After all these years, the word “Linggarjati” still has resonance and meaning from Europe to Southeast Asia, given its place and time. The politicians in The Hague between 1946 and 1949 were hopelessly divided about the response of the Dutch government to the proclamation of

Indonesian independence on Aug. 17, 1945. And our fathers, thousands of young men doing their national military service not long after the German occupation ended in the Netherlands, were sent to the Dutch East Indies in July 1947 and December 1948 to fight in the wrong wars.

After two military interventions in the Dutch East Indies, diplomatic defeats before the United Nations Security Council and a conference in The Hague, the Netherlands finally let go of its colonial possessions in Southeast Asia. On Dec. 27, 1949, the Dutch government officially transferred sovereignty to the Republic of Indonesia. The widespread economic disaster that was predicted if the Netherlands lost its colonies did not happen; the country reoriented itself and, encouraged by American aid from the Marshall Plan, soon focused on cooperation in Europe.