Government and military leadership deliberately tolerated extreme violence

The Dutch government and military leadership deliberately tolerated the systematic and widespread use of extreme violence by Dutch military personnel in the war against the Republic of Indonesia. This is stated in the study Independence, decolonization, violence and war in Indonesia, 1945-1950. It was carried out with subsidy and research frameworks from the government by the Royal Institute for Language, Land and Ethnology (KITLV), the Netherlands Institute for Military History (NIMH) and the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

The researchers conclude that the 1969 position is untenable, which stated that there were excesses but no structural violence. Precise figures for crimes and numbers of victims cannot be given, according to the researchers. “It does appear from the sources that extreme violence on the part of the Dutch armed forces was not only widespread, but was often also used deliberately. This was tolerated at all levels – political, military and judicial.”