St. Whitlam's halo is listing after recent reexaimnation of his role in the invasion of East Timor by Indonesia during his tenure as Australian PM (story). brought up again by a coronial inquest into the deaths of Australian journalists in the country, butchered by Indonesian troops. Fair play to these brave journos, but really, who are they compared to the 200,000 locals slaughtered by the Indonesian military, with the complicity of Whitlam. We know Whitlam knew that indiscriminate bloodletting was going to eventuate because he basically advised the journalists that they'd risk being killed by being in East Timor. His contention that Australia was incapable of preventing the invasion may have been true, but this is no excuse for complicity in atrocities of this magnitude. It's clear that Australian policy never essentially varied, including under Whitlam, namely that fuzzy-wuzzies are better dead than red.

'Free Hew Griffiths' at stoush.net.