It is an incontrovertible fact that the nations of Greater East Asia are bound in every respect by ties of an inseparable relationship.

I firmly believe that such being the case, it is their common mission to secure the stability of greater East Asia and to construct a

new order of common prosperity and well-being.

Japanese Prime Minister, Tojo Hideki.

Welcome to the history of the 20th century.

Music Welcome to the history of the 20th century. Episode 393. Everything is going to be fine.

I want to begin today by talking about the archipelago we know as Indonesia, and what Westerners a century ago called the Dutch East Indies.

Fossil remains show that Indonesia was inhabited by archaic humans of the species Homo erectus more than a million years ago. In fact, when the first human fossils were

discovered in the 19th century, they were originally called Java Man,

after their place of discovery. Only in 1950 were Java Man, along with Peking Man, a set of remains

discovered in China, reclassified as Homo erectus. Our own species, Homo sapiens, arrived in Indonesia roughly 4,000 years ago.

The islands had never been ruled by one all-encompassing nation state,

but smaller nation-states on the various islands existed as early as the 7th century.

These people were originally Hindu and Buddhist, but by the 16th century, Islam was the dominant religion in the islands.

It was also at about this time that the first Europeans arrived, Portuguese Europeans, to be specific, seeking to gain a share

of the lucrative trade in spices from the islands, notably cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, and cloves.

The Dutch then sought to get in on this business themselves, and in 1602, the Dutch East India

company was established.

As you already know, the Dutch and British East India companies competed here and in India,

until the two worked out a modus vivendi, under which the Dutch conceded India to the British,

and the British conceded the East

Indies to the Dutch.

...