THE
INDONESIAN
STORY
The Birth, Growth and
Structure of the
Indonesian Republic
CHARLES WOLF, Jr.
Issued under the auspices of the
American Institute of Pacific Relations
THE JOHN DAY COMPANY, NEW YORK 1948
All rights reserved
Copyright* 1948, by the International Secretariat
Institute of Pacific Relations
1 East 54th Street
Nezv York 22, 2V. Y.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
AMERICAN BOOKSTRATFORD PRESS, INC., NEW YORK, N. Y
To
T. W.
PREFACE
It is not surprising that the islands of the
Indies have more than once been referred to as the cultural “melting
pot of Asia.” The founding of the Hindu kingdom of Taruma in
Western Java brought the rich heritage of ancient India to Indonesia
over 1200 years ago. Later, pilgrims from India introduced Gau-
tama’s teachings to the islands, and in the 8th and 9th centuries
Buddhism reached its apogee with the hegemony of the Sumatran
Empire of Shrivijaya. The remarkable Borobodur, with its countless
carved stone figures of the Buddha, still stands in Middle Java as a
monument to Buddhist art.
In the 14th century the Madjapahit Empire, extending from
New Guinea in the East to Sumatra in the West, brought about
a fusion of the Brahman-Buddhist strains in Indonesian culture.
Madjapahit later fell before the crusading vigor of Islam. By the end
of the 15th century Mohammedanism had been accepted in all of
Java and thence it spread to other parts of the archipelago. The
acceptance of Islam was in many cases merely nominal. To this day
Hindu influence remains in Indonesia as a sort of subtle pantheism,
combined with a naturalist paganism in the more remote parts of the
islands. In Bali and several of the remoter parts of Indonesia, Islam
has never been adopted. There the Brahman-Buddhist-naturalist
traditions have endured to the present day, still basically unchanged.
Western penetration into Indonesia began in the 16th century
with the arrival of the Portuguese, who were ousted in 1595 by the
Dutch. Gradually bringing the outer islands under formal control,
the Dutch erected a colonial structure which was to last until World
War II. But as the Dutch colonial structure matured, Indonesian
nationalism evolved. The nationalist movement gathered increasing
momentum after the turn of the century. When the Japanese occu-
pied the islands at the start of 1942, it grew at an accelerated pace
and with Japan’s surrender, the nationalists prepared for what they
hoped would be a new era in Indonesia’s history. On August 17,
vii
PREFACE
1945, the Republic of Indonesia proclaimed its independence. This
is where the present book begins.
For the people of Indonesia, the surrender of the Japanese to the
Allies meant the beginning rather than the end of war; or more pre-
cisely, it meant the beginning of their war and the end of a foreign
war. They had been affected by World War II. It had been waged
partly on their lands and seas. They had suffered during four years
under a Japanese misrule harsher than anything they had expe-
rienced during three hundred and fifty years of Dutch colonialism.
But in Indonesia, and the other areas of Southeast Asia, the people
had never really become a party to or partisans of the war. There
were small pro-Ally resistance groups in Indonesia, and a few ardent
Japanese supporters as well. But in general, World War II remained
for the people of Indonesia a struggle among alien forces.
During the Japanese occupation, the seeds of Indonesian national-
ism burgeoned. To some degree this was the result of Japanese
propaganda. To a larger degree it was independent of Japanese in-
fluence and quite often a reaction against it. Starting from the as-
sumption that the Japanese overlord was only a temporary master,
the intellectual leaders of the nationalist movement in Indonesia
began to prepare for their real problem: resistance to a post-war
restoration of colonialism. Taking advantage of the opportunity,
they began the task of organizing and mobilizing the ignorant masses
of the population in preparation for the future. They collaborated
with the Japanese to secure these ends. They also supported the
Japanese propaganda of “Greater East Asia” and “Asia for the Asi-
atics” largely because it was a useful and practical tool. The Japa-
nese gave the people of Indonesia sufficient grievances against them
to make antipathy against the Japanese keener there, two and a half
years after the occupation, than it is today in the United States. Yet
the nationalist leaders were in many cases willing to collaborate be-
cause of the ends they had in view. Much had been done toward the
achievement of these ends when the Japanese capitulated, and the
struggle for a new Indonesia began.
This was the position in Indonesia when the British prepared to
re-occupy the islands in September 1945. Much of the background
is feeling and impression psychological and emotionalwhich per-
meated almost all of Southeast Asia at the time of re-occupation.
The forces of the past and of the future met and began to be
resolved, as opposing political and sociological forces usually are,
partly by statesmanship and partly by military pressure. This book
PREFACE IX
deals with the meeting and resolution of these forces. More partic-
ularly, it deals with the political and economic struggle which has
been going on in Indonesia since 1945 and with the young Repub-
lic’s record during this turbulent period. Notwithstanding the ex-
tremely fluid situation prevailing at the time of writing, an attempt
has been made to analyze the Republic’s longer-range prospects, and
to suggest their implications.
Many of the issues discussed are highly controversial. Both the
Indonesian and Dutch viewpoints are held strongly, if not violently,
by their adherents. A sincere effort has been made to be objective
in the analysis; that is, to present each side of the controversy in its
own terms and from its own point of view. Where comparison and
evaluation are undertaken, I have tried to be fair. It is, however, not
always easy or valid to subsume the irrational components of revolu-
tion under the rational. Nevertheless, on both sides of the dispute,
material which was felt to contribute heat rather than light has been
left out. Where value judgments have been made/ 1 think they will
stand out clearly as such to the reader. Reactions and comments
elicited by the manuscript prior to printing have indicated that the
above efforts will not prove fully satisfactory to either Dutch or
Indonesian partisans. That is probably unavoidable.
It should be noted that the scope of the present work is necessarily
limited. No attempt has been made to deal with cultural develop-
ments in modern Indonesia. Only brief reference has been made to
the complicated problem of Chinese and Eurasian minority groups.
Nor is the presentation of Republican economics as complete or
analytical as would be warranted in a work of more exhaustive scope.
Finally, limitations of time and space have made it impossible to dis-
cuss fully certain aspects of events in Indonesia which are of partic-
ular interest to the student of international law, e.g. the issues con-
nected with de facto and de jure sovereignty, recognition, etc.
Attention is called to the seeming anomaly that in Chapter VIII
and in earlier chapters, Dr. Hatta is referred to as the Republic’s
vice-president, whereas in Chapter IX an account is given of the
cabinet crisis of January 23, 1948, which led to Hatta’s designation
as Prime Minister and cabinet formateur. The inconsistency was
due to a substantial rewriting of Chapter IX after the earlier chap-
ters were already in print. Since completion of the manuscript, the
Security Council’s Committee of Good Offices has received official
commendation from the Council for its work in bringing about the
Renville truce agreement and the political principles of January 17,
X PREFACE
1 948. With the major part of its work still lying ahead, the Commit-
tee has returned from Lake Success to Indonesia to launch the second
phase of its task: implementation of the truce and assistance to the
parties in framing a final political settlement. After several incidents
in mid-April, which threatened to nullify the Committee’s earlier
work, negotiations between the parties, under the Committee’s aus-
pices, appear ready to begin anew. Decisive results remain to be
achieved.
Much of the material used was derived from personal observation
and experience in Indonesia during the period February 1946 to
June 1947, when the author was a vice-consul in Batavia. For docu-
mentary material which has been made use of, I am indebted to Dr.
N. A. C. Slotemaker de Bruine of the Netherlands Embassy in Wash-
ington, Dr. H. J. Friedericy and Dr. B. Landheer of the Netherlands
Information Bureau in New York, and the Messrs. Charles Thamboe,
Soedjatmoko Mangoendiningrat and Soedarpo Sastrosatomo of the
Republican Ministry of Information. The manuscript was read by
Miss Virginia Thompson, Professor Raymond Kennedy, Mr. Richard
AdlofE, and Mr. Bruno Lasker, whose comments have been of con-
siderable value. I am also grateful for the suggestions and criticisms
which Mn William L. Holland of the Institute of Pacific Relations
has offered at various stages in the preparation of the manuscript.
The Institute, though sponsoring the publication of the book, does
not assume responsibility for the views I have expressed. For all opin-
ions and conclusions presented in the book I am alone responsible.
CHARLES WOLF, JR.
Harvardevens, Mass.
April 19, 1948
CONTENTS
AUTHOR’S PREFACE
PART I
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Birth of the Republic 3
II. The British Occupation 15
III. Proposals, Counterproposals and the Linggadjati Agreement 29
PART II
THE REPUBLIC IN OPERATION
IV. Political Organization of the Republic 49
V. Economic Problems and Policies 68
VI. Republican Leadership 88
PART III
DEVELOPMENTS AFTER LINGGADJATI AND THE OUT-
LOOK FOR THE FUTURE
VII. Failure to Implement the Linggadjati Agreement and the
Final Breakdown 105
VIII. Military Action and the Role of the Security Council 128
IX. Recent Developments and the Outlook for the Future 145
APPENDIX
Preamble and Constitution of the Republic 165
Political Manifesto of the Indonesian Government 172
Text of the Linggadjati (Cheribon) Agreement 175
Letter from Sjahrir to the Commission-General, June 23, 1947 179
Text of the United States Aide Memoire to the Indonesian Repub-
lic, June 27, 1947 180
Memorandum of July 20, 1947, from the Lieutenant Governor
General to the Government of the Republic of Indonesia 181
Interests of American Firms in Indonesia 185
Truce Agreement Signed Jan. 17, 1948 184
Radio Address of Queen Wilhelmina, Feb. 3, 1948 189
INDEX 193
PART I
THE BEGINNINGS
OF THE REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA
CHAPTER ONE
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC
On August 17, 1945, the Republic of Indonesia was
proclaimed by a small group of determined men,
“Since independence is the right of every nation, any form of subjuga-
tion in this world is contrary to humanity and justice, and must be abol-
ished. The struggle for Indonesian Independence has reached a stage of
glory in which the Indonesian people are led to the gateway of an inde-
pendent, united, sovereign, just and prosperous Indonesian state.
“With the blessing of God Almighty, and moved by the highest ideals
to lead a free national life, the Indonesian people hereby declare their
independence.”
At its inception the new government claimed jurisdiction over a
land area of more than 700,000 square miles and a population of
more than 70 million. To some its birth came as a complete surprise;
as far as they knew it had no roots in the past that preceded the
Japanese occupation. Actually, this is only partially true, During
the nineteenth century there had been no less than thirty-three
revolts against Dutch authority in the Indies. For the most part,
however, these were Batak or Atchenese or other local revolts; that
is, they came from sectional minorities and did not have a national
character.
The formal nationalist movement in the Indies began in Java in
1908 with the organization of the Boedi Oetomo or “High Endeavor”
society under the leadership of a pacifist social reformer, Soetomo.
From that time until World War II, Indonesian nationalism was
characterized by division and disunity, by factionalism of both ex-
tremist and moderate groups, and by the constant addition of new
elements to the movement. The nationalist movement came to repre-
sent different things to different people. It was linked to social re-
form as advocated by Soetomo. It put its faith in traditionalist or
Taman-Siswo mass education, according to the ideals of Dewantara.
It sought autonomy within the Dutch Empire swayed by the pleas of
3
4 THE INDONESIAN STORY
Soetardjo. It was revolutionary Communism when led by the Mos-
cow-trained Tanmalaka. It was non-cooperative and radical, a call to
resistance to Dutch authority, as advanced by the fiery Soekarno
and the professorial Hatta. It was imbued with the concept of
social democracy and economic betterment under independent In-
donesian auspices, led by the young Western-educated socialists
Sjahrir and Sjarifoeddin. All these elements attached themselves to
the nationalist cause in the course of its evolution. 1 For thirty years,
the diversity of these groups and the conflicts among them, no less
than Dutch suppression of overt acts, stood in the way of Indian
nationalist unity.
At last, in May 1939 a federation of all Indonesian nationalist
parties, the Gaboengan Partai Indonesia or G A.P.I., was formed by an
alliance between the cooperative nationalists in the Parindra party
and the radical nationalists in the Gerindo party, together with a
number of smaller groups and religious organizations. This first coali-
tion was a significant achievement in the development of Indonesian
nationalism, although for some time world events were to prevent
the G. A.P.I, from consolidating and exerting a constructive influence.
Nevertheless, however unstable, the unity which it represented was to
become a symbol of profound importance.
With the start of the war in Europe in September 1939, shortly
after the formation of the G.A.P.L, and the fall of Holland in May
1940, the colonial government of the Netherlands Indies was at that
time obliged sharply to curtail the activity of the nationalist move-^
ment in the interest of the European war effort. Great Britain and the
United States were making urgent demands for strategic stockpiles of
the produce of the Indies for rubber, tin, quinine, fibers, and drugs.
To meet these emergency requirements the Dutch sought to place
the Indies on a semi-war footing.
In accomplishing this economic and strategic aim the Netherlands
Indies Government was eminently successful. As an index of the ef-
fectiveness of this policy, a comparison of exports from the Indies to
the United States in 1938 and 1940 shows an increase for tin of 412
per cent, for rubber of 331 per cent, for drugs and spices of 227 per
cent, for fibers of 218 per cent, and a total increase in Netherlands
Indies exports from about $330,000,000 in value to approximately
$450,000,000. 2
l Cf. Paul Kattenburg, “Political Alignments in Indonesia,” Far Eastern Survey, New
York, September 25, 1946.
* See Rupert Emerson, The Netherlands Indies and the United States, World Peace
Foundation, Boston, 1942, pp. 45-7.
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC 5
The heated Japanese negotiations for oil concessions in the Indies,
and the unmistakable signs of trouble appearing on the Pacific hori-
zon, strengthened the Dutch resolve to eliminate dissension and to
render the nationalist agitation ineffectual, at least for the time be-
ing. The Penal Code, forbidding any agitation which might foment
disorder, was narrowly construed and rigidly enforced. Free assembly
was curtailed. The nationalist press was made to toe the line of un-
yielding resistance to the Japanese and of support of the European
war effort. Nationalist pamphleteering was repressed, and many of
the pamphleteers and nationalist leaders were jailed or exiled.
When the Japanese occupied the Indies in March 1942, three of the
future “Big Four” of the Republic Soekarno, Hatta and Sjahrir
were in prison or exile, although their prison sentences had begun
before 1940, and the fourth, Amir Sjarifoeddin, had spent part of
1940 in prison for dangerous incitement, after which he went to
work with the government in the Department of Economic Affairs
because of his antipathy to fascism.
As a result, largely, of Dutch colonial policy from 1939 to 1942,
the Japanese did not have a consolidated Indonesian nationalist
front to contend with when they occupied the Indies. In fact, even
such effective unity as did exist among the nationalists was dis-
rupted still further over the issue of collaboration.
On the one hand, there was a group headed by Sjahrir and Sjari-
foeddin: the young, Western-educated intellectuals who, on purely
ideological grounds, refused to have anything to do with Japanese
fascism. Some of them were immediately jailed. Others, like Sjahrir,
pretended to be only passive toward the Japanese. Released from in-
ternment, Sjahrir went to Tjipanas in the mountains of West Java to
work quietly and plan for the future. Here he and his colleagues
gradually built up the Javanese resistance organization that later be-
came a driving force behind the Republic’s Declaration of Independ-
ence. Here he wrote his Perdjoeangan Kita (Our Struggle) and what
was to become the Political Manifesto of the Republic.
Sjarifoeddin also entered the small underground resistance move-
ment. He was imprisoned by the Kempeitai^ or Japanese Secret
Police, in 1943, and placed under sentence of death, later commuted
to life imprisonment.
On the other hand there was the group, headed by Soekarno,
Hatta, Mansoer and Dewantara, who felt that the defeat of the
Dutch armed forces and the internment of the remaining white
Dutch civilian population promised the dawn of a new era for
6 THE INDONESIAN STORY
Indonesia. This group contended that the new era could best be
prepared for by dealing with the Japanese in the open, rather than
by taking the nationalist movement underground. There is little
evidence to support the charge that this group dealt with the Japa-
nese from choice. In fact, even those whose dislike for the Dutch
originally induced some sympathy for the Japanese soon were alien-
ated completely by the harshness of the Japanese occupation policy,
and by the decidedly unfavorable turn which the war began to take
for Japan.
It is not hard to understand the initial reaction of many of the
nationalist leaders in 1942. In many cases they recognized the Japa-
nese as the victors over a colonial government which, whatever its
merits, had coerced them in peace-time. A certain feeling of grati-
tude and a desire to cooperate with the Japanese were inevitable in
these instances, and yet after the first year of the occupation it be-
came clear to even the most sympathetic nationalists that the na-
tionalist cause would have to be advanced by exerting constant pres-
sure on the Japanese, and not by simply cooperating with them.
There were, furthermore, enough short-wave radio sets operating
clandestinely, despite the untiring efforts of the Kempeitai to ferret
them out, for the nationalists to hear and to become convinced by
1943 that the war was definitely turning against the Japanese in the
Pacific, and that the Japanese hold on the islands was to be short-
lived. Under such conditions, honest and sincere collaboration with
the Japanese was very rare. What at first appeared to be collabora-
tion seems now, upon closer examination, to have been a hard and
tenacious bargaining to secure concessions for the nationalist move-
ment.
THE JAPANESE OCCUPATION
The introduction of Japanese rule after the capitulation of the
Dutch in March 1942 meant the elimination of Dutch officialdom,
and the imposition of military authority over an indigenous adminis-
trative substructure. There was no wholesale overhauling of the
governmental organization despite the elimination of the Dutch, 3
but not the Eurasian, personnel a distinction which was almost im-
possible to draw accurately after many generations of miscegenation.
s In Soerabaja, in 1942, several hundred Dutch officials and petty officials were actu-
ally taken from internment by the Japanese to help solve the city’s food distribution
problem, which the Japanese could not handle themselves after several weeks of try-
ing. Within a relatively brief span of time the Dutch had reorganized food distribu-
tion, and in fact they remained out of internment for over a year until 1943 when the
Japanese felt they themselves were able to control food distribution again.
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC 7
With their own military authorities firmly placed at the helm, the
Japanese had as their principal aim that of making the islands self-
sufficient and of gearing agricultural production to the needs of the
war machine.
Where necessary new directing organizations were set up by the
Japanese. For example, an Agricultural Industrial Control Board
(Saibai Kogyo Kanri Kodan) was set up, early in 1942, connected with
the former Department of Economic Affairs, with broad powers to
handle overall financial and procurement requirements for agricul-
tural industries. The S.K.K.K. was also empowered to deal with
storage and distribution of the produce of these industries, and to
gear estate production to the needs of the war effort. In June 1943,
the powers of the S.K.K.K. were extended still further to include
not only large estate industries such as rubber and cinchona, but
also the small estates, particularly those engaged in the production of
fibers and cacao.
In general, however, the exploitative economic war aims of the
Japanese were prosecuted within the framework of an unchanged
administrative set-up. Political measures, including propaganda and
limited concessions to the nationalists, were regarded by the Japa-
nese as means to achieve the main economic goals, and to enlist
popular support for total economic mobilization. Quinine, tin,
petroleum products, fibers, textiles and food products, especially
rice and cassava, were needed; and the Japanese ruthlessly con-
scripted labor into the Hei Ho or Work Corps, to step up produc-
tion. Actually, in the case of all production except quinine which
was increased by 16 per cent, and ramie, a flax plant for making tex-
tiles which was newly cultivated by the Japanese output fell
considerably under Japanese direction. No figures concerning
petroleum or tin production from 1942 to 1945 are available, but
according to both Japanese and Indonesian statistics covering Java,
rice production dropped by 25 per cent during this period, corn by
36 per cent, cassava by almost 50 per cent, rubber by more than 80
per cent in both Java and Sumatra, tea by over 95 per cent, coffee by
about 70 per cent and palm oil by almost 75 per cent.
The labor reservoir also had to be drained to supply men for the
auxiliary army, and for police and air-raid protection. For all these
purposes the method of conscription was employed.
To enlist popular support for such drastic economic measures, the
Japanese launched successive propaganda campaigns which met with
varying degrees of success depending upon the nationalist support
8 THE INDONESIAN STORY
which they received. The first campaign aimed at the glorification
of Japan and the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, with Indo-
nesia as a part. This so-called Tiga A (Triple A) movement extolled
Japan as the “Savior, Leader and Life of Asia” and at the same time
banned all labor and political organizations, and placed a tighter
clamp on the press than the Dutch had ever imposed. Tiga A was
dropped after December 1942, when it had become clear that its
lack of popular support made it a failure.
The Poesat Tenaga Rajat (Central People’s Power) followed in
its wake. The Poetera, as it was called, was a centralized organization
of all political parties (united formally for the first time since the
defunct G.A.P.I.), including also labor organizations and religious
and youth societies. Led by Soekarno, Hatta, Mansoer and Dewan-
tara, the Poetera acquired a strong nationalistic character, and be-
cause of its broader base, became a potentially stronger nationalist
force than the G.A.P.I. had been. The Poetera movement spread
rapidly after its formation in March 1943. While its immediate
effect was to contribute to a more united war effort, it represented a
force and a threat to the Japanese which they were never quite able
to eliminate. In a sense the Poetera was the first formal nationalist!-
cally-mclined organization to manifest itself during the occupation.
As its strength grew and it came to include an Auxiliary Army force
(Tentara Pembela Tanah Aer) and an armed Police Force as well,
the resistance of the nationalists to Japanese demands stiffened.
The Poetera never broke openly with the Japanese, but neither
did it express opposition to the revolts which broke out in Blitar,
Indramajoe and Tasikmalaja as the occupation wore on. The Poe-
tera carried on a continual tug-of-war with the Japanese military
authorities for concessions to the nationalist cause, for higher posi-
tions in the government for Indonesians, and for a withdrawal of
Japanese officialdom. In exchange for these concessions the national-
ists promised support of the war effort.
The relation between the Poetera and the Japanese military was
thus a dynamic one of stress and strain. As the military situation in
the Pacific grew more and more precarious for the Japanese, the
pull exerted by the Poetera intensified. As the Japanese war position
grew still weaker, the Poetera and the nationalists grew stronger, and
the concessions which they were able to elicit widened in scope.
Finally, after considerable earlier pressure from the Poetera, a
Commission for the Preparation of Independence was set up in
April 1944 with Soekarno and Hatta as its guiding lights. By June
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC 9
1944 the nationalists were able to exert sufficient economic pressure
on the Japanese to bring about the end of the centralized Agricul-
tural Control Board. In its place, an Agricultural Industrial Trust
(Saibai Kogyo Renokat) was set up, exercising the same functions
and with the same powers as the former S.K.K.K., except that it was
now controlled not by the Japanese military but by private estate
owners and agricultural companies, Indonesian and Chinese as well
as Japanese.
In September 1944, under increasing pressure both from the na-
tionalists and the deteriorating military situation in the Pacific,
Premier Koiso made the first formal Japanese promise of independ-
ence to the Indonesians. The red and white independence flag and
the national anthem, Indonesia Raja (Great Indonesia), which the
Preparatory Commission had adopted, now were recognized by the
Japanese authorities. In addition, new regulations were adopted to
increase the participation of Indonesians in the government as the
nationalists had demanded.
In July 1945, with American forces in the Pacific closing in for the
kill, Count Terauchi, the Japanese Commander-in-Chief for South-
east Asia and the Indies, received instructions from Tokyo to
make preparations for independence discussions with the Indonesian
leaders. The original Tokyo plan provided that independence would
be declared in the name of the Emperor as soon as Russia entered
the war, and it was further hoped by the Japanese that, with this
inducement, the Indonesian Auxiliary Army might then be counted
on to fight side by side with the Japanese against the expected in-
vasion forces.
In early August, Soekamo and Hatta left Batavia for Japanese
Asia Headquarters in Saigon by special Japanese plane at Terauchi’s
invitation. There is every reason to believe that they knew what the
purpose of their visit was to be and what the underlying motives of
the Japanese were.
Less than one week after their return to Batavia the Japanese
capitulation was announced, and somewhat hastily and boldly two
days later, on August 17, Soekarno and Hatta proclaimed the Re-
publicnot in the name of the Japanese Emperor, but in the name
of the Indonesian people.
THE ISSUE OF COLLABORATION
Under the confused conditions which prevailed throughout South-
east Asia at the time of the unexpected Japanese surrender announce-
10 THE INDONESIAN STORY
ment, it was inevitable that suspicion of collaboration should be-
come attached to the new-born independence movements in Burma,
Indo-China, and Indonesia, and that these suspicions would crystal-
lize into definite charges against the new regimes by the returning
colonial powers.
The charges were not long in making an appearance. In Septem-
ber 1945, Dr. Hubertus J. van Mook, the Lt. Governor General of
the Netherlands Indies in exile in Australia, advised Admiral
Mountbatten, the Supreme Allied Commander for Southeast Asia:
“It is obvious that this republican movement is a restricted one and
that its pattern is a dictatorship after the Japanese model. … It is to be
seriously doubted that the puppet government has much of a following,
and it is of particular importance that this extremist organization not be
recognized in any way directly or indirectly [since it is] … simply a
Japanese creation/’
Allied intelligence concerning Indonesia during the occupation
was more meager than for any other area in Southeast Asia. The
charges of collaboration thus found the world at large unable to
judge the situation which had existed during the occupation, or
to recognize the larger scope which the nationalist movement was
to attain immediately after the Japanese capitulation. There had
been no O.S.S. or Allied intelligence teams operating regularly
throughout the archipelago as there had been in other parts of the
region. Indeed, Japanese broadcasts and one or two brief landings
on the Java and Sumatra coasts from submarines by Dutch and
Allied operatives furnished most of the sparse information which
came from Indonesia during the war. The landings of British forces,
in October 1945, in insufficient strength and after a critical six
weeks’ delay, reflected this dearth of intelligence.
Even after the re-occupation it was difficult to obtain the informa-
tion necessary for a candid appraisal of the collaborationist charges.
Released Dutch internees and P.O.W.’s were either too biased or too
out of touch to offer a fair index of the real state of affairs. Un-
biased Indonesians were just as difficult to find, and the Chinese
and Eurasian minorities often were too afraid either of the returning
Dutch or of the Indonesians to speak freely.
One of the few Europeans fully qualified and sufficiently open-
minded to judge these charges and to appraise the Republic at its
inception was a British Army officer, Lt. Colonel Laurence van der
Post Colonel van der Post had been assigned by British Army
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC 11
Intelligence to remain behind in Java -when Field Marshal Wavell’s
Southeast Asia Headquarters In Bandoeng decided to evacuate in
February 1942. He had been assigned the mission of continuing
guerrilla operations in the hills as long as possible, and specifically
of keeping au courant of general events during the Japanese occupa-
tion, looking toward the day when Allied troops would return to
the Indies. He himself was interned by the Japanese after the guer-
rilla activities which he had directed in the hills were brought to
an end. Nevertheless, he maintained sufficient contact with the out-
side to remain probably the best authority on the Republic’s pre-
natal history and formation. Unfortunately, however, Colonel van
der Post’s wide fund of information was never given the attention
that it merited.
Actually, an accurate appraisal of the collaborationist charges
which have been directed against the Republic’s leaders depends
primarily on an initial adjustment in viewpoint. In analyzing
collaboration with the Japanese in Indonesia a basically different
approach must be adopted from that applied to the same issue in
the occupied countries of Europe.
In Europe, the populations of the occupied countries knew what
the war was about. Despite blundering and corruption in pre-war
Europe, they knew that fundamentally it represented a struggle for
existence against the expanding forces of aggressive Fascism. They
had the clear evidence before them that the Fascist enemy had
“blitzed” through their defenses, beaten their armies, and forced
their governments into exile. They maintained contact with these
exiled governments through the active underground movements
which flourished under the eyes of the invader. They received news
and pamphlets from their governments by way of the underground
and by air; and they could carry on in the assurance that their
forces and those of their allies were growing stronger day by day and
would eventually return to liberate their soil. In short, despite harsh
and discouraging conditions and deprivations, they still had some
feeling of “belonging,” of being a part of the fight against an enemy
of long standing; a fight that was being prosecuted by their brothers-
in-arms outside the motherland.
Under such conditions collaboration with the enemy by an indi-
vidual citizen was tantamount to treason against his nation’s still-
continuing fight. In Europe a patriotic and thinking citizen’s duty
and attitude toward the invader were clear. Collaboration generally
stood out clearly when judged in this light.
12 THE INDONESIAN STORY
In Indonesia, on the other hand, a patriotic nationalist’s duty and
attitude toward the Japanese were by no means as simple or as clear.
In the first place, the struggle which the war represented between
fascism and democracy was obscure and distant to all but the most
sophisticated and Westernized intellectuals, such as Sjahrir and
Sjarifoeddin. Furthermore, the Japanese were not an established
enemy of long standing with whom the Indonesians had already had
contact before and of whom they had already formed a definite im-
pression. The existence of anti-white racialism, which Japanese
propaganda exploited, led some Indonesians to identify their op-
position to foreign white rule with the Japanese war against the
Western powers.
The Indonesian nationalists did not have the feeling that the
enemy had fought against their defenses, beaten their forces, or
driven their government into exile. In fact, the Indonesian people
had not had any arms with which to fight the invader, since the
Dutch Government had avoided arming or training any large groups,
except for the loyal Ambonese, “and had particularly avoided the
training or arming of educated or nationalistic Indonesians. The
emergency conditions of the period from 1939 through 1942 had not
changed this policy. During this period the Dutch had been even
more circumspect in their building of an Indonesian armed force,
lest it might come under the influence of the nationalist movement.
Finally, the patriotic Indonesian had little feeling of attachment
to or contact with the distant Netherlands Indies Government in
Australia. The underground resistance movement maintained no
liaison with the exiled Dutch. Such resistance as the Indonesians
organized was their own and was neither in close touch with nor
was it supplied by the exile government outside. The Dutch Govern-
ment had gone, and the Dutch civilians remaining behind were
interned and for the most part effectively removed from the scene.
The Indonesians were now alone. They were isolated and left on
their own to sink or struggle to shore as best they could. The resent-
ment and sense of isolation felt were summarized by Sjahrir in his
Political Manifesto:
“When the Netherlands Indies Government . . . surrendered to the
Japanese in Bandoeng in March 1942, our unarmed population fell prey
to the harshness and cruelty of Japanese militarism. For three and a half
years our people were bent under a cruelty which they had never before
experienced throughout the last several decades of Netherlands Colonial
rule. Our people were treated as worthless material to be wasted in the
BIRTH OF THE REPUBLIC 13
piocess of war. From the lowly stations of those who were forced to ac-
cept compulsory labor and slavery and whose crops were stolen, to the
intellectuals who were forced to propagate lies, the grip of Japanese
militarism was universally felt. For this, Dutch colonialism is respon-
sible in that it left our 70,000,000 people to the mercies of Japanese
militarism without any means of protecting themselves since they had
never been entrusted with fire-arms or with the education necessary to
use them. . . .
“A new realization was born in our people, a national feeling that was
sharper than ever before. This feeling . . . was also sharpened by the Japa-
nese propaganda for pan-Asianism. Later attempts by the Japanese to
suppress the nationalist movement were to no avail. During three and a
half years of Japanese occupation, the whole state organization . . . which
had been co
A recent article in the Washington Post highlights the Hinduist terror. It does not give us a complete picture, but it does inform us about some of the recent happenings. The world has now begun to notice the facts about “Incredible India”.
staff report, the building does not look too bad either. Will it be well-executed?
Marquetee teens build a butterfly house in July 2008 in the parking lot of the Grace United Methodist Church.
KBIC Photo of Sand Point 
USFS Official Jan Schultz speaks to Zaagkii Project supporters and volunteers in July 2008 at a Cedar Tree institute BBQ at Presque Isle Park in Marquette, MI
GABRIEL Ben-Harosh was arrested in Canada at the request of the U.S. authorities and held in custody for several months in Toronto before being extradited — with his full consent, according to his lawyer — to Las Vegas. The lawyer, David Chesnoff, says his client requested to go to the U.S. to prove his innocence. “He is looking forward to his day in court,” Chesnoff says, adding that Ben-Harosh “does not know anything about any `Jerusalem Network’ and about any allegations [against him].”
<!–
<!–
<!–
<!–
