Only last year Indonesia's handsome, personable President Sukarno came to Washington, talking largely of Abraham Lincoln, the rights of man, and his devotion to democracy and the West. Overwhelmed by his sentiments and his charm, Washington's National Press Club gave him a standing ovation. Last week Sukarno was displaying his devotion to the West by energetically trying to boot out of his country all Westerners of Dutch citizenship, with never a backward thought for their rights or their properties.
The issue was West Irian (Netherlands New Guinea). For years Sukarno has been claiming as part of Indonesia the wild, raw-material-rich western portion of the world's second largest island (after Greenland). For years the Dutch have refused to hand it over. Sukarno appealed to the U.N. "If the United Nations fail us," he warned last month, "we will resort to methods which will startle the world." The U.N. refused to consider Indonesia's demand, and last week Sukarno made good his threat.
From northern Sumatra to the Moluccas, apprehensive Dutch nationals (there are 46,000 of them throughout the islands) took refuge in their homes as Indonesian workers swarmed through the streets, forcibly took over Dutch commercial installations. The Netherlands was summarily ordered to close every consulate in the republic except for Djakarta's. Dutch nationals were told they would be expelled from the country immediately. The expulsion order, said Justice Minister Gustaaf Adolf Maengkom, meant "within three days, if I have my way. But that is impossible."
Last Flight. At Djakarta's sprawling port of Tandjong Priok, lean little Indonesian commandos swirled up in dusty U.S. trucks and mounted guard over Dutch ships and port facilities. In the capital itself, workers of the Communist-dominated SOBSI (an all-Indonesia association of trade unions) ejected Dutch officials from the gleaming white colonial buildings that house the Royal Packet Service Co. (K.P.M.) and the Netherlands Handelsbank.
In the once luxurious Hotel des Indes, the Dutch manager and his staff were seized. A Dutchman who tried to haul down an Indonesian flag planted atop the Jacobson van den Berg Trading Co. was arrested on the spot. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines' landing rights were summarily canceled. Some 100 KLM employees and families prepared to depart.
Though Indonesian Premier Djuanda threatened "drastic action" against unauthorized seizures of Dutch property, SOBSI-led workers seized a Dutch club in Palembang, largest city of south Sumatra, two banks in Semarang in central Java, tea, coffee, rubber and palm-oil plantations in northern Sumatra and west Java.
Seizures & Censors. Indonesian censors laid a heavy pencil on outgoing news. All Dutch publications, films and news agencies were banned. In Djakarta, Indonesian papers reported that Indonesian passengers and crewmen had forcibly prevented Dutch captains from diverting Dutch-owned ships into "neutral ports." The Indonesian government ordered its 5,000 nationals in The Netherlands to leave at once. In Paris, Foreign Minister Subandrio declared that a complete break in Indonesian-Dutch diplomatic relations was "only a matter of time."