1945: Sukarno, with Mohammad Hatta, proclaims independence from the Netherlands for Indonesia on August 17, two days after the Japanese surrender.

1953: President Dwight Eisenhower draws the attention of U.S. politicians to Indonesia. In a speech to a governors' conference, he says that Washington should continue to foot the bill for the French war in Indochina because "if we lost all that, how would the free world hold the rich empire of Indonesia?"

1958: A CIA pilot, Allen Lawrence Pope, is shot down over Sumatra while flying with an Indonesian right-wing rebel force.

1959-1965: The United States pumps $64 million in military aid to the right-wing Indonesian generals.

1963: Sukarno proclaims himself president for life.

1975: The Indonesian military government invades East Timor—with the blessing of U.S. President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger—and tries to crush the liberation movement there.

Today: Twenty...