The Commission of Inquiry into the First Aceh Expedition was the investigation started after the failure of the First Aceh Expedition (1873), when the Dutch colonial government tried to determine responsibility for the retreat from Atjeh and the death of General Köhler. As described by H. B. van Daalen in De enquête over den mislukten tocht naar Atjeh, the process began not with an open hearing of the commanders, but with secret written questions to senior officers. Only later did it become a formal commission.
The inquiry is important because it turned the defeat of 1873 into an internal struggle over blame, military honour, and government responsibility.
Secret questioning after the retreat
After the expedition returned to the roadstead of Batavia, the government did not rely only on the formal reports of the commanders. Van Daalen wrote that, under date 6 May 1873, written questions were quietly sent to senior officers who had taken part in the campaign. In his view, the purpose was either to prove that the retreat had been unavoidable or to gather support for blaming the commanders in the field.
This already caused unease, because the government appeared to be questioning subordinates behind the backs of their chiefs.
The formal commission
When these earlier steps did not settle the matter, a formal commission was appointed to examine the expedition from its organization to its return. Van Daalen criticized both its direction and its composition. The president was a civilian, and some members were, in his eyes, not of unquestioned military standing in relation to the officers whose conduct might be judged.
The withdrawal of Kroesen
Van Daalen paid special attention to the withdrawal of Colonel Kroesen after he had attended a few sittings. He admitted that the reasons were not fully public, but he treated the event as highly significant. Some people saw it as evidence that the inquiry was aimed mainly at the former army commander. Others saw it as proof that the inquiry itself had taken a troubling direction.
Criticism of procedure
Van Daalen did not say that an inquiry was wrong in itself. He said it had to be fair, open, calm, and based on proper forms. Instead, he believed the government had acted with unusual haste, had used secret accusations, and had damaged confidence within the army by questioning officers in the wrong way.
Later writers such as G. G. Booms and W. A. Coblijn also criticized the tendency to put too much blame on the officers in the field and too little on the larger failures of policy, preparation, and intelligence.
Significance
The Commission of Inquiry into the First Aceh Expedition mattered because it showed that the first Dutch defeat in Atjeh immediately became more than a military event. It became a political and institutional crisis. The inquiry raised the question of whether the commanders had failed, whether the government had failed, or whether both had failed together.
See Also
- De enquête over den mislukten tocht naar Atjeh
- H. B. van Daalen
- Bemoediging
- First Aceh Expedition (1873)
- James Loudon
- Kroesen
- Raad van Nederlandsch-Indië
- Batavia
- 1873
Source
De enquête over den mislukten tocht naar Atjeh, door H. B. van Daalen, redacteur van den Java-Bode. Twee artikelen, overgedrukt uit de nos. 131 en 132 van den Java-Bode (Batavia: H. M. van Dorp & Co.; ‘s-Gravenhage: De Erven Thierry & Mensing; C. van Doorn & Zoon, 1873), pp. 17–23.
Over de eerste expeditie tegen Atjeh: Een antwoord aan Generaal de Stuers, door G. G. Booms (‘s-Gravenhage: A. van Hoogstraten & Zoon, 1875), pp. 12–21.
Hoe Atjeh te onderwerpen, door W. A. Coblijn (‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders van Cleef, 1893), pp. 27–29.