The idea of Indonesia taking over East Timor in and of itself was no more illogical or immoral than India’s takeover of Goa or China’s later takeover of Hong Kong and Macau.
East Timor was to all intents and purposes a part of the Indonesian archipelago, its people were pretty much identical to the Timorese Indonesians of West Timor. It was a pointless appendage of the defunct Portuguese empire and was descending into civil war and control by Marxists.
The US simply turned a blind eye to Indonesia taking over, it seemed to pretty much everyone in the world to be the logical solution.
What was not expected was the savage brutality of the Indonesians when they invaded which was utterly unnecessary and totally self defeating, something most Indonesians (who in fairness had no say in the matter at the time) would agree today.
The Indonesians certainly developed the province in a way that the Portuguese never bothered in their 300 years of colonial rule, but that counted for nothing given their appalling treatment of the Timorese which will always remain a stain on Indonesia’s record.
It is fair to say now however that Indonesia and East Timor (Timor Leste) have superb relations today and if everything is not forgotten or indeed forgiven both countries, as among the few democracies in SE Asia are moving forward together.
Before anyone starts with the Islam thing, religion was a total irrelevance in the invasion, it was a matter of territorial integrity for the Indonesians and a part of their virulent campaign against Communism, at which they were very good and supported by the US.
I remember that. It was pretty nasty. Getting over the loss of Viet Nam didn’t help. Pawns on a chess board.
There was, however, the matter of the butchering of over 100,000 Timorese. But, Gerald Ford like all RepublicRATS was an honorable man.