With the KM’s evacuation of Java and the KNIL’s surrender on March 9, the MLD’s role in the East Indies campaign officially came to an end. In the bitter air battles over Java and the East Indies, Dutch aircrews had clearly proven they were equal not only to the Japanese, but their American and British counterparts as well. Still, despite tremendous courage, skill and the willingness to sacrifice, superior Japanese numbers, personnel shortages and equipment limitations (including a near complete lack of radar1) removed all doubt that the MLD would fall short in the end.
If the actions of the MLD provided any solace for the Dutch, it was purely moral in a losing cause. Despite thousands of sorties and 95 combat encounters in the air and at sea,2 the East Indies campaign had been a compete failure in virtually every aspect. Not only had the last sizeable Dutch territory been lost (the West Indies were all that remained), the material and human cost had been horrific.3 This dictated that further Dutch contributions to the Pacific War remain minuscule.4
Fewer than half of all KM personnel on Java were successfully evacuated to either Australia or Ceylon. These numbers included 43 percent of the Europeans and 55 percent of the Navy’s Indonesian personnel, although as stated earlier, virtually all were forced to leave their family members and loved ones behind on Java to face internment.5 Among the evacuees were 63 percent of the officers and 55 percent of the NCOs, but just 40 percent of the KM’s enlisted personnel. Although these numbers are fairly complete, a postwar commission in Holland ascertained in mid-1945 that 462 Europeans and 2,007 Indonesians remained unaccounted for.6 Although possible that some of these men deserted rather than abandon their loved ones, it is also likely that most were killed or simply lost in the confusion surrounding the fall of the East Indies.
Of the 69 operational front-line seaplanes operated or received by the MLD from December 1941 to March 1942, 53 were lost in action or destroyed to prevent capture when Java was evacuated, a loss ratio of 77 percent. And of the some 160 aircraft possessed by the MLD before, or acquired immediately after, the start of war, only 15 flying boats and 34 primary trainers survived the campaign and disaster at Broome—a survival rate of just over 30 percent. The survivors included X-5, X-7, X-8, X-9, X-10 and X-24, which were joined by Y-45, Y-49, Y-55, Y-56, Y-57, Y-62, Y-64, Y-69 and Y-71. All were scattered between Australia and Ceylon. All were operating from Rathmines Naval Air Station on the east coast of Australia except Y-55, Y-56, Y-57 and Y-64, which had evacuated Admiral Helfrich and his staff to Ceylon.
Of these, X-5, X-7, X-8, X-9, X-10 and Y-49 had been evacuated from Java in mid-February so that only nine MLD aircraft survived the official evacuation of Java and Broome raid in early March, a loss ratio approaching 95 percent. This is mute testimony as to the complete air domination by the Japanese over the NEI in February and March 1942. Aside from the trainers, these 15 seaplanes were all the MLD had left with which to continue the war. Although the Netherlands Purchasing Commission in New York had purchased a great deal of new equipment for the MLD prior to the Pacific War, the first new planes had only begun to arrive by March and April 1942.
Table 6: Nationality of KM Personnel Evacuated from Java7
Nationality: Lost — Evacuated — Total
European: 3,414 — 2,599 — 6,013
Indonesian: 307 — 370 — 677
Total: 3,721 — 2,969 — 6,690
Table 7: KM Personnel Evacuated from Java8
Rank: Lost — Evacuated — Total
Officers: 333 — 561 — 894
NCOs: 396 — 482 — 878
Enlisted Personnel: 2,968 — 2,014 — 4,982
Total: 3,697 — 3,057 — 6,754
Table 8: Percentile Breakdown of KM Personnel by Branch9
Branch: Lost — Evacuated — Total
MLD: 50% — 50% — 100%
Submarine Force: 28% — 72% — 100%
Marines: 65% — 35% — 100%
Surface Fleet: 40% — 60% — 100%
Shore Personnel: 75% — 25% — 100%
Total (Average): 52% — 48% — 100%
The Dutch could have evacuated more planes to Australia and Ceylon if they had greater range. From Java, the range to Darwin is 1,295 miles and to Ceylon approximately 2,800 miles, far too great for many of the MLD’s smaller planes. Although Dutch airfields remained open in northern Sumatra, the range was great and chance of reaching them through Japanese airspace was small. A number of ML airmen reached Australia and Ceylon after the fall of Java, but they did so in aircraft with greater ranges than any of those destroyed by the MLD.
Upon arrival in Australia, the 232 MLD personnel evacuated aboard Tjinegara, including 167 pilot trainees, were almost immediately ordered to the United States. Here, the MLD and ML formed a joint flight training school at Jackson, Mississippi. The 575 cadets were comprised of three groups with varying levels of readiness: 1) those with basic flight training on Ryan and Koolhoven primary trainers; 2) those with intermediate training on Curtis CW-22 Falcons; 3) those pilots with advanced and operational training on single- and twin-engine land- and seaplanes.
The Royal Netherlands Military Flying School initiated flight operations at Jackson on June 6, 1942. A number of subsidiary facilities were also organized throughout the United States, including a number in south, central and west Texas. These included an MLD seaplane facility at Corpus Christi for operational training of pilots and navigator and bombardier training schools at Hondo and Midland. Upon graduation, these aircrews would form the backbone of Dutch air operations in the Pacific for the remainder of the war.10
Meanwhile, the MLD suffered a number of difficulties while trying to reorganize and rearm in Ceylon. Most serious was the loss of thousands of highly trained ground crews and maintenance personnel during the KM’s failed evacuation of Java. As new planes arrived, the MLD had little trouble finding aircrews, but soon experienced trouble trying to maintain them. Although KLM Airline provided 15 ground crewmen, the Dutch squadron was soon a mixture of Dutch, Indonesian and Commonwealth personnel.11
For their part, the British Navy quickly discovered that Y-55, Y-56, Y-57, Y-62 and Y-64 were in no shape for sustained operations. Not only were the seaplanes in poor shape after months of constant flying without adequate maintenance, the crews were psychologically and physically exhausted. The RAF stationed them at Kogalla on the south coast of Ceylon, where it was hoped they could regroup with new aircraft while flying light reconnaissance missions.
Unfortunately, the Dutch PBYs were thrown back into action almost immediately. In early April, a powerful Japanese task force entered the Indian Ocean and launched a series of devastating air attacks on elements of the British Eastern Fleet at Colombo and Tricomalee. With British reconnaissance forces decimated after the East Indies campaign, the British had no choice but to commit the MLD planes.
As the Japanese savaged allied merchant shipping in the Indian Ocean and along the coast of India and Burma, three Dutch Catalinas and their British counterparts flew a number of reconnaissance missions over the Indian Ocean and Japanese force April 5–9. Although three British PBYs were shot down, their reports resulted in a number of attacks on the Japanese carriers by British bombers that also suffered heavy losses. During this period, and the preceding three weeks of March, the exhausted Dutch were lucky to put even three PBYs into the air.
Between May and June, the MLD planes on Ceylon were joined by the PBYs in Australia. Upon their arrival, the squadron was redesignated 321 Squadron (Dutch) on July 1, 1942, and transferred to China Bay on the north coast of Ceylon, where it operated as part of the RAF’s 222 Group. The base at China Bay was primitive and required a great deal of work by squadron personnel to make it operational. As the British allocated very few supplies to the Dutch, many facilities had to be built from scratch, including air raid shelters, magazines and workshops.
From December 1942 to January 1943, 11 new PBY-5A amphibians arrived at China Bay, providing the MLD with its first reinforcements since early 1941. Designated Y-74 through Y-80 and Y-82 through Y-85, these planes allowed the MLD to begin rebuilding and make a contribution to the war effort. For its part, 321 Squadron (Dutch) spent the remainder of the war flying long-range reconnaissance and A/S patrols over the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal.
The planes in Australia operated under American operational command until May 1942, when the remaining PBYs were transferred to Ceylon. The remaining X-boats were sold to the RAAF, which used them for transport duties and covert operations into occupied Sumatra and Dutch New Guinea. X-24, the last remaining MLD Dornier, was used for covert, long-range supply missions into Japanese-occupied Dutch New Guinea until it too was transferred to the RAAF in October 1943. However, the planes were virtually impossible to maintain due to a lack of spares, and the last Dornier was broken up in late 1944.
The loss of aircraft represented only part of the nearly insurmountable task facing the MLD during its attempts to rebuild after the fall of the East Indies. Admiral Helfrich had hoped to evacuate a large percentage of his naval stores from Java. However, the speed of the Japanese advance across Java and the late start of the KM’s prearranged evacuation plan from the island precluded this.
Although fortunate to get a handful of ground personnel out of Java by ship, the MLD lost all its equipment, including tools, aircraft spares, engines and machinery. So when the surviving aircraft and ground personnel arrived in Australia and Ceylon, the MLD found it difficult to continue flight operations. Compounding the problem was that many of the seaplanes had not been properly serviced or overhauled since the outbreak of the Pacific War.
On a different scale, the Dutch learned much about where they stood with their American and British allies. Highlighted by what the Dutch saw as a virtual desertion by the British Royal Navy and the American Army Air Force during the final days on Java, relations took a downturn.12 Matters were not helped as the Americans and British (the Americans in particular) proceeded to dominate Pacific War strategy. Despite Dutch efforts to direct the war effort toward the East Indies, American leadership pointedly ignored them and pursued a course back to the Philippines.
And although the KM and MLD enjoyed a good working relationship with the USN throughout the East Indies campaign, these relations cooled as the war progressed.13 This can be attributed to Dutch inability to influence war strategies, which led them to maintain close ties with fellow colonial power Great Britain and the Royal Navy. However, there was still a certain amount of goodwill generated by the USN’s decision to stand by the Dutch during the final days on Java although the East Indies campaign was clearly lost. At a time when the Royal Navy essentially abandoned the Dutch, American naval leadership, much to its credit, honored its commitment to the KM though few others would have questioned a decision to pull out.
It does not appear that this goodwill necessarily went both ways. There was deep resentment in certain circles of the USN regarding combined Anglo-Dutch efforts that resulted in the removal of Admiral Thomas C. Hart from command of the United States Asiatic Fleet and ABDA-FLOAT in February 1942. As fleet commander, both the Dutch and British felt that he was not aggressive enough, while the USN felt that “the two colonial powers were risking and losing American ships in a campaign of which they heartily disapproved on both strategic and tactical grounds.”14
On this note, there were also serious ideological differences among the Dutch, British and Americans. Although all three nations fought a common enemy, Dutch and British motivations were far different from that of the Americans. The Europeans fought to preserve colonies that had been under their control for hundreds of years and that they considered to be an integral part of their respective empires. Thus, they were willing to fight to the bitter end to defend these territories, a concept many of the American troops in the East Indies could not understand.15
The United States as a nation was not an inherent colonial power, given its war of independence from Britain. For all practical purposes the Philippines were a largely unplanned afterthought of the Spanish-American War. Although the spoils of empire came with this victory, it was a situation this nation never would have pursued otherwise. And since the Philippines were well down the road to being granted independence by the United States in December 1941, many American servicemen also could not see the point in fighting to preserve a European colonial system that was diametrically opposed to the fundamental concept of democracy.
While not a major issue that can be related to the failure of the East Indies campaign, inter-Allied relations at the lower ranks are still interesting to study. In many instances, Australian troops found their Dutch counterparts in the field to be aloof, although their respective governments had worked closely together before the outbreak of war. The British at all levels did not entirely trust their Dutch allies and made a habit of withholding sensitive military information from them.16 This included access to British radar installations and their codebreaking efforts.
But while American and British officers in the upper and middle ranks considered the Dutch to be extremely cooperative, the same view was not always true in the field. Relations at the lower ranks were often strained as many American enlisted men considered their Dutch allies to be somewhat arrogant and ungrateful. Some of these hard feelings were undoubtedly caused by the Dutch military’s inflexibility toward the American airmen’s situation.
Like other European colonial armies, Dutch forces in the East Indies were a “spit and polish” organization. As such, they adhered to strict rules and regulations similar to those experienced by American personnel in the Philippines before the war. However, the evacuation of USN aircraft to Java brought a flood of poorly equipped flight crews with them. The Dutch insisted that these expatriates conform to strict uniform regulations. But with so many of them escaping the Philippines with little more than the clothes they wore, this created problems.
Clothing issues aside, a number of more serious misconceptions lingered below the surface. By January 1942, few MLD airmen were impressed with the fighting record of their USN counterparts, and many were not shy with their opinions. On the other side, the men of PatWing 10, who had just been run out of the Philippines after a brief but bitter fight, did not think the Dutch had a right to talk when they had yet to see any “real” action, although this was far from true. A number of brawls between American and Dutch personnel did not help.
These feelings were reinforced by the fact that in mid-December, the war was still being conducted far north of Java. Japanese air domination had yet to take hold as it did in the Philippines, and many Dutch personnel acted as though there were no war on. There were no blackout measures in effect, and no one seemed overly concerned. But had the Americans been at home at the same time, they probably would have seen little different outside of California and the West Coast, which were hastily being prepared to defend against a feared invasion.
In addition, the Dutch had been engaged in a “Cold War” with Japan since May 1940. They had lived with the threat of Japanese attack for some 18 months before the Pacific War started and were far more prepared for the conditions that accompanied the outbreak of war than the Americans realized. At the same time, war seemed such a long way off in December, and few doubted the ability of the Dutch military to stop the Japanese once reinforced by the Americans.
American servicemen have also commented on the disappointment expressed by the Dutch that America had failed to do more. While the Americans felt they were fighting uselessly to defend Dutch territory, many Dutchmen felt let down by the lack of American aid.17 Few expected Britain to make a serious effort to defend the East Indies. But after tremendous verbal support from President Roosevelt and a stringent economic embargo against Japan beginning in mid-1940, many believed the United States was prepared to go the distance in defense of the East Indies.
Although language played a role in increasing friction between Dutch and American servicemen, it was not the only reason. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the American government suppressed the full extent of the damage for several months. As a result, very few Dutchmen knew that the core of the USN’s Pacific Fleet lay wrecked. Without it, the United States was apprehensive about its ability to defend against an invasion of Hawaii and the West Coast.
In addition, the United States was poorly prepared to defend itself or the Philippines—much less the East Indies—against Japanese attack. So when the Dutch complained about the United States not doing enough, many did not understand the “big picture” and expected the Pacific Fleet to sail in with thousands of ships, men and planes that simply did not exist at that stage of the war. It should also be added that thousands of American troops holding out in the Philippines harbored the exact same thoughts and wondered why their government was not doing more.
Nonetheless, despite losing 95 percent of its operational front-line aircraft and 50 percent of its total manpower in the East Indies, the MLD successfully rebuilt, letting it contribute to the rest of the Pacific War effort in a useful though limited role. By the end of the Second World War, the Royal Netherlands Navy had a solid base to build a postwar naval air force on. By successfully weathering a crushing defeat in the East Indies, the MLD was able to preserve its identity and establish a powerful legacy for subsequent generations of its personnel to build upon.18