The Communist-oriented putsch developed on the night of September 30, 1965, when the Indonesian Communist Party--the oldest in Asia--had attained the zenith of its power and influence as the biggest Communist movement in the world after China and Russia. When Sukarno, the Communists, and a group of "progressive, revolutionary officer" struck, the Anglo-American allies were standing back to back on the rim of the South China Sea. In Vietnam, to the...