Skallagrim
Banned
This is always interesting, though let me tell you: it's a touchy subject in both Indonesia and here in the Netherlands. Decolonisation of the Dutch East Indies was a total mess, and "we" (meaning the Dutch government) promised a lot of Indonesians that they'd be part of a loose federal state. The post-colonial Indonesian government had, let us say, other ideas. We had promised, in particular, to help the (majority-Christian) South Moluccans to get some sort of independent status... and that fell through completely. The South Moluccas declared unilateral idependence, were crushed, a bunch went into exile in the Netherlands, we offered them help in securing a state, we totally let them down, and eventually a bunch of those exiles hijacked a train (like, a stone's throw from my house, incidentally). It ended up being a mess, with multiple deaths, and the grief over it all still lingers. Any discussion on the subject gets political fast.
The thing relevant to this particular discussion is: there is no way the State of East Indonesia is going to be a thing. Literally no way. Remember that in OTL, there was a bloody civil war between Muslims and Christians on the Moluccan islands. So here's how it'll go. If this state somehow lasts for a bit under Dutch protection, the muslim-majority islands are all going to want to join Indonesia proper, and nobody can stop them. You'll end up with a rump state consisting of all the relevant islands marked in yellow (plus Flores, in pink) on this map. All the green ones join Indonesia proper post-haste. So you basically get a federal, Christian-majority South-East Indonesian state consisting of Flores, Soemba, Timor and the South Moluccas. Presumably, West Papoea doesn't get gobbled up by Indonesia, either, but I see them opting for union with the rest of their island, rather than joining this federal state.
Another possible outcome is more support for the South Moluccan independence attempt, resulting in all other islands being gobbled up by Indonesia, but the South Moluccas remaining independent from Indonesia. (In that scenario, too, I can see West Papoea staying free from Indonesia.)
Either scenario would be considered a great improvement on OTL by basically everyone but Indonesia. It would certainly have avoided a lot of grief. The Moluccan conflict between Muslims and Christians is likely prevented, the whole Dutch debacle of the Moluccan exiles never exists, and presumably both the Christian 'South-East Indonesians" and the West Papoeans enjoy a very good relation with the Netherlands. (Indonesia, far less so, but there were going to be hard feelings there anyway...)
Last edited:
