The Government Resolution of 5 September 1893, No. 1 geheim (Gouvernementsbesluit van 5 September 1893, No. 1 geheim) — reproduced as one of the official documents gathered in the Annexes of Kruisheer’s ATJEH ‘96 — was the secret decree of the Government of Nederlandsch-Indië that authorised the appointment of Teuku Umar under the new official name Toekoe Djohan Pahalawan as Panglima Prang Besar of the Government. The resolution, classified secret, formalised the Dutch policy of seeking peace in Groot-Atjeh through the alliance of native auxiliaries — a policy described by Kruisheer as resting on “een zwakke basis” (a weak foundation) because it depended on the good faith of a single man. It was the legal foundation of Umar’s two-and-a-half-year career as a Dutch ally and, by consequence, of the defection of 29 March 1896 that brought that policy crashing down.
Background
The resolution grew out of a Dutch strategic reappraisal following the difficult years of the Atjeh-oorlog in the late 1880s and early 1890s. Umar had rendered good services to the Kompeni in August 1893 by the “zuivering der XXV Moekims” — the “cleansing” (pacification) of the XXV Moekims — and his value as a native intermediary was evident. The Civiel en Militair Gouverneur proposed to formalise Umar’s role by appointing him to a new office — Panglima Prang Besar of the Government of Nederlandsch-Indië — with the rank, the symbols, and the war material appropriate to that position. The Government at Batavia approved, and the formal Gouvernementsbesluit was issued on 5 September 1893 under the secret classification.
The resolution was the legal predicate of the formal act of subjection of 30 September 1893, at which Umar and 15 of his war leaders talso the Oath of Loyalty before the Dutch administration at Koeta Radja. On 21 October 1893 T. Djohan was given leadership of the XXVI Moekims; on 30 November 1893 he conquered Ana’ Galoeng for the Dutch. These acts all flowed from the authority granted by the Gouvernementsbesluit of 5 September 1893.
Content
The resolution authorised the appointment of Toekoe Oemar — under the new official name Toekoe Djohan Pahalawan — as Panglima Prang Besar of the Government of Nederlandsch-Indië. The conferral of a new name was not a matter of casual courtesy: it constituted Umar, in the formal Dutch register, as a new man and a new officer, distinct from the Toekoe Oemar who had previously been a sometime-enemy of the Kompeni. The office of Panglima Prang Besar — literally “Great War Commander” — placed him above the ordinary territorial chiefs and made him the Government’s principal native warlord in Groot-Atjeh, with authority to raise, equip, and command auxiliary forces against the recalcitrant Lamkrak mukims and other hostile districts.
The resolution was classified geheim — secret — because the Dutch understood that the visible elevation of a former enemy to a senior war command would provoke resistance both among the hoeloebalang who had remained loyal and among the clerics and hoeloebalang of the hostile mukims. The text of the resolution is preserved in Kruisheer’s Bijlagen alongside the Confirmation Act of 30 September 1893 and the subsequent Government Resolution of 19 January 1896 No. 9 appointing Umar as hoeloebalang of Lepong.
Reception and Aftermath
The immediate aftermath of the resolution was the formal subjection ceremony of 30 September 1893 and the 1893 campaigns that brought Ana’ Galoeng and the XXVI Moekims under Dutch control. For two and a half years Umar served as the linchpin of Dutch policy in Groot-Atjeh, commanding his legioen of native auxiliaries, drawing Dutch pay and Dutch weapons, and — according to Ketjihik Oemar’s telegrams — meeting busily with the heads of the clergy in ways the Dutch did not fully understand. Kruisheer records that the policy was recognised at the time as a “zwakke basis” because it rested on one man.
That basis collapsed on 29 March 1896 with the defection. The Gouvernementsbesluit of 5 September 1893 was effectively abrogated by the 11, which dismissed Umar from the office of Panglima Prang Besar and from the hoeloebalang of Lepong conferred by the Resolution of 19 January 1896, and stipulated that he would henceforth be officially designated by his old name Toekoe Oemar. The renaming of 1893 was thus symbolically undone.
Significance
The Gouvernementsbesluit of 5 September 1893 is the founding document of the Dutch-alliance phase of the Atjeh-oorlog (1893–1896). Its language — conferring a new name, a senior war command, and an explicit government commission on a former enemy — captures the ambition and the risk of the stelsel. Its abrogation by the Resolution of 26 April 1896 marks the formal end of that policy and the beginning of the conventional military phase of the war under Vetter. As a historical document, the resolution is indispensable to understanding both Umar’s rise and his fall.
See Also
- Teuku Umar
- Panglima Prang Besar
- Oath of Loyalty and Confirmation Act of 30 September 1893
- Gouvernementsbesluit of 19 January 1896, No. 9
- 11 (Bijlage VI)
- Subjection of Teuku Umar (30 September 1893)
- Defection of Teuku Umar (29 March 1896)
- 1893
- 1896
Source
ATJEH ‘96, door A. Kruisheer, Kapitein der Infanterie O.I.L., met 2 kaarten en 4 portretten (Weltevreden: N.V. Boekhandel Visser & Co, 1913). Instituut Kern, Leiden. OCR-filename: 20260715_163243_DLP-89-Atjeh_96_Met_2_kaarten_en4_DOORA_KRUISHEER_Kapiteinder_Infanterie_nemoretriever-ocr-v1_OCR.txt, p. 346.