Japan and Indonesia, Brief Thoughts

Adm. Takeo Takagi

During the Greater East Asian War, Japanese forces invaded and took control of Indonesia (then known as the Dutch East Indies) with relatively little difficulty. This was due mostly to the decisive naval victory over the Allies in the battle of the Java Sea by Admiral Takeo Takagi. The Allied fleet was not well coordinated and the Americans were doubtful about the operation as a whole, thinking it was useless. The Dutch naturally wanted to defend their territory and had been scoring naval victories in the days before the engagement so that the Dutch commander, Helfrich, was annoyed by the lack of commitment from his allies. In the battle, Admiral Takeo employed classic battle tactics made famous by the great British admiral, Lord Horatio Nelson, in the 19th Century. The old methods still worked well and the battle was an overwhelming victory for the Imperial Japanese Navy. Japan suffered only damage to one destroyer and minor casualties (less than 40 men) compared to Allied losses of 2 cruisers, 2 destroyers and over 2,000 casualties. With this victory the Japanese gained naval and air superiority over Indonesia and had the Dutch garrison isolated. Ground forces landed in amphibious assault teams and the small Dutch colonial army had no real chance of success and their surrender came relatively quickly.

Gen. Hitoshi Imamura

In the aftermath, Japanese troops moved quickly to occupy the islands, imprison the Dutch population and organize the native Indonesians to aid the war effort. To do this, the most prominent anti-Dutch nationalist to turn to for assistance was the leftist radical Sukarno. He was released from prison by General Hitoshi Imamura who commanded the Japanese army of occupation. General Hitoshi Imamura was a very humane officer and wanted to win the goodwill and cooperation of the Indonesians. Not every Japanese officer or official approved of his methods but since his policies worked so well he was allowed to continue and even gained a promotion because the results he produced so impressed the government in Tokyo. There was a great deal of talk about independence but Prime Minister Tojo was reluctant to go along with this because of how vitally important Indonesian resources were to the Japanese war effort, particularly the oil Japan needed for aviation fuel. Sukarno organized laborers for the war effort, set up schools to teach Japanese to the Indonesians and was able to surge ahead with his nationalist campaign for independence. However, Sukarno was not a true nationalist as he despised the native customs and leaders of Indonesia and those Japanese who were reluctant to trust Sukarno would, in the end, prove to be correct.

Indonesian Homeland Defense Volunteer Army

Japan helped in the establishment of a native Indonesian militia force and eventually even a proto-government as many Japanese officers and officials were ardent supporters of Indonesian independence and thought Sukarno was firmly on their side. However, Sukarno was a radical leftist and was really only using the Japanese for his own purposes. It was only in 1945, after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, that Tokyo agreed to independence for Indonesia and even then, once Sukarno learned that Japan had lost the war, his supporters had to force him to issue the declaration of independence from the Netherlands. Still, many Japanese supported the independence movement. They refused to cooperate with the returning Dutch authorities and some joined the war against them. However, Sukarno showed his true colors by immediately trying to gain Allied favor by turning against the defeated Japan to whom he owed almost everything.

Under Sukarno, Indonesia demanded and received billions of dollars from Japan in compensation for losses during the war. This was in spite of the fact that Japan had never been at war with Indonesia (Japan was at war with the Netherlands that ruled Indonesia but never Indonesia itself) and was very hypocritical since Sukarno had actively collaborated with Japan, had aided in supporting the Japanese occupation and had come to power with a military force that had been set up and trained by the Japanese during the war. Now, he demanded billions of dollars from Japan as though he and his country had been the victims of Japanese aggression. It was complete and total hypocrisy. Yet, Japanese governments of each major party have remained extremely generous towards Indonesia. Indonesia has received more investment and financial assistance from Japan than from any other country. Thousands of Indonesians have come to live and work in Japan, many more than the number of Japanese who have gone to work in Japanese businesses set up in Indonesia. This was itself partly due to the fact that so many of the factories, hotels and other businesses Japan paid for ended up failing due to mismanagement so that Japan began to bring in their own people to run Japanese funded businesses in the future. Indonesia has become, effectively, an economic dependency of Japan. Japan is Indonesia's largest trading partner, which is, of course, of benefit to Japan, but Indonesia has received far more in assistance, at the expense of Japanese tax-payers, than Japan has ever received in goods and services from Indonesia.

The country has been chaotic and badly run ever since the end of Dutch colonial rule. New leadership is obviously called for and Japan is perfectly placed to help bring this about given how heavily Indonesia depends on Japanese subsidies. What I would like to see is an alliance of traditional monarchists in Japan and Indonesia. This could be done in a way similar to what was done in the past. I would like to see special schools established in Japan to educate and train the princes of Indonesia who could then return to their country, prepared to work together to ultimately bring about a restoration of Indonesia as a federal monarchy, perhaps along similar lines to the system employed in Malaysia by the monarchial states there. It would also be nice to see monarchists in Australia cooperate with this movement as well as it would also benefit their country given how much the poverty and instability in Indonesia has been problematic for Australia. If the sons of the princely states of Indonesia could be educated in Japan on the workings of a modern constitutional monarchy, combining new ideas with timeless traditions and how to carry out effective political campaigns, there is no reason such a movement could not effect great and beneficial changes in Indonesia and by which Japan could play a key role in building up a solid bloc of friendly monarchies in East Asia against the growing threat of aggressive republics on the mainland.