did not adequately reflect the
content of the threat assessments that were available by that time that
specifically warned that Australians in their own right were now seen as
terrorist targets in Indonesia. ASIO's threat assessments had made plain that
Australians were potential terrorist targets not just because they were
'westerners', but because Australia itself had become a focus of alQa'ida/Jemaah
Islamiah terrorist attention. In the Committee's view it would have been better
for this additional piece of information to have been provided through DFAT's
travel advisories so that potential Australian travellers would have been aware
that Australians in their own right were now the objects of specific terrorist
interest in Indonesia.
Furthermore, while
DFAT's travel advisories warned of a generic terrorist threat 'in the region',
the ASIO threat assessments had referred to Australians becoming potential
terrorist targets specifically within Indonesia (as well as elsewhere in the region). Again,
it is the Committee's view that it would have been better to tell the
Australian travelling public that Australians in Indonesia (rather than simply westerners within the
region) were of potential interest to alQa'ida/JI terrorist organisations.
It would be
reasonable to assume, however, that anyone reading the Travel Adviceeven just
the headline summary and Safety and Security sectionwould understand that there was a
generic terrorist risk, that bombs had exploded in the past, including where
tourists gathered, and that further explosions may be attempted.
What the Travel
Advice reader may not have
appreciated was that Bali was no safer than any other part of Indonesia in terms of the terrorist risk or the
likelihood of a bomb going off. The Committee considers that there are at least
two reasons why this may have been so.
The first is that
the average touristcertainly as represented by some of the Bali victims and
their families that appeared before the Committeeregarded Bali as a safe
haven, set apart from the rest of Indonesia, a destination regarded as
'special' by the many hundreds of thousands of Australians who had visited Bali
over many years. The second is that the references to Bali as 'calm' and
'normal', especially when juxtaposed against those specified locations that
were highlighted as dangerous, would have resonated reassuringly with what the
intending Bali holiday-maker already, but mistakenly, believed.
During its inquiry,
the Committee was repeatedly informed by almost every official who appeared
before it that, throughout 2002, Bali could
not be considered any safer, or at less risk of terrorist attack, than anywhere
else in Indonesiathat Bali was just as vulnerable and the threat to it
was just as high as the rest of the country.
This fact was
constantly pressed upon the Committee by both the intelligence agencies and by
DFAT officials. Yet nowhere in DFAT's Travel Advice for the period was that
fact conveyed simply and directly to the Australian travelling public, even
though the (mistaken) idea that Bali was a
safe haven somehow set apart from Indonesia was almost an article of faith among
Australian tourists. The Bulletins issued to resident expatriates and
registered visitors by the Australian Embassy in Jakarta, whenever there was a
reference to Bali being calm and normal, always added the reminder: 'Australian tourists in Bali
should observe the same prudence as tourists in other parts of the country'.
The Committee considers
that advice about Bali being 'calm' and with tourism 'normal', while being
strictly correct, and deliberately included by DFAT in response to many
questions about the state of affairs in Bali, nevertheless reinforced a benign
(and erroneous) view of Bali at precisely the time when the security threats to
Westerners from terrorists were unprecedentedly high.
What tourists really
needed was to have their pervasively inappropriate views challengedwhich does
not mean being alarmist. A suitable advice could have taken the form: "Bali has long been considered a safe haven, but
the risks of terrorism are as high there as elsewhere in Indonesia". Given that around 200,000 Australians
a year were visiting Bali, the merits of such a proposal seem
self-evident. While this suggestion benefits from hindsight, it is also a
properly contextualised, relevant and measured piece of factual advice,
entirely consistent with ASIO's uniformly high threat assessments and the
general intelligence picture at the time, and it also takes into account the
mindset of those travellers to whom it is directed.
The Committee agrees
that ASIO properly assigned a threat level of HIGH to the situation in Indonesia (and thereby Bali). The Committee notes that ASIO, along with
other agencies, was assiduous in the production of intelligence advice
throughout the period as it came to better understand the nature, capabilities
and intentions of JI. The Committee also appreciates that at no time was it
appropriate for ASIO to issue a threat assessment at the top of its threat
scalesomething which would have required the threat to be confirmed by
specific, reliable information about an attack.
But the majority of
the Committee has somewhat different views from those held by the intelligence agencies
about the particular vulnerability of
Bali at least so far as these were conveyed to the Committee by agency heads
during the Committee's hearings. Agency heads repeatedly told the Committee
that the concentration of Australians in Bali, of itself, did not render Bali a more likely target than elsewhere. The
majority of the Committee does not share that view for the following reasons.
This Report
rehearses at length the sequence of intelligence reporting relating to the
terrorist threat in Indonesia in the twelve months leading up to the Bali
bombing. In short, the threat was highofficially so from September 2001; Australia's profile as a supporter of US action was growing, and Australia was being increasingly portrayed as
antiIslamic; it was increasingly clear that JI had the intention, capability
and resources to mount terrorist attacks including against soft targets and
Australians could not be considered exempt.
Other factors were
also at play. It became more apparent during 2002 that JI had links with
alQa'ida, and that Osama bin Ladeninspired jihadism was energising Indonesian
militants. The Indonesian authorities were either unable or unwilling to act
against them. Indeed, the secular Muslim government was held in almost as much
contempt by the radicals as their nemesis the West.
Osama bin Laden had
identified Australia as a crusader force and within Indonesia there had been a surge of militancy against
Westerners and their activitiesespecially tourist and recreational
activitiesthat had long been regarded as decadent and offensive by Muslim
activists. To terrorists like JI, nursing their potent grievances, and looking
for suitable soft targets against which to exact their revenge, it is likely,
in the view of a majority of the Committee, that Bali (along with other sites)
would have been drawn into focus on the terrorists' strategic landscape.
Bali also enjoyed some qualities that
distinguished it from other tourist destinations. It was renown as the tourist
destination of choice in Indonesia for Westerners who wanted to let their hair
down. It was regarded as a safe holiday destination, with a Balinese (largely
Hindu) population that seemed more tolerant or indulgent of Western tourists'
mores and behaviour than their Javanese Muslim counterparts.
Westerners gathered
in large numbers in the clubs and bars that were concentrated in Kuta, and
there was virtually no security presence. The relatively small number of
Muslims inhabiting Bali reduced the likelihood of collateral Muslim
casualties should a strike be mounted. In the background was a strong sentiment
amongst Indonesian radicals, notably Laskar Jihad, that nonMuslim communities
should be cleared out of the region.
In the light of all
these considerations, the majority of the Committee finds it difficult to agree
with the assessment of agency heads that Bali was not any more vulnerable than any other
part of Indonesia. It was, in the Committee's majority view,
more vulnerable than many if not most partsespecially given the fiercely antiWestern,
jihadinspired and selfrighteous anger of Indonesia's extremists.
These views about Bali's vulnerability in no way detract from the
legitimacy of ASIO's assessed threat level for Indonesia being placed at HIGH from December 2001. The
Committee acknowledges that, in the absence of credible, specific information
confirming a threat, ASIO could not have issued a threat assessment any higher
than the penultimate level at which the assessment already stood. It is not in
the 'headline' threat assessments, but in the more general intelligence reports
about terrorist threats in Indonesia that more consideration should have been
given to the question of the vulnerability of Bali, especially given that around 200,000
Australians visited there each year. This might have also resulted in more
appropriately crafted Travel Advice.
Both ASIO and DFAT
have stated to the Committee that, notwithstanding the solid relationship and
good communication that existed between the two agencies prior to Bali, their roles were 'too compartmentalised'
when it came to the preparation of Travel Advice. That situation was reviewed
immediately after Bali, and new arrangements were put in place
which integrated ASIO into the iterative process whereby DFAT's Consular
Division, its South and SE Asia Division, and its Jakarta Embassy formulate
Travel Advice.
ASIO is now required
to 'tick off' on Travel Advice pertaining to any region where the ASIO threat
assessment is high. As well, DFAT has made major efforts to enhance the
dissemination, accessibility and intelligibility of its Travel Advice, and to
ensure that it works in close partnership with the travel industry to optimise
the information flowing to intending travellers. The Committee commends the
agencies on these initiatives. It is imperative that where a threat assessment
is high, every effort is made by the travel industry to ensure that that
information is drawn to travellers' attentionperhaps by annotation on the
actual airline tickets.
Travel agents are a
key source of advice for tourists. While the Committee commends the various
initiatives by DFAT and the travel industry to work in partnership to encourage
best practice, the Committee believes that steps could be taken to further
strengthen the quality of advice and service to wouldbe travellers.
The Committee has
therefore recommended that the government, in consultation with the travel
industry further develop and oversee a code of practice which would, among
other things, make it mandatory for travel agents/advisers to provide to
overseas travellers, at the time a booking is made, a copy of both DFAT's
Travel Advice for the destination concerned and ASIO's threat assessment for
the country itself. Travellers must be advised to consult the DFAT Travel
Advice 24 hours prior to their departure.
The Blick Report
Although the
Committee did not have access to the classified material that informed the
Australian intelligence agencies' assessments at the time, the Committee is in
no doubt that there was no specific, actionable intelligence related to the
bombings of 12 October 2002. This was the consistent evidence of the
intelligence agencies and was the conclusion reached by the statutorily
independent InspectorGeneral of Intelligence and Security, who did have access to all the relevant
material. The Committee has no reason to (and does not) call into question Mr Blick's conclusions.
The terms of
reference under which the Inspector-General operated did not require him to
examine areas such as the formulation and accuracy of threat assessments, and
their relationship to, and commensurability with, the travel advisories issued
over that period. The Committee does not doubt in any way the professionalism
and efficiency of the officials carrying out these duties within their respective
agencies. Because the Senate Committee has not had access to the original
intelligence, it has not been able to assess for itself whether the published
threat assessments were congruent with the intelligence available. As well,
given that such an assessment was also outside the terms of reference of the
Blick inquiry, there is little the Committee can do to prevail against public
criticism that this aspect of ASIO's work has not been subject to independent
scrutiny.
This difficulty has
not been overcome by the July 2004 report of the Flood inquiry which, by its
own account, 'did not inquire into ASIO per se because that would not have been
justified by the terms of reference. For this reason, domestic security and
intelligence arrangements are not the focus of this [Flood] report'.
Again, the Committee
can only assess the commensurability of Travel Advice against what were the
published threat assessments or what was otherwise revealed publicly to the
Committee by the agencies. Nor was the Inspector-General required to make such
a judgement. While the Committee is perfectly satisfied that its assessments
are justified on the basis of the evidence placed publicly before it, the
Committee concedes that this is unlikely to be enough to satisfy those who insist
that such assessments are impeded by lack of access to the detail of the
intelligence reporting.
The Committee is
mindful of the fact that it has been unable to have access to the underlying
intelligence assessments which gave rise to the threat assessments and travel
advisories constructed by DFAT on that basis. Further, the Committee is also
mindful of the fact that the only previous inquiry conducted into these matters
by the Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) did not have any terms
of reference empowering IGIS to examine the correlation between underlying
intelligence assessments, threat assessments, and travel advisories
For these reasons
the Committee is of the view that the country's future arrangements in these
areas may be advantaged by an independent commission of inquiry with specific
terms of reference to address these and related matters.
Allegations of 'missed' intelligence
During the inquiry,
reference was made to various reports in the press and elsewhere claiming, for
example, that relevant information from foreign intelligence agencies had been
made available to Australian authorities, and that threat advice had been
ignored. These reports and allegations were either simply erroneous or lacked
foundation, or were highly contestable opinions.
The Asian Pacific Post out of
Richmond, British Columbia, on 26 June 2003 reported that American spies identified two Bali resorts as terrorist targets months before
the Bali attacks. It also claimed that the report was
meant to be shared with allies by the US liaison officers.
According to the former
Director-General of Intelligence and Security (Bill Blick) this socalled Combined
Analysis report was a forgeryit being clearly established to his
satisfaction that there was no such report emanating from any official source. Mr
Blick's testimony was supported by a letter to the
Committee from the Director-General of ASIO (Mr
Richardson) advising that all relevant Australian agencies had
searched their records and can find no evidence that any such document was ever
received.
Mr
Richardson also provided to the Committee a copy of the 27 June 2003 letter from the US Assistant Secretary of State (James A Kelly) to HE Michael Thawley (Ambassador of Australia). The
United States Department of State advised the Australian Ambassador in Washington on 27 June that the claim was 'thoroughly researched'
and that there was 'no evidence to suggest that such a document was produced by
the US Government'.
As well as
confirming that the US Government had not produced the alleged document, the
letter from Mr Kelly also stated that 'it has consistently been our policy
to share information relating to possible terrorist threats to Australian
citizens I reaffirm: we had nothing to indicate a specific threat of attack or
danger of attack in Bali'.
Mr Richardson also told the Committee that he had been advised that there had been
an earlier, similar report in the Canadian press. 'The Canadian authorities
checked that out with the United States at the time and got the same answer,
and also the Canadian authorities could find no evidence in their system of any
such document'.
Another particular
issue that has been raised in several media reports concerns information
emerging from the interrogation by the FBI of the alQa'ida operative known as
Jabarah, who had been arrested early in 2002. During that interrogation,
Jabarah revealed that the senior JI figure known as Hambali had planned 'to
conduct small bombings in bars, cafes and nightclubs frequented by westerners
in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines and Indonesia. Hambali also
stated that he had one ton of PETN explosives in Indonesia. The source [Jabarah] did not know who would
carry out the bombings or when'.
Several of the media reports assumed that this information was made
available to Australian authorities prior to the Bali bombings. In fact, it was not forwarded to Australia until well after the event although some
general background on Jabarah had been forwarded to Australia in mid-2002. The Committee considers that at
the very least, such information about Hambali's intentions, had it arrived
earlier, would have assisted Australian intelligence agencies to enhance their
assessments of the terrorist threat in Indonesia, and could well have resulted in stronger
travel advice being issued. It could also have led to more direct pressure
being applied by the Australian government to the Indonesian authorities to
take stronger action against suspected terrorists. Whether it would have led to
explicit warnings about Bali's vulnerability is completely
undeterminable. It is unlikely, howevereven if Hambali's intentions had been
knownthat such knowledge would have resulted in the prevention of the Bali atrocity. Prior to Bali, the Indonesian
government had consistently been unable or refused to respond appropriately to
pressure from Australia and its allies to take action against extremists.
Towards the end of its inquiry, the Committee was confronted with
another controversy arising out of comments in a report published by America's Rand Corporation. Entitled Confronting the "Enemy Within",
the report examined the domestic intelligence bureaus in the UK, France, Canada and Australia. Page 49 of that report included the
following paragraph:
In the United Kingdom,
MI5 has been accused of ignoring the threat posed by al Quaeda.
Equally in Australia, regional analysts following the movements of JI charge
ASIO blatantly disregarded threat assessments that, if followed, could have
prevented the October 2002 Bali tragedy.
The footnote to the last sentence
referred to interviews with people in 'The Intelligence Corps, AFP', the
'Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies, Singapore'
and an article in The Age of 8 January 2003. The Committee wrote to
Dr Chalk,
one of the RAND Report
authors, asking for further details.
Dr Chalk responded promptly to the
Committee's letter saying that the reference to the AFP was incorrect (it
should have been the ADF), that he would not reveal his interview sources, and
that he considered The World Today
(the basis for The Age report) to be a reputable and suitable
publication upon which to draw. Dr Chalk
also pointed out that he was not making allegations against ASIO, he was simply
reporting what others had said to him.
The Committee regards the
allegations that ASIO 'blatantly disregarded' warnings that 'could have
prevented' the Bali bombing to be without foundation.
The Committee is not aware of any approaches made by Dr
Chalk to the heads of either the AFP or ASIO
to seek a response from those agencies to the allegations, either prior to or
since the publication of the RAND
report. The Committee considers that these allegations, especially given the
prominent media coverage of the RAND
report that resulted from their inclusion, may have caused unnecessary grief to
the families of Bali victims, and undermined public
confidence in ASIO.
The RAND
authors are perfectly entitled to publish their views, and to report the views
of others. However, it cannot have escaped their notice that allegations of the
type they were reporting were not inconsequential. Their failure to balance
those allegations, for example by making reference to the findings of the
widely-publicised Blick reportwhich examined all the preBali intelligence material
and concluded that there was no specific intelligence warning of the attackwas
an omission that does not reflect well on the authors.
Although not a matter that was
included in its terms of reference, the Committee considered it appropriate to
comment on the question of compensation for victims of the terrorist attacks in
Bali. There are some complex jurisdictional issues at
play here that have led to variable levels of assistance and support to Bali
victims. The Committee has made some recommendations to both Commonwealth and
State governments with a view to establishing a fair national scheme for
compensating victims of crimes such as terrorism.
Senator
Steve Hutchins
Chair