Java

Java, principal island of the Netherlands East Indies, rich in rubber, tin, and oil (see also raw materials), where, despite Dutch repression, nationalism had developed considerably between the wars. The Japanese Sixteenth Army, commanded by Lt-General Imamura Hitoshi, swiftly conquered the island in March 1942 and a military administration, quite benign under Imamura, was established there. What remained of the 250,000-strong Dutch population who had not fled were interned, and while the administrative infrastructure was nominally turned over to the Indonesians, the Japanese held nearly all the key positions. An auxiliary military force, called Peta (Pembela Tanah Air, or Defenders of the Homeland), some 35,000 strong by 1944, was raised by the Japanese. They also recruited 25,000 military auxiliaries, or hei-ho, and started a number of organizations which ranged from auxiliary police to the 50,000-strong Jibakutai (self-explosion corps) whose members, armed with nothing more than bamboo spears, were pledged to die defending their country.

As elsewhere in South-East Asia the Indonesians at first welcomed the Japanese as liberators from their colonial masters. But this welcome soon turned to frustration when the Japanese imposed their own form of colonial rule. Initially they encouraged division amongst the country's different social, religious, and racial factions, but later replaced this traditional policy of ‘divide and rule’ with one of attempting to unite the people to oppose any Allied invasion. After much pressure from nationalists, the Indonesians were allowed to form a political association in March 1943. Called Pusat Tenaga Rakjat (Centre of People's Power), or Putera, it was ostensibly a stepping-stone towards independence, and was led by a four-man committee with the nationalist Sukarno as its chairman. When it failed to live up to Japanese hopes of using it to maintain Japanese domination, it was dissolved in February 1944 and replaced by the more broadly based Jawa Hōkōkai (People's Service Association), though Sukarno remained at its head. After more prevarication, and spurred by a Peta revolt against them in February 1945, the Japanese took steps towards conceding Java's independence. But on 16 August, before this could be announced, Sukarno was kidnapped by radicals of a youth organization called Angkatan Muda (Young Generation). They argued that independence must be seized from the Japanese, not granted by them, or the Allies would not recognize it, and proposed attacking the occupiers that night. This was averted when the Japanese on the island urged Sukarno to declare independence which he did the next day. In the weeks, months, and years which followed the Indonesians fought the Japanese, then the British, and finally the Dutch, until in November 1949 the government of the Netherlands recognized Indonesia's independence and its control of all the Netherlands East Indies except Dutch New Guinea.

Bibliography

Friend, T. , The Blue-Eyed Enemy: Japan Against the West in Java and Luzon, 1942–45 (Princeton, 1988).