Visions of Empire in the Nazi-Occupied Netherlands: “Look to the East!”

During the first few years of the occupation, as a newly fashioned corps of resisters struggled to find a place for itself and its ideals, two new mass movements aimed to reshape Dutch society. The Nationaal Socialistische Beweging (the Dutch Nazi Party, or NSB) had existed for years before the Germans arrived in the Low Countries, whereas the Nederlandse Unie owed its existence to the Dutch defeat and German presence. Each political movement claimed to best represent the nation, and each operated from the assumption that the German occupiers sought local cooperation and collaboration. Further, and unlike the clandestine writers and editors pursued because of their illegal activities, the leaders of these two organizations earnestly believed that they would be able to influence occupation policy and German behavior. Anton Mussert of the Dutch Nazi Party anticipated his imminent appointment to the occupation regime and, with it, the ability to craft domestic and foreign policy, whereas Unie leaders believed that their movement’s tremendous popularity left the Germans no choice but to act on their recommendations. In their quest for public support and political legitimacy, these two movements looked to the Dutch empire, and they urged their followers to do the same, albeit for widely different ends. Although neither group would obtain the position of authority they felt they deserved, their wartime work inadvertently paved the way for subsequent underground discussions concerning the colonies. Further, their preoccupation with the Netherlands’ overseas territories and the continued sovereignty of the Dutch empire helped drive a wedge between the NSB, the Unie, and their German occupiers. This was a risk these groups were apparently willing to take: They could accept the Netherlands under German rule, but they simply could not consider the prospects of a Dutch kingdom devoid of its rightful colonies. Prophesying Disaster: The Dutch Nazi Party And The Loss Of Empire For nearly a decade before the war, Anton Mussert and his Dutch Nazi Party had claimed to best represent the interests, values, and future of the Dutch people. Whether in the pages of their weekly paper, Volk en Vaderland , or from the second chamber of parliament, the Dutch Nazis spent the 1930s loudly denouncing the government’s inability to protect the Dutch people from economic ruin, social disorder and decay, and the expanding reach of Marxism-Bolshevism. As an alternative to this rotten system of parliamentary democracy, the Dutch Nazis held out to their fellow citizens a set of nationalist, authoritarian, and corporatist ideas, similar to those professed by Mussolini. Mussert and his party sought “a powerful state, self-respect of the nation, discipline, order, solidarity of all segments of the population and the precedence of general (i.e. national) interests above group interests and group interests above personal interests.” Nor was this newly revitalized and strengthened national community to consist of the European Netherlands alone, for according to “the Leader” the parts of the empire located in Europe, Asia, and America were to support each other as much as possible “under all circumstances, and, to the outside world, constitute one unit.” Yet as Mussert later clarified, this imperial cohesiveness should not be taken to imply that all parts of the empire were to be considered equal. The East Indies may have been the most populous region of the three territories, but the European Netherlands occupied a clearly preeminent position: It served as the empire’s protector, employing both military and diplomatic means to safeguard against internal and external threats. If Japan’s behavior toward China was any indication of its intentions in the region, the Netherlands needed to act quickly and decisively, lest this or any other force take action against the prized colony. The Dutch, in other words, had every reason to heed Mussert’s demands for stronger, more technologically advanced imperial defenses, and the sooner the better.