(Old page) East Indies Crisis - do not edit: Difference between revisions
From Roses, Tulips, & Liberty
(Old page) East Indies Crisis - do not edit (view source)
Revision as of 20:53, 13 June 2021
, 3 years agoA rewrite ongoing series of projects
Dutch-ODST (talk | contribs) |
Dutch-ODST (talk | contribs) (A rewrite ongoing series of projects) |
||
Line 27:
| casualties2 = 7-10 Deaths<br>205.000 wounded<br>490.000 Missing/KIA
}}
The '''East Indies Crisis,''' (Malay: ''Krisis Hindia Timur'') also known as the '''Archipelago war,''' '''War of liberation''' and in the Netherlands as the '''Indian war''' (Dutch: ''Indische oorlog''), or ''Oostelijke acties'' (Eastern actions) was a conflict fought through the Indonesian archipelago, with major area’s of combat being on the islands of Sumatra, Borneo, Malay peninsula, Java and Celebs. Between the Kingdom of the Netherlands and her allies and the East Indies Liberation Front. Fought from 1960 up to 11th of November 1976 when Batavia fell to the East Indies Liberation Front. It was one of the last and largest colonial conflicts fought in the 20th century, involving not just the Netherlands but also numerous Allies and the British, and was part of the larger cold war.
Facing them was the East Indies Liberation Front that was backed by numerous local supporters but mainly by Russia. Although the war is considered a proxy war in the Anglo-Saxon historical literature, due to Britain and Russia using their proxies to fight one another, this view is disputed by many historians both from the East Indies Federation and the Netherlands, and The Batavosphere as a whole. In the Netherlands and in general, within the Batavosphere the conflict is seen as a separate conflict from the cold war, while heavily influenced by cold war events it stands on its own legs. This is due to a variety of reasons but mainly according to some historians the need for the Netherlands and Dutch society as a whole to rationalize their actions, to rationalize 16 years of brutal warfare and tens of thousands of Dutchmen that never came home and the hundreds of thousands that were permanently scarred by the war.
The East Indies Crisis was also the first televised war with people seeing the extent of the fighting and the brutality of it every night on their TVs. This shaped not just the Netherlands ‘ public perception of the war but also the global perception of the war, it showed to the world that this war and all wars are a brutal affair. The war left millions dead and even more homeless and wounded and it is seen today by historians as one of the most brutal wars fought in the 20th century. While the reasons for its end are still debated today the generally accepted narrative is that the Netherlands itself pulled out and eventually realized what it had done and stopped the war. It left behind an archipelago forever changed and never to be the same again.
== Background ==
Line 63 ⟶ 67:
== Final Period of the War (the blooding) ==
1972 the 9th of march marked the start of the final and most brutal phase of the war. Through the 5 years period of relative calm, yet still fighting was intense but no major offensives took place, the EILF had infiltrated and expanded their operations on Java the bastion of Dutch colonial control. This had in the 5 years resulted in several strikes, terrorist attacks, and small uprisings. These were all easily crushed but they were only small scale and thus on the whole Dutch forces were lulled in a sense of security when it came to Java. At the start of march 1972 around 83,000 Dutch soldiers both KNIL and the regular dutch army were stationed on the island. While on Borneo some 70,000 were stationed, on Celebs some 90,000 were stationed on Sumatra 120,000 were stationed and in Malaya 100,000 were station. With a total of 463,000 army personnel and some 80,000 air force and 50,000 naval personnel being stationed through the archipelago.
In 1972 on the 9th of a march on the eastern side of the island of java this all changed when a large-scale uprising took place. Across the eastern side of the island in the countryside around major cities they rose up and slaughter took place in the first 48 hours. Dutch forces were engaged everywhere but there and chaos ensued as nobody had expected this. This chaos in the Dutch command structure and the sense of security that was on Java and the lack of troops in eastern java created a slaughter of Eurasian civilians, Dutch civilians, administrators, and everyone who was remotely associated with the Dutch when they took large parts of the cities, with only the harbor sections being defended by local dutch soldiers. This period that started on the 9th of March and lasted until the 11th of March is known in the Netherlands as “De Java moorden” or the Java killings, in total, it’s estimated some 11,000 civilians died. It was only on the 11th of March that the Dutch command structure had a good idea of what was going on. The uprising on eastern java was coordinated with large-scale conventional offensives on the Malayan peninsula and across Sumatra and Borneo and even an attack on Malakka.
The Dutch response to all that was taking place in what was dubbed “Het maard offensief” was one that would set the tone of the remainder of the war. The counter-offensive took place in multiple theatres. The primary theatre and where the response was the quickest was that of eastern Java. Dutch armored forces and the by now famous “Lucht brigades” or air brigades came in hard and fast and started a full-on clearing operation across the countryside and eventually securing the city of Semarang, where brave Dutch defenders held out against the EILF insurgents. When the city was liberated on the 14th of March a large battle ensued that would say many of the insurgents not make it back home. At the same time, marines from de Korps Mariniers supported by the carrier “van Amstel” conduct an amphibious assault near the city of Surabaya, where Dutch soldiers were holding out while being surrounded by insurgents. The fighting around the city and eventually in the city was some of the most brutal fighting the war had seen so far.
At the end of what was called the Java uprising which officially according to Dutch history ended on the 28th of March 1972, some 11,000 Dutch civilians had died, 5400 soldiers were KIA, 617 were MIA, and 19182 were wounded. While on the EILF side the numbers sometimes disputed were far higher. According to captured documents of the EILF a total of 43,019 men died in the first 3 days, while in the last 15 days a total of 111,179 casualties (71,192 killed and 39,987 wounded). It is said to be some of the most brutal fighting and highest casualty rates of the war and it would set the tone for the remainder of the conflict. In regards to civilian casualties caused by the Dutch counteroffensive to this day, it is disputed, however, all agree that the numbers reach into the millions.
=== The blooding ===
The new phase that was opened in the conflict was in general seen as a far more brutal phase of the war. With the general offensives on the other islands taking place the first weeks of this new phase were filled with constant counter-offensives by the Dutch. These offensives were rapid unforgiving and effective. It was only after the frontlines were secured that the Dutch realized the full scope of what had transpired. Not only had EILF conducted an uprising in eastern java, but they had also launched full conventional counter-offensives against their positions in Sumatra, the Malayan peninsula, Borneo, and Celebs. They now knew that not only would they face guerilla warfare but now the threat of full conventional assaults was there. While on an individual level these types of warfare could be dealt with two of them would be possible to deal with as well however it was the numbers. The Dutch were outnumbered by their own estimates by 7 to 1. To throw in the threat of conventional armored forces would put a larger strain upon their manpower and equipment sources.
While at the time it was not known, the final campaigns of the war were being fought and each was more brutal than the next. The new threat of EILF armored forces combined with irregular forces and being outnumbered made the Dutch only more ruthless. Battles on Malaya and Sumatra went from fire force operations to a new concept called “Forced Penetration” It would see Dutch forces enter in full force in certain areas. Capture it hold it for a given period and meanwhile inflict as much damage as possible. This took place across the islands but while it killed more of the EILF than of the Dutch, for every insurgent killed 3 would take their place.
Fighting was fierce across the islands and quickly through 1972 and early 1973 a pattern began to emerge. On Malaya, fighting was far more conventional and in that field the Dutch had a relatively great deal of strategic success at first, only to be pushed back to their lines due to insurgent activities. On Celebs, the war was still a counter-insurgency campaign and air assault was the name of the game there the Dutch fought hard and achieved their objectives but the EILF simply did not give up. On Sumatra, it was where like always the most intense fighting took place. conventional and unconventional forces employed and the Dutch often was fought to a stalemate, only winning if they went in full force. However the real strain came when Java for the second time in a short period went up in flames, this time the insurgency was not large but it was a directed and strategic one. This put the final so-called strain on the Dutch manpower forces as by now they were tapping into reserves of the older generations that fought there. The war had turned from a high-intensity insurgency campaign, for the first time in the Dutch government her view into a total war and for the first time all pretenses were dropped. In total it’s estimated but never confirmed that between some 5 to 7 million people died directly of fighting, while another 10 million would die due to indirect reasons.
Despite the massive amount of enemy forces killed nothing seemed to stop the EILF in their onslaught. Dutch soldiers were fighting for months on end seeing no rest and fighting day and night, all of this the brutality the exhaustion the hopelessness combined with the increase in Russian support, international condemnation, and the fact that it was all televised finally chanced the mood in the war. On the 18th of April 1974, the largest anti-war protest the Netherlands would ever see took place. This was a protest not carried out by the regular people that would protest. These protests were large with roughly 3.4 million people protesting, veterans of the war that now would see their own sons die in a war they fought in, mothers fathers, wives, friends of those send over to fight. People had enough of the conflict they were exhausted, nearly 11 years of war abroad seeing it day in day out on the television had chanced the Dutch nation as a whole. These protests were so large that it for one day shut down the nation, the police were not willing to do anything and it was a time of chaos. Prime minister Geert Dijkman even ordered his cabinet and the military at home to prepare for a revolution. However, his army generals said loud and clear that they would not fire on their own people. These protests and strikes known as the silent revolution of april would eventually within the same month see a vote of no confidence pass the chamber. A new election was declared to be needed and was scheduled for the 17th of Juli 1974.
Despite the best efforts of '''Prime Minister Geert Dijkman''' and his “''Conservatieve anti revolutionare partij”'' or CARP, they stood no chance. They where soundly defeated by the ''“Partij voor democratie''” or PVD led by former veteran turned politician '''Koen Haverman'''. Out of the 150 seats in the second chamber, the PVD won a total of 83, thus needing no coalition and pushing their agenda forward. Their agenda was a simple one on paper pull out of the archipelago, yet in reality, this would be a hard one and prove to be a complicated affair.
[[File:Troops under fire.jpg|thumb|A soldier watching air support drop its payload upon the enemy her positions, somewhere around Malakka.]] ▼
▲WIP[[File:Troops under fire.jpg|thumb|A soldier watching air support drop its payload upon the enemy her positions, somewhere around Malakka.]]
=== The fall of Batavia ===
From May 1975 the new government led by <u>Prime Minister Koen Haverman</u>, himself a veteran of the war, began what it called a “Scale down”. This scale-down was however not peaceful it was a scorched earth campaign. Malakka at that moment knowing what was to come declared itself independent on July 8th, 1975, this was the first sign of what the last months of the war were to be like. The Dutch began a scale down which came down to a withdrawal, the KNIL in these last months were to be the crack forces that held the line fighting as at the same time the Rebels began a grand offensive which was held back and repelled but the rebels now gave it they’re all. From November 1975 all the way up to February 1976 Dutch & KNIL forces withdrew but held the rebels off giving time and space for Dutch, Taulanders, Amerikaeners, Afrikaners, Eurasians, and others to flee from Sumatra Borneo and Celebs, and eventually, they held only to the ports and like the rest of the cities and infrastructure has bombed the ground once the last boat left. What followed in the cities on the islands once the rebels got their hands on it was pure slaughter and mass killings were started.
|