ISIS in Indonesia: Understanding the Threat

Members Only Subscribe to read the full article
Already a member? Log In

January’s ISIS inspired attack in Jakarta raises serious concerns that the ISIS brand might be spreading to the world’s largest Muslim country.  Indonesia is the home to more Muslims than the entire Arab Middle East combined and occupies a strategic location alongside the busiest trading routes in the world.  Any serious inroads by ISIS in South East Asia would be a significant setback for Western efforts to battle the militant/terrorist group.  However, a closer look at the attack in Jakarta shows that the emergence of ISIS in Indonesia, while troubling, is probably more related to Indonesia’s unique circumstances than to anything that ISIS itself has accomplished.

Indonesia is home to over 200 million Sunni Muslims, but it is not a Muslim state.  There is no reference to Islam in Indonesia’s constitution, and the country has a long tradition of religious tolerance.   It could have gone the other way, however.

The Cipher Brief has become the most popular outlet for former intelligence officers; no media outlet is even a close second to The Cipher Brief in terms of the number of articles published by formers.” —Sept. 2018, Studies in Intelligence, Vol. 62

Access all of The Cipher Brief‘s national security-focused expert insight by becoming a Cipher Brief Subscriber+Member.

Continue Reading

Get access to all our briefs

Sign up Today

Already a member? Log In

Categorized as:InternationalTagged with:

Search

Close