A Day in a Year of Dependence
A Day in a Year of Dependence
The 17th of August, 1945, was a culmination
of a concerted endeavour starting in 1908 to oppose the Dutch colonialism
together as a nation. It was a new paradigm that brought a new form of
resistance. It did not come out of the blue, as previous forms of resistance had
failed with hundreds of thousands of lives lost. In the span of centuries of colonial
presence in Indonesia, a chronological overview of resistance, expeditions and
wars is presented in a tremendous book “Koloniale oorlogen in Indonesië” written by a Dutch jounalist Piet Hagen, published in 2018.
The 37-year long struggle from 1908 to 1945
was characterized by intellectual activisms, forbidden by the colonial ruler, but
succeeded to garner the young minds across the archipelago towards one goal as
one nation. An unexpected turn occurred when the Japanese occupation replaced the
Dutch colonialism. While this brought a period of intense suffering of hundreds
of thousands of people who were sent out as forced labours for deadly Japanese
war efforts, immediately after the Japanese surrendered to the allied forces, a
small window of opportunity appeared. The founding fathers proclaimed the
independence of the new nation, Indonesia. A goal shared for centuries by
peoples of the same destiny of being oppressed by one foreign entity.
It marked the beginning of a new era with
new hopes for a just and prosperous country. However, the journey of
independence has never been without challenges, and some of them were deadly. An
immediate challenge was due to the former Dutch colonial ruler, who could not
see themselves losing its colony. To reverse the proclamation, they opted the same
mode of operation that was used by their predecessors in centuries long of
bloody purges of local resistance.
However, this time it was equipped with modern
warfare with sophisticated command and control systems like those used by the
allied forces against the Germans, allowing far-reaching military operations akin
to war crimes. Again, the blessed tropical land must witness hundreds of
thousand of deaths attributed to the same actor as in previous centuries.
After all, Indonesia prevailed. The
independence was defended, not only with bloods and tears, but also with loads
of money to buy the Dutch out to drop the illusion of ever coming back to
Indonesia as a colonial ruler. Upon such a great sacrifice, the founding
generation has taught, “remember but don’t look back, fill the independence,
mind your future!”
A new chapter began, but Indonesia found
itself in a world divided by the east and west in the cold war era. Fifteen years
later in 1965, Indonesia must experience another bloody episode with hundreds
of thousands of casualties. In contrast to the war with the Dutch, while the
events and victims were real, identifying the actor(s) and accomplices seems to
be virtually impossible. It has only become academic studies by historians,
analyzing possible roles based on documents declassified by the American CIA,
and also by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as cited in a fascinating book “Migration in the Time of Revolution: China,
Indonesia, and the Cold War” written by Taomo Zhou, published in 2019.
As described above, during the journey of
independence in the 20th century, two large scale human tragedies
had occurred in Indonesia, resulting in a number of deaths in the order of
hundreds of thousands. What is then the meaning of independence? Indeed,
independence is an elusive concept. Nothing in nature can be independent. In a
mathematical analysis of natural phenomena, one can identify two zones: (a)
zone of dependence and (b) zone of influence.
Whatever state at a point in a given
location and time is determined by what has happened in its zone of dependence.
In turn, whatever happens at that same point in space and time will determine
the state in its zone of influence. Referring to the above human tragedies, in
terms of the state of human existence on this planet, apparently Indonesia was
very much in the zone of influence of other nations. In other words, our state
of existence has been very much dependent on government policies from thousands
of miles away.
Now in 2021, another human tragedy is
unfolding. This month has witnessed a grim milestone: one hundred thousand
deaths by Covid. Indonesia is in great need of vaccines, hundreds of millions
of doses of them. But Indonesia can only stand in a line behind those nations
capable of making vaccines. And déjà vu, Indonesia suddenly found itself again in
the midst of the same geopolitical rivalry experienced in 1965. A war of
narratives has penetrated deeply into the minds of the Indonesian people
through various forms of digital media. The Indonesian government must walk a
delicate thin line of vaccine diplomacy to care the best for its people. All
this gives an immense sense of dependence.
Yes, starting this year, we should value
every 17th of August as a moment of reflection, to contemplate how we can be
less dependent on other nations, to pull Indonesia more into our own zone of
influence. There is no quick fix. Quick wins are elusive. It is an endeavour
that needs perseverance in decades and centuries to come.
The author is a resident of the city of Leiden, the Netherlands.
[written for the commemoration of 17 August 2021]
An annotation of this essay, describing the thought and information behind the paragraphs, can be found here.
