INDONESIA: The Unfinished Tour

For Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, Britain’s special envoy to Indonesia, time dragged as sluggishly as a sick carabao. While he waited for Indonesians and Dutch to get together, the Ambassador visited Surabaya, where tall, mustachioed Major General Eric Mansergh, Commander of the Fifth Indian Division, invited him to give British troops a lecture about Russia.

The lecture hall was Surabaya’s Rex Cinema, hot, humid and jampacked with soldiers. Britain’s former Ambassador to Russia and next Ambassador to the U.S. stepped up to the speaker’s stand. First he tried to pour himself a drink, but the cap on the bottle stuck. Next he asked for a reading lamp. It was brought, minus a shade. Sir Archibald borrowed a beret from an officer in the first row and placed it jauntily over the light. Then he began:

“I want to take you on a little tour. . . .” But only a squeak came from the microphone. Sir Archibald shouted: “Can you hear me?” A thousand throats yelled: “No!”

An officer hurriedly adjusted a wire. Again Sir Archibald shouted: “Can you hear me?” Half a thousand throats yelled: “No!” The other half-thousand cried: “Yes.” General Mansergh stepped into the breach, bellowed: “I want one man to answer and only one. Third man from the left in the last row in the balcony—can you hear the Ambassador?” A lonely voice piped: “No.” Again someone fiddled with the wires. For the third time Sir Archibald cleared his throat:

“I want to take you on a little tour. . . .” At this point he was drowned out by the rush and thud of a sudden tropical rainstorm. Java’s torrid heat made closing the doors unthinkable. Then nearby British artillery opened fire, presumably against Indonesian guerrillas. Sir Archibald, seasoned diplomat though he was, gave up, with a shrug of his shoulders. “I can’t compete with this,” said he. General Mansergh, not realizing that the thunderous obbligato was being played by his own guns, bellowed: “The Ambassador can’t compete with the Almighty—rain and thunder!”

As the special envoy hurried away, the speaker’s lamp started burning a hole through the lampshade beret.