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The Japanese Occupation and Rival Indonesian Elites: Northern Sumatra in 1942

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Anthony Reid
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Extract

There is a bewildering contrast between the superficial calm of the 1930s in Indonesia and the turbulence of the immediate post-war period. In addition to the enormous upsurge of anti-colonial militance, the years following the Japanese surrender were marked by an unprecedented degree of conflict amongst Indonesians, as society adjusted to the radically changed conditions of independence. In other countries occupied by Japan, notably Burma and Malaya, ethnic animosities were also unusually overt after the war. It seemed natural to ask, as Elsbree did in his pioneering essay of 1953:

did the [Japanese] occupation, with its dissolution of existing ties, aggravate the fissures of the old order? … Did the Japanese deliberately pursue a “divide and rule” tactic, and is their policy to be held responsible for the violent outbursts and the general increase in racial tension since the end of the war?

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The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , November 1975 , pp. 49 - 61
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1975

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References

The author is greatly indebted to a number of Japanese colleagues who made it possible, during a short visit to Japan in August 1973, for him to locate and use important Japanese sources concerning the occupation in northern Sumatra, and to interview Japanese concerned in those events. The debt is especially great to Mrs. Shiraishi Saya, who guided, translated, and advised; most of the translations from Japanese sources are hers. I also wish to thank Professor Itagaki Yōichi, Fujiwara Iwaichi, Azuma Tōru, Ichikura Tokusaburō, Professor Nagazumi Akira, Professor Masuda Ato, and Dr. Nishihara Masashi. Indonesians; who have helped me with information and guidance are more numerous, and not all would wish to be mentioned. I would nevertheless like to mention particularly the late Said Abu Bakar, whose exciting tale led me into many new paths.

1 Elsbree, Willard H., Japan's Role in Southeast Asian Nationalist Movements (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953), p. 12Google Scholar.

2 Elsbree, pp. 120–32; 141–5; 163.

3 In addition to Piekaar and Benda, discussed below, see Anderson, Benedict, Some Aspects of Indonesian Politics under the Japanese Occupation, 1942–1945 (Ithaca: Cornell Modern Indonesia Project, 1961), pp. 22-3Google Scholar; Legge, J. D., Indonesia (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1964), p. 132Google Scholar; Reid, Anthony. “The Birth of the Republic in Sumatra,” Indonesia, 12 (1971), p. 24CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and, to some extent, Kahin, G. McT., Nationalism and Revolution in Indonesia (Ithaca: Cornell, 1952), pp. 110-14Google Scholar.

4 Piekaar, A. J., Atjeh en de oorlog met Japan (The Hague: Van Hoeve, 1949)Google Scholar.

5 On this clash, the “Cumbok war” of December 1945/January 1946, see Abdullah Arif, “The affair of the Tjumbok traitors,” trans, and ed. by Anthony Reid, Review of Indonesian and Malayan Affairs, 4/5(1970/71), pp. 29–65; and Amin, S. M., Sekitar Peristiwa Berdarah di Atjeh (Jakarta: Soeroengan, 1956), pp. 11–13Google Scholar.

6 Benda, Harry J., The Crescent and the Rising Sun: Indonesian Islam under the Japanese Occupation, 1942–1945 (The Hague: Van Hoeve, 1958), especially pp. 186–9 and 199–204Google Scholar. Also Continuity and Change in Southeast Asia: collected journal articles of Harry J. Benda (New Haven: Yale Southeast Asia Studies, 1972), pp. 44–5, 77, and 151–2Google Scholar.

7 Benda, The Crescent, p. 199; also Benda, Continuity, p. 173.

8 Benda, H. J., Irikura, J. K., and Kishi, K. (eds), Japanese Military Administration in Indonesia: Selected Documents (New Haven: Yale Southeast Asia Studies, 1965)Google Scholar.

9 “Principles governing the administration of occupied southern areas, 20 November, 1941,” in ibid., p. 1.

10 There is a similar striking contrast between the unity presented by the AFPFL in Burma and the Vietminh in Vietnam in 1945, and the seemingly hopeless divisions of the pre-war national movement in these two countries. The specifically anti-Japanese character of these two movements in 1945, however, makes comparison with Indonesia difficult.

11 Nationalists themselves frequently complained of this: “The reputation of the leaders is ruined in the eyes of the people,” said Ki Hadjar Dewantoro n June 1945, cited in Dahm, Bernhard, Sukarno and the Struggle for Indonesian Independence (Ithaca: Cornell, 1969), p. 304Google Scholar. “What the masses are saying … is frequently not very nice. There are some who say, Our leaders are now living the good life but we are just as poor as ever,’” Mohammad Hatta, August 1943, as translated by Frederick, William in The Putera Reports. Problems in Indonesian-Japanese wartime cooperation (Ithaca: Cornell Modern Indonesia Project, 1971), p. 61Google Scholar.

12 On the “social revolutionary” upheavals of 1945–6, see Anderson, Benedict, Java, in a time of revolution, occupation and resistance, 1944–1946 (Ithaca: Cornell, 1972), pp. 16–189Google Scholar and 332–69; Smail, John, Bandung in the Early Revolution 1945–1946. A study in the social history of the Indonesian revolution (Ithaca: Cornell Southeast Asia Program, 1964), pp. 99–146Google Scholar; Reid, Anthony, The Indonesian National Revolution (Melbourne: Longman, 1974), pp. 14–17Google Scholar and 59–76.

13 Bernhard Dahm, Sukarno, pp. 261–6; and History of Indonesia in the Twentieth Century (New York: Praeger, 1971), p. 93Google Scholar. See also Kanahele, George S., “The Japanese Occupation of Indonesia: Prelude to Independence” (Ph.D. Thesis, Cornell University, 1967), pp. 241–2Google Scholar. Harry Benda himself, in Continuity and Change, p. 72, described a situation in Java very like that presented below for Sumatra, though without drawing the same conclusion.

14 Piekaar, p. 332. Despite my difference here, one must admire the astonishing level of fairness towards the Japanese regime shown by Piekaar, given the circumstances under which he was writing.

15 These broadcasts, for an hour each evening, were directed by the veteran Sumatran nationalist Mohammad Samin (bin Taib), well-remembered both in East Sumatra and Aceh for his prominence as Medan leader of Sarekat Islam, editor of the radical Benih Merdeka, and legal agent, until hobbled by government restrictions in 1921. He moved to Penang in the late 1930s, where he wrote for such journals as Sahabat and Suara Malaysia. At the Japanese conquest he emerged as leader of a Persatuan Indonesia Merdeka (Indonesian independence association) with another Minangkabau, Haji Thamin. Interviews with Nip Xarim and Ghazali Yunus.

16 Piekaar, p. 183.

17 Anthony Reid, The Contest for North Sumatra: Atjeh, the Netherlands, and Britain, 7858-/898 (Kuala Lumpur; OUP/UMP, 1969), pp. 119–55, 226–37, and 256–9.

18 Piekaar, pp. 14–24. Siegel, James T., The Rope of God (Berkeley: University of California, 1969), pp. 83–133Google Scholar. Ismuha, H., “Lahirnja ‘Persatuan Ulama Seluruh Atjeh’ 30 Tahun Jang Lalu,” Sinar Darussalam, 14 (June 1969), pp. 43–7Google Scholar, and 15 (July 1969), pp. 33–9.

19 Politiek Verslag S.O.K., June 1938, pp. 3–7, mailrapport 766 geh/38, in the colonial archive of the Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken, The Hague.

20 Lebra, Joyce C., Jungle Alliance. Japan and the Indian National Army (Singapore: Asia Pacific Press, 1971)Google Scholar, passim. Iwaichi, Fujiwara, F-kikan (Tokyo: Hara Shobō, 1966)Google Scholar, passim.

21 Fujiwara, p. 149. Fujiwara interview, 23 August 1973.

22 Said Abu Bakar interview.

23 Hussain, Abdullah, Terjebak (Kuala Lumpur: Pustaka Antara, 1965), pp. 27–41Google Scholar. Also Fujiwara, pp. 149–51; Nakamiya Gorō, “Sumatora muketsu senryo no kageni” [Behind the bloodless occupation of Sumatra] in Yomiuri, Shukan, Nihon no himitsu sen (Tokyo: 1956), pp. 93–6Google Scholar. I have discounted Fu-jiwara's claim to have first met Abu Bakar in Tai-ping, since it is not supported by other sources.

24 Piekaar, p. 179.

25 Fujiwara, pp. 200–1.

26 Fujiwara, pp. 201–2. Abdullah Hussain, pp. 44–6, records a different speech by Fujiwara, in which the subordinate role of the F-kikan was still more explicit. The group was told frankly that it was to be a fifth column, whose role was to enable “a country to be conquered easily, causing few victims among its inhabitants.”

27 Fujiwara interview, 23 August 1973.

28 Cited Piekaar, p. 145.

29 Abdullah Hussain, pp. 47–85. Fujiwara, pp. 275–6. “Verslag van Atjeh … tot 15 january 1946,” in Spits to Van Mook, 26 February 1946, Archive Ministerie van Zaken Overzee, 21/1. Interview. The Dutch sources—including Piekaar, p. 61–include the famous Seulimeum ulama, Sjech Ibrahim, in the group of F-kikan members who came from Malaya in the guise of refugees. Said Abu Bakar and Fujiwara, however, give him no place in the F-kikan, because he returned to Aceh before the Japanese occupation of Singapore.

30 Piekaar, pp. 63–7. Panglima Polim, T. M. A., Memoir (Tjatatan) (Kutaraja: stenciled, 1972), pp. 3–5Google Scholar.

31 Panglima Polim (or Polem) was the title of the principal ulèëbalang of the Sagi of the XXII Mukims, the largest of the three Sagis that made up Aceh Besar. Since its foundation in the seventeenth century, the dynasty was always one of the most powerful in Aceh. Muhammad Ali's father (d. 1941) had led resistance against the Dutch in the period 1898–1903, but subsequently became a highly respected part of the Dutch administration.

32 Piekaar, pp. 77–9 and 84–5.

33 Piekaar, p. 142. Fujiwara, p. 273. Interviews.

31 Asia Raya (Jakarta), 19 October 2602 [1942] published a fanciful tale of 50 emissaries from ulèëebalangs in Aceh. However, one figure in this account—T. Muhammad of Jeuniëb (Samalanga, North Aceh)—may really have been sent to Penang by the ruler of Jeunieb, whom Piekaar, (pp. 132–3) notes suddenly aligning with PUSA in February 1942, evidently to insure himself with the Japanese. T. Njak Arif is sometimes also credited with having sent envoys to Penang, though I have seen no hard' evidence.

36 Fujiwara, pp. 273–4. Piekaar, pp. 145 and 178. Nakamiya Gorō, p. 96.

36 These events are carefully chronicled from the Dutch side by Piekaar, pp. 85–106 and 120–88.

37 The PUSA view appears to have been first advanced in an article in Pewarta Deli (Medan), 7 May 2602 [1942], cited in Piekaar, pp. 170–6. An extreme ulèëbalang view, apparently conveyed to Parada Harahap, appeared in Asia Raya (Jakarta), 19 October 2602. In general, published Japanese sources give an exaggerated view of the PUSA role, apparently because a common source for these accounts is a paper prepared by Said Abu Bakar.

38 Piekaar, p. 177, citing the Pewarta Deli article (21 December); Fujiwara, pp. 274–5 (mid- December); and Nakamiya Gorō, p. 97 (6 March).

39 In a 1969 interview, Daud Beureu'e h categorically denied that PUSA organized the 1942 revolt. He explained the PUSA envoys to Malaya as an insurance against the certainty that th e Japanese would wor k through the ulèëbalangs unless PUSA had good relations with them. Ismuha, in Sinar Darussalam, 15 (July 1969), p. 36, chronicles the history of PUSA without claiming credit for the revolt, beyond the spontaneous participation of members of the youth group, Pemuda PUSA.

40 Piekaar, p. 190.

41 Piekaar, pp. 158–61.

42 In one case noted by Piekaar, pp. 138–9, the PUSA activist who had become the strong-man of the Lho'Seumawe district was apparently dismissed because of an unfavorable report from the local Dutch official!

43 Ismuha, loc. cit., p. 37, clearly implies that these arrests of Daud Beureu'eh and others occurred because of hostile reports by other Acehnese.

44 Interviews with Sugondo Kartodiprodjo, 29 July 1972 and Selamat Ginting, 22 August 1971. Abdullah Hussain, p. 89. Dr. Amir's notes of 14 June 1946, I. C. 005966 in Rijksinstituut voor Oorlogsdocumentatie—which have been used by Kanahele (pp. 28–9 and 259), among others—state that this Comité Indonesia urged the Japanese to abolish the Sultanates. This is strongly denied by Sugondo, and appears to result from a confusion with the F-kikan on Amir's part.

45 Brandt, Willem, De Gele Terreur (The Hague: Van Hoeve, 1946), pp. 22–4Google Scholar; Tengku Luckman Sinar, “The East Coast of Sumatra under the Japanese heel,” Sumatra Research Bulletin I, Part 2 (1972), p. 29; Tetsurō, Inoue, Bapa Djanggut (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1953), p. 77Google Scholar.

46 Abdullah Hussain, pp. 91–4. Abdullah Jusuf interview, 17 August 1972. Asia Raya, 10 June 2602 [1942] reported that the Indonesian political parties of Medan dissolved themselves on 7 June, after thanks wer e expressed for their help in defeating the Dutch army.

47 Malik, Haji AbdulAmrullah, Karim [Hamka], Kenang-kenangan Hidup (Kuala Lumpur: Pustaka Antara, 1966), pp. 197–8Google Scholar.

48 Sumatora Gunseikanbu, Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru chian-jō no ichi-kōsatsu,” 27 November 2602 [1942] (stenciled document in Tokugawa papers of Japanese Defence Agency), pp. 40–48. Also Inoue, pp. 54–5.

49 Inoue, p. 54.

50 Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru,” p. 47.

51 Inoue, p. 55.

52 Table in Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru.” Interviews. One important source of land conflict in the affected parts of Karoland was the re-allocation of land which had followed irrigation works in the 1930s.

53 Inoue, p. 55.

54 Table in Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru.”

55 Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru,” pp. 36–8.

56 Tengku Luckman Sinar, p. 34.

57 Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru,” p. 39.

58 Inoue, pp. 52–3.

89 Both Inoue, p. 55 and Tengku Arifin (cited in Tengku Luckman Sinar, pp. 34–5) attribute to Arifin the linking of the GERINDO leadership with the aron disturbances. Although I have questioned a number of GERINDO leaders on the matter, it seems impossible to establish what truth there was in the allegation, beyond the stimulus GERINDO un-doubtedly gave to the earliest phase of the Karo movement in 1938–9.

60 Table in Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru.”

61 Inoue, pp. 70–72.

62 Sumatora Shinbun (Medan), II March 2603 [1943]. Table in Keimubu, “Sumatora ni okeru.”