Dutch Colonial Rule in Indonesia

AD – MPE: 0.65

The Wikipedia-article called “Indonesian National Revolution” cites estimates for the number of civilians killed from 1945 to 1949, which range from 0.03 to 0.1 million, the vast majority of them Indonesians. I choose 0.05 million as the most plausible estimate.

The Spanish flu killed less than 0.7 percent of the Dutch population, but 5 percent of the Indonesian population. 1.5 million Indonesians were killed by the Spanish Flu. If we assume that 40 percent of the excess mortality in Indonesia was caused by Dutch colonialism, the remaining increase would still have been more than four times higher than in the Netherlands. This makes it a reasonable assumption. It would mean that Dutch colonial policies were responsible for roughly 0.6 million excess deaths from the Spanish flu.

Plausible estimates for the number of civilians who died as a result of Dutch colonialism and the independence struggle in Indonesia range from 0.3 to 0.9 million. I choose 0.65 million as the most plausible estimate.