The Dutch East Indies, or Netherlands East Indies, (Dutch: Nederlands Indië) was the name of the colonies colonised by the Dutch East India Company which came under administration of the Netherlands during the ninteenth century (see Indonesia).
During the 1920's Sukarno -- the future first president of Indonesia -- had actively encouraged the Japanese Empire to declare war upon the western powers of the Pacific, and was serving the second of two sentences for sedition when on January 11, 1942Japan declared war on the Netherlands and invaded the Dutch East Indies. During the Pacific war Sukarno and many other Indonesian nationalist leaders organised the supply of aviation fuel required for the Pacific War on behalf of the Japanese, volunteer work brigades, a national self defence army (Peta), a Vanguard Corps (Barisan Pelopor), was decorated by the Emperor in 1943 and in March 1943 was appointed by Japan to head a independence committee for Java and Sumatra. In later years, these leaders justified their action by claiming that they had supported the Japanese war efforts in return for Japan's promises of eventual independence for Indonesia.
Proclaiming himself leader of an independent East Indies in 1945, Sukarno had the military forces to eliminate the opposition independence movements and to thwart the Netherlands attempts to reclaim the islands. In March 1949 the Dutch Foreign Minister Dirk Stikker was informed the United States were considering economic sanctions if the Netherlands continued refusing to comply with Security Council directives. These wars were euphemistically called "police actions" in an eventually unsuccessful attempt to bypass UN restrictions.
The Dutch retained sovereignty over Dutch New Guinea, the west side of the island of New Guinea and took urgent steps to prepare it for independence; some five thousand teachers were flown to Dutch New Guinea; though Papuan workers were comparable to western workers in skills and duties, the Dutch put an emphesia upon political, business, and civic skills. The first Papuan naval cadets graduated in 1955 and the first Papuan army brigade become operational in 1956; elections were held across Dutch New Guinea in 1959 and an elected Papuan Council official took office on April 5 1961 to prepare for full indpendence by the end of that decade. The Dutch endorsed the Papuan Council's selection of a new national name ('West Papua'), anthem, and the Morning Star as the new national flag for Dutch New Guinea upon December 1 1961. As with the Moluccas (called Maluku by Indonesia) and East Timor, Indonesia invaded two weeks later on the December 18 1961 to prevent any further independence efforts by the Papuan people.
The capital of the Dutch East Indies was Batavia, now known as Jakarta.
The Dutch EastIndies, or NetherlandsEastIndies, (Dutch: Nederlands Indië) 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).
The greatest source of wealth in the EastIndies, 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.
The capital of the Dutch EastIndies was Batavia, now known as Jakarta, still capital of the republic.
East Timor was recognized by the United Nations as a non-self-governing territory, with Portugal as the administering power, while Iran Jaya remained an resolved question of decolonization of Indonesian territory of what was once the NetherlandsEastIndies.
This is reflected in several agreements concluded between Indonesia and Netherlands : The Linggardjati agreement of 1947 explicitly stated “ The United States of Indonesia shall comprise the entire territory of the NetherlandsEastIndies”.
The transfers of administration from the Netherlands to the UNTEA (United Nations) took place on 1 October 1962, in accordance with Article V and VI of the New York Agreement, in a ceremony when the UN flag was raised and flown side by side with that of the Netherlands.
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