Japanese occupation of Indonesia

On May 24, 1937, radical nationalists and some members of the underground Communist Party created the "Movement of the Indonesian People" ("Gerindo"). The Guerindo movement, without proclaiming the principle of non-cooperation, advocated the country's political and economic independence, as well as the fight against fascism. In connection with the spread of rumors that, in accordance with the Anti-Comintern Pact, Germany and Japan had agreed to divide Indonesia, in 1939 Gerindo demanded that measures be taken to develop the economy of Indonesia and to create a popular militia to defend the archipelago.

In May 1939, Gerindo, the Sarekat Islam Muslim Party, and several other parties announced the creation of the Indonesian Political Association (GAPI). The GAPI program included the requirements of self-determination for Indonesia, national unity, the creation of a democratically elected parliament responsible for the people of Indonesia, and a government responsible for parliament. In December, the GAPI held a Congress of the Indonesian people, which was attended by representatives of 90 national organizations. Congress officially proclaimed the Indonesian language as the national language, the red and white flag as the national flag of Indonesia, and the song "Great Indonesia" as the national anthem. Congress adopted a resolution proposing cooperation between the peoples of Indonesia and the Netherlands in the face of a sharp complication of the international situation.

In August 1940, the Dutch government in exile stated that in the current situation it did not intend to develop any plans for changing the legal status of Netherlands India. The signing of the Atlantic Charter , in the opinion of the Dutch government, was not a reason for any changes in course towards Indonesia. It was limited only to the fact that in September 1940 created a commission to clarify the aspirations of the indigenous population. Despite the disappointment, the GAPI decided to cooperate with this commission, and on February 14, 1941 handed over to it a detailed draft of the future constitutional structure of Indonesia within the confederation with the Netherlands, the formation of which took five years. However, the commission rejected the draft, citing “specific conditions” in the colony; only in May 1941, Queen Wilhelmina in a radio message from London spoke in the most vague terms in favor of changing relations between the Netherlands and Indonesia, but only after the end of the war.

In September 1941, the second Congress of the Indonesian people took place, declaring itself a permanent Assembly of the People of Indonesia. After Japan entered the war, on December 13, 1941, the leaders of the People’s Assembly and the SAI issued a statement expressing loyalty to the Dutch government and calling on the people of Indonesia to support the metropolitan government in ensuring peace and security; in protest of this statement, the Sarekat Islam party withdrew from the Assembly and the SAI.

At first, the Japanese administrative division of Indonesia simply corresponded to the location of the occupying armies: Java was under the jurisdiction of the 16th Army , Kalimantan and the islands of the southern part of the archipelago were under the command of the fleet, and Sumatra was united under the general military administration of the 25th Army with Malaya, since the indigenous the inhabitants of Malacca and Sumatra were close to each other and culturally different from the Javanese.

According to the original Japanese plans, a pro-Japanese independent government was to be created in Indonesia. After the adoption of the constitution, the country was to conclude a military treaty with Japan by analogy with such countries as satellites like Manzhou-go .

The propaganda campaign was entrusted to the propaganda department of the 16th Army. The plan developed in Tokyo was called “Tiga-A” (“Three A”), which stands for the three hypostases of Japan in Asia: “light”, “leader” and “patron”. The purpose of the campaign was to prove to the Indonesians their common interests with Japan, after which they had to work for the Japanese army and support the Japanese war.

Soon after the Japanese occupation of Sumatra, Colonel Fuji, who commanded the division stationed there, ordered Sukarno to be found and taken to his place. After some hesitation, Soekarno agreed. He himself later recalled:

Our people hated the Dutch, especially now, when they fled like rats, leaving us at the mercy of the victors. None of them even tried to protect us or our country ... I knew the brutality of the Japanese, I knew how they behaved in the occupied territories, but what to do - we had to put up with this for several years.

Learning about how Sukarno uses Fuji, the commander of the 16th Army stationed in Java, General Imamura, also tried to win local nationalist leaders to his side, but they pointed out that without involving Sukarno himself from the Tiga-A movement, nothing will not work. Therefore, in July 1942, Sukarno was transported to Java. Immediately upon arrival, Sukarno met with the main leaders of Indonesian nationalism - Hatta and Sharir , and offered them cooperation until the Japanese were expelled. Sukarno's plan was to use all legal opportunities to strengthen the Indonesian liberation forces and create national organizations. As Sukarno said, "we planted the seeds of nationalism - now let the Japanese grow them."

Putera

Sukarno invited the Japanese to create a new mass organization designed to mobilize the Indonesian people to help Japan. The proposal was accepted, and on December 8, 1942, General Imamura, at a ceremony marking the anniversary of the victory in Pearl Harbor, publicly announced the upcoming creation of a national Indonesian party. Officially, it was founded on March 3, 1943 and received the name "Puter". For the Japanese, this was interpreted as an abbreviation for the words "Center of the Popular Forces," but for Indonesians it sounded like "the son of the Fatherland." Formally, the party was headed by Sukarno and his three deputies - Hatta, Mansur and Devantoro . The main objectives of Putera were declared the creation of "Great Asia", training in combating the difficulties of wartime, deepening understanding between the Japanese and Indonesians, etc.

Putera became the stronghold of the Japanese occupation administration. However, Sukarno correctly assessed that as the affairs of the Axis powers on the fronts go worse, Japanese policies in Indonesia will shift towards liberalization and flirting with the Indonesians. And subsequent events quickly confirmed that he was right: on June 16, 1943, Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo in a keynote speech at the 83rd session of the parliament promised to grant independence to the Philippines and Burma in the near future, and mentioned self-government for Java. Although no specific dates were set, and other parts of Indonesia were not mentioned at all, Sukarno, speaking on the radio with an answer to this speech, did not regret kind words for Japan and emphasized that Indonesia, previously occupied by a small European country, is now returning to the ranks of full-fledged Asian peoples.

In July 1943, Tojo visited Java during a trip to the occupied countries. In a welcoming speech, Sukarno did not miss the opportunity to express hope that Japan "will return Indonesia to the Indonesians." On August 21, the Japanese announced the creation of a General Meeting for the Indonesians in Jakarta , and local councils in the provinces. Soon, the Japanese forced the General Conference to vote for the introduction of universal labor service in the country, and forced the Putera leaders to loudly advocate for it.

Union of allegiance to the people

Having decided that Putera did not meet the tasks assigned to her, the Japanese dismissed her, and instead of her, on March 1, 1944, the "Union of Fidelity to the People" began to function again with Sukarno at the head. Meanwhile, discontent increased in Indonesia, clandestine groups and detachments arose in various places of the archipelago, but national leaders still sought in no way to allow open speeches.

Due to the fact that the successes of the Allied forces began to negatively affect the prestige of Indonesian figures collaborating with the Japanese authorities, in September 1944, Japanese Prime Minister Kuniaki Koiso announced in parliament that independence would be granted to Indonesia. It was allowed to hang red and white national flags and perform the hymn "Great Indonesia", but the Japanese authorities emphasized that independence would be given only after Japan won the war.

During the years of Japanese occupation, the basis of the Indonesian economy was oil production , since it was the Japanese fleet that needed oil. The supply of Indonesian oil to Japan stopped only with the fall of the Philippines in 1945, when tankers could no longer break through to the north.

The coffee plantations created by the Dutch colonialists turned out to be unclaimed. In August 1942, the Japanese authorities issued a decree in Indonesia, which should uproot half of all coffee trees. About 16 thousand ha of tea plantations were destroyed, only 50 of 220 tea factories worked. Since Japan could consume only a small part of the rubber produced in Indonesia (and Indonesia itself consumed only 1% of the rubber produced in the country - everything else was exported before the war), huge plantations have become redundant.

They tried to transfer sugar factories to the production of the necessary military industry alcohol, and when this did not succeed, the factories were destroyed, and the equipment allowed for scrap. As a result, the total sugar production during the years of occupation fell by almost 20 times, the number of operating plants decreased by 10 times.

Cattle requisition was widely held in the villages, and the population was mobilized for forced labor. The sharp decline in living standards and the uncertainty of tomorrow led to the fact that at first the Japanese forced labor system was somewhat popular among young people: workers were promised food and clothing, but there were no other ways to survive. In Indonesia, there are two forms of forced labor: the heho labor battalions carried out construction work and sometimes carried guard duty, the rumusa contract system served to send those mobilized to other countries. Believe ^{[ who? ]} that during the Japanese occupation, about 4 million Indonesians died, a significant part of which were “ rumusa ”.

All Europeans living on the archipelago - about 62 thousand people - by the end of 1943 ended up in concentration camps, of which only a third were men, the rest were women and children. In addition to them, about 45 thousand people were held in prison camps.

For cash settlements in the territory of occupied Indonesia, the Japanese issued special occupation guilders . Their real value quickly fell, which led to such an unusual result as repayments by the Indonesian peasants of their debts to the landlords: the peasants began to pay debts exclusively with occupational money, and the landlords could not accept them, because in this case the Japanese could intervene, forced to side peasants so as not to admit that their money is fiction.

On October 3, 1943, the Japanese command issued a decree on the creation of auxiliary Indonesian armed groups PETA (Pembela Tanah Air - the army of defenders of the fatherland), which in 1945 played a decisive role in Indonesia's independence. PETA consisted of 81 territorial battalions of 600-800 people each. Each battalion consisted of three rifle companies and a company of heavy weapons, divided into two mortar and two artillery platoons. According to Japanese plans, in the event of the Allied troops landing, the PETA battalions were assigned the role of the coast guard, which should take the first strike. To prepare the reserve for the PETA army, the Japanese, in parallel with its creation, expanded the network of youth militarized organizations.

Despite all the Japanese efforts to isolate Indonesia from news from the outside world, it was clear that the Japanese were losing. An alarming surprise for the Japanese was the uprising of the PETA battalion in the Blitar region in February 1945. When the USSR denounced the neutrality pact with Japan in April 1945, and Germany surrendered on May 7, the Ministry of Great East Asian Affairs was forced to act, and on May 11 declared that independence would be granted to Indonesia by January 1946. It was assumed that Indonesia would have a federal structure and enter the war on the side of Japan.

A study group was set up to prepare the independence of Indonesia, at the meeting of which on June 1, 1945, Sukarno proposed his concept of ideological foundations for the country's future independence in the form of five principles. July 10, the commission decided that the future state will be a republic. In addition to the territory of the Dutch East Indies, it was planned to include the territories of British Malaysia and Portuguese Timor in the new Indonesia ( Paradise Indonesia ).

Towards the end of the war, anti-Japanese sentiments in PETA reached a dangerous level, and all mass organizations became unreliable. Moderate Indonesian politicians warned the Japanese that if they did not want to get a grand rebellion in their rear at the most crucial moment, they had to hurry up with giving the country independence. In Australia, the East Indies' Netherlands government was in exile, which was supposed to move to Indonesia and declare itself the only legitimate ruler of the Netherlands East Indies as soon as the Americans occupied a large city.

On July 29, 1945, Marshal Terauchi received a secret message from Tokyo:

In principle, the emperor grants independence to the Indonesians, but it can only be declared when Russia's participation in the war becomes inevitable.

Deciding that it was impossible to drag the matter further, Marshal Terauti summoned Sukarno, Hattu and Rajiman to his headquarters at Saigon on August 6, 1945, and announced to them: "The Japanese government will transfer the cause of the independence of your people into your hands." When the Indonesian leaders returned to Jakarta on August 15, they learned that Soviet troops were already advancing in Manchuria, and that the Americans had used some new weapons of unprecedented power. On the same day, August 15, the first, not yet officially confirmed message about the surrender of Japan came to Jakarta.

It was highly likely that with the arrival of the Allied forces on the archipelago the Dutch colonial administration would return. На совещании подпольных молодёжных группировок 15 августа было решено, что независимость должна быть провозглашена самим индонезийским народом, а не получена в дар от японского правительства. Было также решено предложить выступить с этим актом Сукарно и Хатте как наиболее авторитетным национальным лидерам. В связи с тем, что Сукарно и Хатта отказались от предложения подпольщиков, те пошли на отчаянный шаг: в ночь с 15 на 16 августа Сукарно и Хатта были похищены и доставлены в небольшой городок неподалёку от Джакарты, который контролировался батальоном ПЕТА, арестовавшим японских инструкторов. Солдаты, не подозревавшие, что приезд Сукарно и Хатты не был добровольным, радостно встретили вождей революции. Другие отряды ПЕТА тем временем устанавливали контроль над окрестностями Джакарты. В сложившихся условиях Сукарно решился на провозглашение независимости.

Вечером 16 августа Комиссия по подготовке независимости собралась в доме японского вице-адмирала Маэда. Утром, 17 августа, Сукарно зачитал толпе, собравшейся перед домом, Декларацию независимости :

Мы, индонезийская нация, настоящим провозглашаем независимость Индонезии. Вопросы, связанные с передачей власти, и другие вопросы будут решены самым тщательным образом в кратчайший срок.

Сразу после распространения текста декларации средствами массовой информации по всей стране начались массовые манифестации, в ходе которых демонстранты срывали японские флаги. 19 августа было сформировано первое правительство независимой Индонезии. Так как японцы не отрицали за Индонезией права на независимость, то они не предпринимали никаких действий, направленных на свержение правительства Сукарно, однако продолжали вести борьбу с радикальными индонезийскими группировками, тем самым расчищая дорогу умеренным элементам, сотрудничавшим с японцами в годы оккупации. Правительство Индонезии продолжало вести себя сдержанно по отношению к японской администрации, а 29 августа 1945 года приняло резолюцию, в которой говорилось, что господство Нидерландов над Индонезией завершилось 9 марта 1942 года, так как нидерландское правительство оказалось неспособным обеспечить безопасность и благосостояние индонезийского народа.

Союзники не имели свободных войск для немедленного десанта в Индонезии, и потому лорд Маунтбеттен мог лишь послать маршалу Тэраути телеграмму, в которой возлагал ответственность за поддержание порядка в Индонезии до прихода туда Союзников на японские войска. Одновременно Маунтбеттен направил в Джакарту миссию адмирала Петерсона, которая должна была проследить, чтобы японцы не капитулировали перед «самозванцами». Прибыв в Джакарту 15 сентября на крейсере «Кэмберленд» Петерсон обнаружил, что Республика Индонезия уже существует, причём не только в столице, но и в провинциях, что действует гражданская администрация, созданы министерства и ведомства и даже гражданская полиция. Он попытался заставить японский гарнизон Сурабаи продержаться до подхода англичан, но японцы наотрез отказывались сражаться, и к концу сентября сдались индонезийским отрядам.

29 сентября 1945 года в Джакарте высадился первый английский небольшой десант. Его командир генерал-лейтенант Кристисон сделал официальное заявление, что десант прибыл для того, чтобы разоружить японцев. Сукарно, выступая 2 октября, обратился к индонезийцам с просьбой сохранять спокойствие: если цели англичан таковы, как официально объявлено, то индонезийское правительство им препятствовать не будет. Однако Петерсен заявил, что английские войска будут поддерживать в стране порядок до тех пор, пока не начнёт функционировать законное правительство Нидерландской Ост-Индии. 4 октября прибыла новая партия британских войск, а также переброшенные из Европы первые нидерландские части, рассматривавшие индонезийцев как коллаборационистов , которых необходимо разоружить наравне с японцами. В этих условиях 5 октября Сукарно опубликовал президентский декрет о создании Национальной армии Индонезии.

Понимая, что для дальнейшего контроля над страной необходимо овладеть морской базой в Сурабае, 25 октября 1945 года англичане высадили там войска. Индонезийские отряды отказались сдать оружие, и началась война за независимость Индонезии .

• Годы японской оккупации - "ростки независимости"

• История Востока (в 6 т.). Т. V. «Восток в новейшее время (1914—1945 гг.)» — М.: Изд-во «Восточная литература» РАН, 2006. — ISBN 5-02-018500-9
• И. В. Можейко . Западный ветер — ясная погода. — М.: АСТ , 2001. — ISBN 5-17-005862-4