Some 70,000 young women, ‘the comfort women’, were forcibly put to work in army and naval brothels during the Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies between 1942 and 1945. Japan financed the war with the money they earned, the Dutch intelligence service NEFIS discovered shortly after the Japanese surrender. This research was never fully made public, which made it unclear for a long time.
The money was deposited daily at the war banks of the Dutch East Indies: the Bank of Taiwan and the Yokohama Specie Bank. According to Follow The Money, the Nederlandsche Handel-Maatschappij (NHM), with the Dutch state and the Royal House as major shareholders, appears to have benefited from the closure of those banks. The research platform says that “with a conservative estimate (only the deposits from the last three months before Japan capitulated) it comes to 25.76 million guilders. Indexed over the period 1945-2021, that amounts to more than 156.5 million euros.”
Paid untaxed
King Willem I owned 4000 shares in the NHM, which subsequently went to Princess Wilhelmina, Queen Juliana, Prince Bernhard and the four princesses. The dividend per royal share, which has risen considerably in value due to the liquidation proceeds of the Japanese war banks, was exceptionally paid out tax-free at the time.
The Government Information Service and the spokespersons for Finance and General Affairs have informed Follow The Money that “we have not been able to verify what happened with the said brothel money and who could be aware of it.”
‘Further investigation’
Director Rocky Tuhuteru of the Pelita Foundation does not yet want to take a position on the story of Follow The Money. Pelita offers guidance and assistance to those involved in the war with Japan. “We can only take a position if further research has been done into the money flows,” says Tuhuteru through a spokesman.
This indicates that at least 95 percent of the comfort women were Korean and Indonesian women. “Only a small proportion of the comfort women were Dutch East Indies or Dutch.”