Dutch East Indies
The
Dutch East Indies, or
Netherlands East Indies, (
Dutch:
Nederlands-Indië;
Indonesian:
Hindia Belanda) was the name of the
colonies set up by the
Dutch East India Company, which came under administration of the
Netherlands during the
19th century (see
Indonesia).
Adventurous reconnoitering in the late
16th century (J.H. van Linschoten,
1582, and the daring adventures of
Cornelis Houtman,
1592) paved the way for Houtman's voyage to
Banten, the chief port of
Java, and back (
1595–
97), which raised a very modest profit. Dutch penetration into the
East Indies, which was
Portugal's sphere, was slow and discreet.
The
Dutch East India Company (Dutch:
Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie or VOC), chartered in
1602, concentrated Dutch trade efforts under one directorate with a unified policy. In
1605 armed Dutch merchantmen captured the Portuguese fort at
Amboyna in the
Moluccas, which was developed into the first secure base of the VOC. The
Twelve Year's Truce signed in
Antwerp in
1609 called a halt to formal hostilities between
Spain (which controlled Portugal and its territories at the time) and the
United Provinces. In the Indies, the foundation of
Batavia formed the permanent center from which Dutch enterprises, more mercantile than colonial, could be coordinated. From it "the Dutch wove the immense web of traffic and exchange which would eventually make up their empire, a fragile and flexible one built, like the Portuguese empire, 'on the
Phoenician model'." (Braudel 1984, p. 215)
One after another the Dutch took the great trading ports of the East Indies:
Malacca in
1641; Achem (
Aceh) the native kingdom in
Sumatra,
1667;
Macassar,
1669; finally
Bantam itself,
1682. At the same time connections in the ports of
India provided the printed
cottons that the Dutch traded for
pepper, the staple of the
spice trade.
The greatest source of wealth in the East Indies,
Fernand Braudel has noted, was the trade
within the archipelago, what the Dutch called
inlandse handel, where one commodity was exchanged for another, with profit at each turn, with
silver from the Americas, more desirable in the East than in Europe.
By concentrating on monopolies in the fine spices, Dutch policy encouraged
monoculture:
Amboyna for
cloves,
Timor for
sandalwood, the
Bandas for
mace and
nutmeg,
Ceylon for
cinnamon. Monoculture linked island economies to the mercantile system to provide the missing necessities of life.
By
1700 a colonial pattern was well established; the
VOC had grown to become a state-within-a-state and the dominant power in the archipelago. Its method of
indirect rule, treated in the article
Regentschap, was to survive it. After the company was liquidated in
1799 (decades before the British
HEIC was taken over in the form of crown colonies), and after a British interregnum â€" strategic custody â€" during the
Napoleonic Wars, the Dutch government effectively took over the administration.
Malacca and the
Malay Peninsula were ceded to the British after the
Anglo-Dutch Treaty of
1824.
The Dutch government retained control of the remaining parts â€" except for the period of
Japanese occupation from
1942-
1945 during
World War II â€" until they accepted the independence of
Indonesia in
1949 following the
Indonesian National Revolution. The capital of the Dutch East Indies was
Batavia, now known as
Jakarta, still capital of the republic.
Following the capitulation of Japan at the end of the second World War,
Indonesia declared her independence, sparking armed conflict when the Dutch attempted to regain control of the region. The Dutch were able to first regain control of
Jakarta, forcing the removal of the Indonesian capital to
Yogyakarta. A second offensive resulting in the takeover of Yogyakarta meant that capital was again moved, this time to West
Sumatra. However, pressure from
Australia and newly-independent
India forced a negotiation brokered by the
United States of America resulting in the Round Table Conference of
1949 in which the Dutch acknowledged the sovereignty of Indonesia excepting the region of
western New Guinea.
The Indonesian government under
Sukarno eventually took control of western New Guinea by force, and
military skirmishes took place between 1961 to 1962, including a brief naval engagement in
1962. The United States pressured the Netherlands to surrender West New Guinea to Indonesia in August under terms negotiated in
New York City in a document called the "New York Agreement". At the same time, the Australian government reversed its policy and also began supporting Indonesian control of the area. Today it remains under Indonesian control, although resistance continues in various parts of the region.
*
History of Indonesia*
Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies*
Braudel, Fernand,
The perspective of the World, vol III in
Civilization and Capitalism, 1984
