De Visser was the member of the Tweede Kamer who, in the Atjeh debate of 16 November 1897, stated the confessional case against Van Kol’s motion in the sharpest terms, holding that its logic led either to the seizure of the Dutch colonies by other powers or to their delivery to the power of Islam.
Argument
De Visser gave two objections. His first was that the consequence of the standpoint of the deputy from Enschedé was “prijsgeving van onze koloniën” — the surrender of the colonies — which meant in other words either the indication of the opportunity for other powers to take possession of them, or the bringing of those colonies “onder de verderfelijke macht van den Islam.”
His second objection rested on the authority of Dr. Snouck Hurgronje. Whoever had read Snouck Hurgronje’s book on Mekka — see Mekka (Snouck Hurgronje) — knew, he said, how the Muhammadans boasted and vaunted of their power, their superiority over the Dutch government. He therefore believed that if the Dutch were to act in the spirit of Van Kol, their colonial possession in general would really run into danger.
One thing in the motion attracted him, namely its opening consideration that the war with Atjeh must be regarded as a national disaster. In Van Kol’s argument it had seemed to him as if the mover regarded the war only as a disaster for the Indies, and it therefore somewhat surprised him that the beginning of the motion expressed precisely the conviction that the war was a disaster for the nation, “ook voor ons, niet het minst met het oog op de talrijke slachtoffers die daar vallen.” — also for us, not least in view of the numerous victims who fall there.
He had, however, so much confidence in the government of his country that he was convinced it would make an end as soon as possible of everything that might be called a national disaster, in the matter of the war with Atjeh also.
Troelstra’s reply
Troelstra answered De Visser directly, treating his speech as an example of the radeloosheid — the wits’-end condition — that in his view prevailed in the chamber. “Niet meer of minder werd ons hier door den heer De Visser toegevoegd, dan dat, wanneer wij ophouden met den Atjeh-oorlog, wanneer wij de veroveringspolitiek der Regeering niet verder volgen, de koloniën voor ons verloren zullen gaan en Indië overgeleverd zal worden aan den Islam.” — Neither more nor less was flung at us here by Mr. De Visser than that, if we cease the Atjeh war, if we do not further follow the Government’s policy of conquest, the colonies will be lost to us and the Indies will be delivered over to Islam. When one uttered such an assertion, Troelstra said, one ought to motivate it by indicating in what the absolute necessity of the subjection of Atjeh consisted; but the honourable deputy had not done so. He had wished to frighten the chamber, to make it afraid of the bogeyman — “doch ik ben niet bang voor den boeman.”
Troelstra added, against the fear of foreign intervention, that already in November 1877 Fransen van de Putte had said in the chamber that the object of the war, the prevention of the interference of foreign powers, had already been reached; and against the argument from prestige, that the prestige of the Netherlands had suffered by nothing so much as by the barbarities committed in the Indies.
Van Kol returned to the point on 17 November under the heading Ons prestige in Indië, arguing that no serious man could expect that Dutch withdrawal from Atjeh would bring the loss of the colonies and the triumph of Islam, and instancing the twenty-five-year history of the war: when in the first half of 1876 a quarter of the soldiers and a third of the coolies died, when the army was exhausted and Java almost defenceless, no risings broke out anywhere; when the Dutch suffered a reverse on Timor in 1890 and the surprise at Lombok brought part of the army into serious danger, and when Toekoe Oemar had turned from ally into dangerous enemy, nowhere was an attempt at resistance tried or ventured.
De Visser voted against the motion.
See Also
- Atjeh debate in the Tweede Kamer (16-17 November 1897)
- Van Kol’s motion of 16 November 1897
- Pieter Jelles Troelstra
- H. van Kol
- C. Snouck Hurgronje
- Mekka (Snouck Hurgronje)
- Isaac Dignus Fransen van de Putte
- 1897
Source
Atjeh in de Tweede Kamer: Debatten bij de behandeling der begrooting van Nederlandsch-Indië voor 1898, uitgave van de Sociaaldemokratische Arbeiderspartij in Nederland (Amsterdam: J. A. Fortuijn, 1897). Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen, Br P95-178, pp. 32, 36, 65–66.
Acknowledgement of sources. The material in this article derives from Atjeh in de Tweede Kamer: Debatten bij de behandeling der begrooting van Nederlandsch-Indië voor 1898 (Amsterdam: J. A. Fortuijn, 1897). Dutch passages are quoted in the original with an English rendering.