The Sufferer and the Witness

The colonial experience of Indonesia was a difficult one to endure. Four hundred years of suffering, captivity, and struggles. The explorers of the Portuguese, interesting to the oblivious natives, soon became a harbinger of doom (12); economic exploitations brought by the Dutch ensnared the citizens in an endless loop of poverty; the Japanese treaties led to the torture and agony of millions of Indonesians, executed and raped by the Japanese military.(13)

Yes, the colonial experience tolerated by the natives of Indonesia was marked by anguish, malicious intent, and emotional scarring. Victims of violent injustice since the Portuguese arrived in 1511 (14), continuing with the drawing up of the treaties with the Dutch Netherlands, the Indonesian people finally decided to rise up and claim their independence. Dutch control over the indigenous led to inhuman and cruel treatment; over three-thousand villagers were left dead after an expedition to the village of Aceh. In some places, up to twenty percent of the Indonesian population was wiped out by the Dutch!(15)

And yet the Dutch control over Indonesia was not all negative. Other than expanding the lands of Indonesia far greater than a native could possibly imagine, the Dutch provided a system of education for a small portion of the natives.(16) Its ‘Ethical Policy’ crafted bickering Indonesian aristocrats into an educated elite. The poor natives were economically supported.(17) With the negatives the Dutch provided, a number of positives were also left behind.

Contrarily, however, this was near opposite in the case of the Japanese; no observable benefits lingered when the Japanese departed Indonesia. Not only were thousands snatched as war laborers and died of dehydration, starvation, or of the elements, but a huge portion of Indonesian women were tortured and raped; many men endured the false accusations of war crimes and were executed.(18) The harshness of the crimes also differed, depending on a person’s location and economic status.(19) It seems, then, that only one country provided Indonesia with the tools they needed to self-suffice: the Dutch provided Indonesia with a huge influence in economics and education, which flourished after Indonesia declared its independence; they provided more land and expansion of territory for the natives; lastly, and most importantly, they united the nation of Indonesia.

At the end of the day, as humans, you naturally remember gave you a bandage for a cut and who else poured salt into the wound. The Dutch provided Indonesia with the proper tools to stand tall and survive on its own; they gave the Indonesians tools meant to be used when needed. And use them they did.




The highlighted portion represents the extent of VOC influence, as well as the approximate size of Indonesia and the scattered villages in 1782.

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