The Aceh War: The History of the Bloody Conflict that Imposed Dutch Rule Over Indonesia

During the 17th century, the Netherlands, despite having only 1.5 million people in 1600, became a global maritime and trading power. By contrast, France at the time had 20 million people, Spain had 8 million, and England had 5 million. Nevertheless, Amsterdam became one of the most important urban centers in the world and the location of the world’s first stock market, and Dutch merchant ships and pirates plied the Atlantic Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and the Pacific Ocean. The Dutch acquired colonies in the East Indies, where they seized control of the spice trade from the Portuguese, and in the West Indies, they acquired a number of islands from the Spanish (several of which are still Dutch today). They became the only Westerners who were allowed to trade with Shogunate Japan from a small island next to Nagasaki, and they settled the town that ultimately became New York City. Naturally, all of this imperialism generated enormous amounts of wealth that flowed into the Netherlands.

Naturally, not everybody welcomed the Europeans, and some of the fiercest opposition came from the Sultanate of Aceh. Aceh is now a part of Indonesia, but the people have stubbornly maintained a unique sense of self-identity based on a quite distinct and separate history. Once a major political and military power in the Indian Ocean, its power gradually declined over a period of several centuries, but Aceh successfully maintained its independence until 1873, when the Dutch invaded. The war between the Dutch and the Acehnese was the longest and bloodiest of the many Dutch military campaigns in Indonesia. Even after the Dutch technically subdued them, insurgency campaigns would last well into the 20th century, and sporadic fighting was still ongoing as the Japanese pushed across the Pacific in the 1930s and 1940s.

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Release date

Audiobook: March 2, 2023