The Salatun Files - A Brief Background

As a fellow Indonesian, Air Vice Marshall (Ret.) J. Salatun's book - 'Menyingkap Rahasia Piring Terbang' (Unveiling the Flying Saucer's Secret) published in 1960, is truly an intriguing literature to behold. On the one hand, it is the first ever 'indigenous' literature on ufology to be published in Indonesia. Furthermore it is also written in a highly serious manner pertaining to the most sophisticated 'scientific' efforts of the time to explain the UFO phenomena. It wasn't just a catalogue of 'western' UFO-related cases, from someone who simply believed in everything others' have to say about the phenomena. It was more likely a quite meticulous analysis done by an active Air Force officer (still a Lt. Col. by then) who is concerned about the potential security threat as well as technological edge connected to the UFO phenomena.

On the other hand, Salatun's monumental work has (strangely enough) never stirred up a widespread interest on ufology in Indonesia. At least not until quite recently. One could even say that the book practically remained in relative obscurity for the past 4 decades. Was it because political turmoils has pretty much predominate Indonesians' life in the 1960's? Did the book itself simply fail to hold any interest for the majority of Indonesians at the time? Whatever it is, decades after it was published, the majority of Indonesians still consider the UFO phenomena as an exclusively 'western' (if not 'American') issue. At times, it even seemed easier for Indonesians to accept the possibility of UFO cases when it happens elsewhere rather in their own homeland.

One could speculate that Salatun's book and its relative 'alienation' from the local public up until now might also account for the somewhat slow development of ufology in Indonesia. Perhaps, providing an online repository of the book's excerpts as well as some personal analysis regarding its most intriguing contents would change the situation for the better. Such an effort has actually been done by the country's most active group in ufology : BETA UFO, through their website (although the focus is more to collecting and analyzing cases). In light of that one does believe that an online English data base, focusing on Salatun's original book/writtings, is the logical next step to take.

This is the reason for starting this series of writting entitled "The Salatun Files". How much will this effort actually affect the development of ufology in Indonesia? One could only hope it will not be diminutive nor futile.