Loudon–Fransen van de Putte telegrams (February–March 1873)

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tagsdocument, correspondence, diplomacy, aceh-war, 1873, colonial-policy, dutch
aliasesTelegramwisseling Loudon-Fransen van de Putte, Telegrammen Februari-Maart 1873, Loudon and Fransen van de Putte correspondence 1873

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The Loudon–Fransen van de Putte telegrams of February–March 1873 are the sequence of cipher telegraphic exchanges between Governor-General James Loudon at Batavia and Minister of the Colonies I. D. Fransen van de Putte at The Hague in the weeks immediately preceding the outbreak of the Atjeh War. They were reproduced at length by Brooshooft in the second chapter of his Brooshooft (1886) to defend Fransen van de Putte against the accusation that he had rushed light-heartedly into war, and they have remained a primary source for the immediate origins of the Dutch declaration of war on Atjeh.

Context

After the Sumatra Treaty of 2 November 1871 had removed the British objection to Dutch extension of authority on Sumatra, the Dutch government still intended to settle relations with Atjeh peacefully by treaty. That plan was overtaken in January–February 1873 when W. H. Read, the Dutch consul at Singapore, telegraphed Batavia that Acehnese envoys had approached the consuls of the United States and Italy at Singapore to ask for help against the hated Dutch. The same envoys had only weeks earlier assured the Dutch that the Sultan was friendly and was asking Dutch help against a war faction in his own court. Governor-General Loudon, fearing actual foreign intervention (appeals were also reported to France and Turkey), requested authority to send the Vice-President of the Raad van Nederlandsch-Indië (Nieuwenhuyzen) with warships to demand recognition of Dutch sovereignty, failing which war would be declared and an expedition landed. The Minister agreed that firm action was needed but disputed the formulation of the initial demand.

The Exchange as Printed by Brooshooft

Brooshooft printed the following sequence in full (summarised):

  1. Fransen van de Putte to Loudon, 18 February 1873. Sent with foreknowledge of the Council of Ministers and the King. Having noted with satisfaction from the mail report of 9 January that firm action in Atjeh was being prepared, the Minister had urged the United States and Italy to restrain their agents. “If you do not doubt the correctness of Consul Singapore’s report, further delay is impermissible.” He ordered a strong naval force sent to Atjeh to demand explanation and redress for the Sultan’s “double-faced and treacherous” conduct and a settlement of Dutch–Atjeh relations in the intended sense; if satisfaction were not given, forces sufficient to back the demand were to be concentrated. Where preparation was unavoidable, including to ascertain the real state and disposition of the Sultan (who was, if possible, still to be spared and supported), sufficient naval power had to be sent at once to make a useful impression and to forestall foreign intervention. Protests were to be lodged against any intervention. (signed) Fransen van de Putte.

  2. Loudon to Fransen van de Putte, 3 March 1873. The Vice-President would leave in a few days with two ships for Atjeh, to get us recognised as sovereign or war, and so to forestall America. (signed) Loudon.

  3. Fransen van de Putte to Loudon, 5 March 1873. “With the demand for sovereignty be cautious.” Atjeh must first be properly shown how moderate and reasonable Dutch wishes were, and how the conduct of Atjeh made greater demands necessary. The Vice-President was to be provided with a cipher key and instructions so he could telegraph in cipher in emergencies.

  4. Loudon to Fransen van de Putte, 6 March 1873. The Vice-President was departing. “I cannot give him a cipher key; from Pinang sovereignty recognition is highly necessary, otherwise nothing is gained. If prohibition is received I will obey. Copying costs too much time: almost no loss of time via Batavia.”

  5. Fransen van de Putte to Loudon, 7 March 1873. “We may not and will not bind your hands by prohibition, but consider that sovereignty or war as the first demand would make a bad impression.” With prompt and vigorous action, the first step should be the demand within the same interval in which troops could be expected, for satisfaction and guarantees arising from what had occurred. In case of refusal, evasion or delay, war was unavoidable, “which of itself resolves into sovereignty.”

  6. Loudon to Fransen van de Putte, 9 March 1873. “No other guarantee conceivable than recognition of sovereignty. Without that the expedition makes no sense. Please send definite orders at once or let me act entirely on my own responsibility.”

  7. Fransen van de Putte to Loudon, 10 March 1873. “I doubt whether my telegram of 7 March was properly understood.” It had said that war of itself resolves into sovereignty. He had no objection to sovereignty recognition emerging as the outcome of negotiation; but the form of the manifesto to Atjeh would determine the outcome there and the impression in the Netherlands and abroad. Sovereignty as a first demand in the manifesto he could “never, never approve.”

  8. Loudon to Fransen van de Putte, 12 March 1873. “Tell me without delay what demand I must make. I truly can find no other guarantee and there is no more time to lose.”

  9. Fransen van de Putte to Loudon, 12 March 1873. “Our difference concerns introduction and form, but these are here of great weight.” With rapid and vigorous action it was all the more important to show that justice and prudence guided the Dutch. Their starting-point must be, as in earlier telegrams, “our demand for explanation, accountability, and satisfaction for what has occurred, and guarantees by treaty against repetition and for lasting regular relations.” The further definition of the relationship was left to the treaty, in the conclusion of which the display of Dutch force was naturally to be used.

  10. Loudon to Fransen van de Putte, 20 March 1873. The Commissioner had left Pinang for Atjeh the previous day. Troops would leave Batavia on the 22nd.

Brooshooft’s Use of the Telegrams

Brooshooft introduced the exchange with the remark that “how little he [the Minister] had, according to the celebrated French example, declared war à cœur léger, may appear from the following telegrams,” and he closed it with an explicit defence of Fransen van de Putte, arguing that the Minister, far from having sought war, had done everything possible to avoid its unnecessary declaration; that after the years of humiliation, the continuing piracy and the latest duplicity of the Acehnese envoys, he would have been culpable if he had let these provocations pass; and that the war, when it came, was the fault of the Sultan and his advisers, who had chosen to answer a legitimate demand for explanation with evasions and delays while strengthening their coastal defences.

Historical Significance

The telegrams show:

  • That the Dutch cabinet, including the King, was informed in advance and endorsed a firm response.
  • That Fransen van de Putte was concerned above all with the form of the Dutch action — with ensuring that the Netherlands did not appear to foreign powers and to Dutch public opinion to be demanding sovereignty brusquely as a first step, but rather to be seeking satisfaction and guarantees, with sovereignty emerging as the natural outcome if Aceh forced war.
  • That Loudon, on the spot, believed only an immediate demand for sovereignty would justify the expedition and forestall American intervention.
  • That civilian control from The Hague was weakened by the lack of a cipher key with Commissioner Nieuwenhuyzen and by the time pressure; Loudon effectively despatched Nieuwenhuyzen before agreement on the wording had been reached.
  • That the decision for war was taken in Batavia earlier than in The Hague, with the Minister acquiescing rather than initiating.

The telegram exchange became a key document for later debates over responsibility for the long and costly Aceh War, which was still being fought, with more than 20 million guilders spent annually, at the time Brooshooft wrote.

See Also

Source

Brooshooft, Mr. P. Geschiedenis van den Atjeh-oorlog 1873–1886. Utrecht: F. B. van Ditmar, 1886, Hoofdstuk II (“Oorzaken van- en aanleiding tot den oorlog”), pp. 22–24 of the work (pp. 30–32 of the OCR). The telegrams are there quoted in Dutch in full; the Minister’s signature is rendered as “FRANSEN VAN DE PUTTE” and the Governor-General’s as “LOUDON.”

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