American Idealism vs. Cold War Realism: The United States and the Decolonization of the Netherlands East Indies
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2020-07-21
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en
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This thesis investigates the development of American foreign policy towards the decolonization process of the Netherlands East Indies over the course of the four-year conflict. Following the declaration of independence by Sukarno on 17 August 1945, the United States adopted a policy of neutrality in the colonial conflict that erupted between the Netherlands and the Republic Indonesia. American policymakers were preoccupied with the economic and political reconstruction and the containment of communism in Europe, which took precedence over anti-imperialist considerations. As the Cold War theater expanded from Europe into Southeast Asia in 1947 and 1948, the Indonesian Question gained significance to the United States and its resolution became an urgent matter to the State Department. Surveying a range of scholarly work as well as primary sources, this thesis will assess the American policy shift by analyzing the set of factors that contributed to this shift from different levels: the Cold War context of the Indonesian question, the actions and developments in the Republic Indonesia and the Netherlands, and the international-level and American domestic-level factors. These factors together contributed in varying degrees to the gradual reassessment of American foreign policy, that ultimately allowed the United States to live up to its self-proclaimed ideals of freedom, democracy, and self-determination.
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Faculteit der Letteren