On 17 August 1945, two days after the Japanese surrender that also brought an end to the Second World War in Asia, Indonesia declared its independence. The declaration was not recognized by the Netherlands, which resorted to force in its attempt to take control of the inevitable process of decolonization. This led to four years of difficult negotiations and bitter warfare. In 2005, the Dutch government declared that the Netherlands should never have waged the war. The government’s 1969 position on the violence used by the Dutch armed forces during the war remained unchanged, however: although there had been ‘excesses’, on the whole the armed forces had behaved ‘correctly’. As the indications of Dutch extreme violence mounted, this official position proved increasingly difficult to maintain. In 2016, the Dutch government therefore decided to fund a broad study on the dynamics of the violence. The most important conclusions of that research programme are summarized in this book. The authors show that the Dutch armed forces used extreme violence on a structural basis, and that this was concealed both at the time and for many years after the war by the Dutch government and by society more broadly. All of this – like the entire colonial history – is at odds with the rose-tinted self-image of the Netherlands. 1. Introduction 1 Background, guiding principles and methodology Gert Oostindie 2 The Netherlands and Indonesia 1945-1949. The political-historical context Gert Oostindie 3 The war in Indonesia 1945-1949. The military-historical context Gert Oostindie and Rémy Limpach Interim conclusions 2. Intermezzo The human dimension. The search for stories about the Indonesian War of Independence Eveline Buchheim, Fridus Steijlen, Stephanie Welvaart i i i. Research results 1 ‘Hatred of foreign elements and their “accomplices”’ Extreme violence in the first phase of the Indonesian Revolution (17 August 1945 to 31 March 1946) Esther Captain and Onno Sinke 2 Revolutionary worlds. Legitimacy, violence and loyalty during the Indonesian War of Independence Roel Frakking and Martijn Eickhoff 3 ‘Information costs lives.’ The intelligence war for Indonesia, 1945-1949 Rémy Limpach 4 The myth of the ‘Dutch Method’. Heavy weapons in the Indonesian War of Independence Azarja Harmanny 5 The law as a weapon. The actions of the Dutch judiciary during the Indonesian War of Independence Esther Zwinkels 6 Silence, information and deception in the Indonesian War of Independence Remco Raben and Peter Romijn 7 Silence as a strategy. International visions of the Indonesian War of Independence Jeroen Kemperman 8 Beyond colonial guilt ranking. Dutch, British and French extreme violence in comparative perspective, 1945-1962 Thijs Brocades Zaalberg and Bart Luttikhuis 9 A guilty conscience. The painful processing of the Indonesian War of Independence in the Netherlands Gert Oostindie and Meindert van der Kaaij 4. Closing remarks Conclusions 5. Epilogue Dealing with the legacies of a violent past Hilmar Farid Notes Abbreviations Further reading Acknowledgements About the authors Index