De Atjeh-Oorlog (Kruijt, 1896)

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tagsdocument, book, colonial, dutch, aceh-war, military-history, 19th-century, source, kruijt
aliasesDe Atjeh-Oorlog, De Atjeh-Oorlog Kort Overzicht van Oorsprong Verloop en Gevolg, Kruijt De Atjeh-Oorlog, Kruijt 1896 brochure, Atjeh-Oorlog brochure Kruijt

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De Atjeh-Oorlog: Kort Overzicht van Oorsprong, Verloop en Gevolg (“The Aceh War: A Short Overview of Origin, Course and Consequence”) is a Dutch-language historical brochure of seventy-nine pages by J. A. Kruijt, Oud Controleur-Generaal der Nederlanden te Pokkenhage, published in 1896 at ‘s-Gravenhage by Loman & Funke as a volume in the Boekerij van het Koloniaal Instituut (Library of the Colonial Institute) series. The brochure, written in August 1896 in the immediate aftermath of the defection of Teuku Umar of March 1896, is a sustained polemical indictment of the Dutch conduct of the Atjeh-oorlog from 1873 to 1896, organised as a chronological narrative in thirteen chapters covering each successive Dutch governor and military commander of Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden.

Authorship and Purpose

Kruijt, signing himself only as “De Schrijver” in the introduction and dating the preface “Den Haag, Augustus 1896”, wrote the brochure in explicit response to what he describes as the renewed public attention to the Atjeh question following the “jongste gebeurtenissen” — the recent events of 1896. He invokes the contemporary complaint of Nederburgh (writing in 1886) that “ons brein wordt meer verbijsterd dan verlicht door den strijd der deskundigen” (our brain is more bewildered than enlightened by the quarrel of the experts), and the March 1893 testimony of Pruijs van der Hoeven at the handover of his governorship, that the Dutch public was “onbekend met doel, handelingen en beteekenis van voorvallen in Atjeh” (unacquainted with the purpose, actions and significance of events in Atjeh). The brochure aims to supply that missing knowledge by giving “een duidelijk overzicht te geven van wat in Atjeh gedaan is en hoe zulks tot den huidigen toestand heeft geleid” — a clear overview of what has been done in Atjeh and how this has led to the current state.

Structure

The brochure is organised into an Inleiding (Introduction) and thirteen chapters, each devoted to a successive phase of the war, principally demarcated by the tenure of the senior Dutch officer in Atjeh:

  1. Inleiding — explaining the renewed public attention to Atjeh and the author’s purpose.
  2. Chapter I. Wat is Atjeh? Hoe kwamen wij er mee in oorlog? — historical background from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries through the Treaty of 1824 and Treaty of 1871 to the declaration of war of March 1873.
  3. Chapter II. De eerste expeditie en blokkade, van April tot December 1873 — the First Aceh Expedition under General Köhler, his death on 14 April 1873, the failed assault on the kraton, the withdrawal, and the Lieutenant Bogaert’s operations on the East Coast.
  4. Chapter III. Tweede expeditie, van December 1873 tot April 1874 — the Second Aceh Expedition under General van Swieten, the taking of the Missigit on 7 January 1874, the fall of the kraton on 24 January 1874, the death of the Sultan on 26 January 1874, and Van Swieten’s proclamation annexing Atjeh.
  5. Chapter IV. Pel’s verrichtingen, van April 1874 tot Maart 1876 — the operations of Colonel Pel and the elaboration of Pel’s Plan for the line of fortifications around Kota Radja.
  6. Chapter V. Periode onder de generaals Wiggers van Kerchem en Diemont, van Maart 1876 tot Juni 1877 — the governorship of General Wiggers van Kerchem and General Diemont, the return of Habib Abdul Rachman el-Zahir to Atjeh, and the completion of Pel’s Plan.
  7. Chapter VI. Het bestuur van generaal van der Heijden, van Juni 1877 tot April 1881 — the “glorie-tijdperk” (glory period) of General van der Heijden, the conquest of the 22 Moekims and 26 Moekims, and the displacement of Van der Heijden by civil government.
  8. Chapter VII. Scheepvaartregeling — Kruijt’s extended editorial on the scheepvaartregeling (maritime trade regulation) as the central strategic instrument neglected by the Dutch throughout the war.
  9. Chapter VIII. Achteruitgang onder de Civiele Gouverneurs Pruijs van der Hoeven en Laging Tobias, van April 1881 tot September 1884 — the civil government period under Pruijs van der Hoeven and Laging Tobias, the Nisero affair, and the collapse of Dutch authority.
  10. Chapter IX. Blokkade en Concentratie onder den Civiel en Militair Gouverneur Demmeni, van September 1884 tot December 1886 — the concentration system under Colonel Demmeni, the failed blockade, and the restoration of the Sultanate attempt.
  11. Chapter X. Politiek onder generaal Van Teijn. Blokkade en poging tot herstel van het Sultanaat, van December 1886 tot April 1891 — the governorship of General van Teijn, the Tengkoe di Tirou’s encirclement of the Dutch line, and the death of the principal resistance leaders.
  12. Chapter XI. Kortstondig bestuur onder kolonel Pompe van Meerdervoort, van Mei 1891 tot Januari 1892 — the brief and contentious governorship of Colonel Pompe van Meerdervoort, the “vriendelijke oorlog” (friendly war) policy, and the arrival of Dr. Snouck Hurgronje in Atjeh.
  13. Chapter XII. De politiek en het beleid van generaal Deijkerhoff, van Januari 1892 tot April 1896 — the governorship of General Deijkerhoff, the arming of Teuku Umar as Panglima Prang Besar, and the catastrophic betrayal of March 1896.
  14. Chapter XIII. Besluit — Kruijt’s editorial conclusion prescribing the future course of Dutch policy.

Argument

Kruijt’s central argument is that the Dutch failure in Atjeh was not the failure of any single system — “niet omdat éénig stelsel op zich zelf niet deugde, maar omdat geen enkele maatregel consequent is doorgevoerd en volkomen tot zijn recht is kunnen komen” (not because any single system was bad in itself, but because no measure was carried through consistently and brought fully to its right). He identifies a recurring pattern of half-measures, contradiction between the Dutch government at home and the colonial administration in Batavia and Atjeh, “ongeloofelijk optimisme” (incredible optimism) in the reports from Atjeh, and a structural failure to recognise that the centre of gravity of the war lay not in Groot-Atjeh but on the kusten (coasts) — the East Coast, North Coast and West Coast of Atjeh — where the resistance was financed, where its recruits were raised, and from which the war was sustained.

Kruijt’s prescription, foreshadowed throughout and articulated in the Besluit (Conclusion), is for a war footing, the maintenance of the Dutch stelling (defensive position) in Groot-Atjeh with active defence, the rigorous and uncompromising application of the scheepvaartregeling on the coasts, and the avoidance of all “concessiën of vergunningen” (concessions or permissions) and “bijzondere vriendjes” (special friends) until complete submission had been obtained.

Reception and Significance

The brochure appeared in the year of the defection of Teuku Umar, at the moment when the failure of the policy of arming Atjehese auxiliaries had been definitively exposed. It is one of the earliest sustained historical critiques of the entire Dutch conduct of the Atjeh War, written before the publication of Snouck Hurgronje’s De Atjehers (1906) and before the ultimate Dutch victory under Van Heutsz’s governorship from 1898. Kruijt’s diagnosis — that the war had been lost by half-measures and inconsistency rather than by any inherent flaw in any single system — would be vindicated by the subsequent success of the consistent scheepvaartregeling and the marechaussée campaigns under Van Heutsz.

The brochure’s publication by the Boekerij van het Koloniaal Instituut placed it in the institutional context of the Koloniaal Instituut (Colonial Institute) of Amsterdam, the principal Dutch scholarly institution for the study of the colonies. Its tone — at once scholarly and polemical, annotated with personal judgements on the principal actors — reflects the genre of the colonial brochure of the late nineteenth century.

See Also

Source

De Atjeh-Oorlog: Kort Overzicht van Oorsprong, Verloop en Gevolg, door J. A. Kruijt, Oud Controleur-Generaal der Nederlanden te Pokkenhage. Boekerij van het Koloniaal Instituut. ‘s-Gravenhage: Loman & Funke, 1896. OCR-filename: 20260716_140310_DLP-101-De_Atjeh_oorlog_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt, pp. 5–85.

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