Indonesia's revolution mixed guerrilla war with two diplomatic crises
The Indonesian National Revolution or War of Independence ran from the 1945 independence proclamation to Dutch recognition after four years of bloody skirmishes, communal upheaval, and two major international diplomatic interventions. Dutch and briefly Allied forces held cities while Republican control endured in hinterlands.
Nationalism predated the war. Indonesians date their movement to 20 May 1908, now the Day of National Awakening, and groups such as Budi Utomo, Sarekat Islam, the Indonesian National Party and the Communist Party grew quickly; some joined the Dutch-created People's Council hoping for self-rule, others refused to cooperate. Japan then overran the Dutch East Indies within three months and held it for three and a half years, fostering nationalist institutions on Java and Sumatra for its own ends. In September 1944 Prime Minister Koiso promised independence without naming a date.
Two days after Japan's surrender, radical youth groups known as pemuda pushed Sukarno and Hatta to proclaim independence on 17 August 1945, and a preparatory committee made them president and vice-president the next day. News reached the outer islands only by mid-September. Allied ships were slow to arrive, partly because Australian dockworkers boycotted Dutch vessels, strikes not fully broken until July 1946. Meanwhile pemuda took over railway stations and trams, launched radio stations and newspapers, and a literary generation of 45 emerged in Jakarta, Yogyakarta and Surakarta.
Leaders disagreed on tactics. The leftist Tan Malaka wanted a youth-led revolutionary war, while Sukarno and Hatta preferred building institutions and winning by diplomacy, even calming a rally of more than 200,000 people in Jakarta on 19 September. Impatient militias attacked Dutch internees, Eurasians, Ambonese, Chinese and others branded spies in the Bersiap period of 1945 to 1946, whose death toll is estimated at 3,500 to 30,000. Around the Battle of Surabaya, between 6,300 and 15,000 Indonesian fighters died, along with about 660 British troops, mostly Indians.
By 1949 the Dutch held the cities but not the countryside, and an American threat to halt postwar reconstruction aid helped force the transfer of sovereignty at the end of that year.
Source: Indonesian National Revolution
