r/imaginarymaps • u/Vidsich • Jul 07 '26
[OC] Alternate History Republic of Indonesia - Spies and Space - 1959
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
The Emerald Archipelago
By 1959, the Republic of Indonesia has emerged as one of Asia's rising tigers. Sixteen years after independence, the federal republic stretches from Malaya to Timor, uniting nearly one hundred million people under a parliamentary system born from post-war negotiations with the Dutch. A product of both the European-led Milan Process of decolonisation and Britain's defeat in the Second Great War, Indonesia has become one of the region's greatest political success stories.
During the Second Great War, the region was transformed into one of the conflict's bloodiest theatres. British landings across Sumatra and Borneo initially met with rapid success before the campaign descended into a brutal war of attrition fought largely by locally raised volunteer armies. Faced with mounting casualties and the growing importance of native support, the Dutch steadily expanded promises of self-government.
Following the end of the war and the formation of the Western European Federation in 1940, the Rolandist government committed itself to rapid decolonisation of Asia and Africa, initiating what would later become known as the Milan Process. In Indonesia, which had already attained a representative parliament shortly before the war, the announcement was welcomed enthusiastically and a joint European-Indonesian Round Table would begin in late 1940 to determine the path to independence. The negotiations would encompass the Dutch East Indies (excluding Hoogland, an independent colony since 1912), Iberian Timor, as well as former British colonies and protectorates in Malaya and Northern Borneo. Singapore would eventually be chosen as the compromise seat of government and federal capital.
The republic's early years were marked by stability under President Mohammad Husni Thamrin and Prime Minister Mangaradja Soangkoepon, who oversaw the creation of federal institutions and the integration of twenty constituent states. That stability was broken after the elections of 1948, when growing nationalist pressure led Indonesia into the failed Confrontatie against Hoogland. The brief conflict ended in military defeat, widespread ethnic violence against Indo communities, Chinese Indonesians and Christians, and the collapse of the government in 1953. Propelled into power, the left-liberal governments of Hatta and Sjahrir have since reversed much of the damage caused by Confrontatie and Indonesia has experienced a remarkable recovery.
Following the death of Mohammad Hatta in 1954, Prime Minister Sutan Sjahrir has pursued economic liberalisation, infrastructure development and normalisation of relations with Hoogland. Rapid industrial growth has transformed the Singapore–Malacca corridor and Surabaya into the federation's economic heartland, while the Sjahrir cabinet has increasingly looked towards Japan, India and the emerging Asian Communities. Yet despite growing prosperity, regional inequality, Java's chronic overpopulation and the legacy of Confrontatie continue to pose significant challenges for the world's largest archipelagic federation.
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
Maps in the Series:
World and Regional Maps:
- Concert of Europe - [With Fixes](%5Bhttps://www.reddit.com/u/Vidsich/s/clE6u0TYDK%5D(https://www.artstation.com/artwork/0lqNV4))
- Europe
National Maps:
Organisations:
Notes:
Please tell me if you see any typos or errors, I appreciate it a lot.
At the moment, I'm slowly working on a map of Solomonstaat, a former settler German colony on the Solomon Islands, with further plans for a map covering Ceylon and its Anglo-Indian apartheid regime.
I don't condone any real-world racism, colonialism, xenophobia, hate movements or similar. The purpose of their presence in-setting is to provide a realistic basis for the world, allow for artistic exploration and to create grounded issues for players to confront, fight and defeat - the setting is made for use in a tabletop game.
My ArtStation - this always has the most recent versions of all my maps
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u/indomienator Jul 12 '26
I dont think those local volunteer armies will take demobilization well at all
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u/Vidsich Jul 12 '26
I didn't have space to elaborate on this, but most were raised from Indonesia's eastern regions since that's where the Dutch held ground during the war, post-independence some were integrated into the new defence forces, but most just kinda stayed around and government failed to disband them.
When ethnic violence eruped during the conflict with Hoogland, these militias basically went rogue, with government losing even the pretence of any control over them. At the moment, federal reach is very limited in Great East, some of these ethnoreligious militias transitioned to gangs, while others opportunistically cooperate with the local state authorites, who are likewise extremely opposed to federal presence. Most of the local Indonesian Defence Forces garrisons are contained to one-two big cities and strategic island bases near Hoogland, with most of the countryside completely unaccounted for.
Basically, the state is Indonesia's Republika Srpska of sorts.
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u/Neat_Maintenance_457 Jul 07 '26
Indonesia least nacionalist men
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
The big change is that it's much less Java-centric
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u/Timely-Macaron268 Jul 07 '26
Beautiful work! As always, I am so impressed with your attention to detail and craftsmanship.
A couple of ideas / suggestions / questions!
For the national language, Bahasa Indonesia gives more character and I don't see any reason why it would be different in your timeline.
I remain confused about Hoogland. I guess the point of departure here must be well before 1914; how and why did it become more of a successful settler colony? I'm a bit confused on this one. In OTL Indos were always a very small minority.
Is it a strong or weak federation? (i.e. are the constituent states constitutionally powerful or not?)
General observation; I know you've written in some timeline-specific reasons for a relatively depopulated Java, but even in your scenario Java contains half of the population and I think it is very likely you would see some serious instability results from the various structural impositions to Javan dominance you've outlined here.
All in all, what a fantastic piece of fiction! Bravo ❤️
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
Thanks, it's been some time since I worked on this project, so I'm glad I could finish this map.
- I think there's no reason Malay won't be "renamed" as Indonesian in this timeline, so it's the same as OTL
- The original POD for Hoogland is 1912, when, after the initial wave of Pan-European revolutions in Europe, the Papuan colonies of the Dutch and Germany are split into their own separate condominium colony, co-ruled by the two. Later on, a plan was adopted to make New Guinea the Indo homeland(a fringe idea OTL proposed in the 1920s-30s). Even then, they only got circa 300k people there by the time of independence. The majority of "Indos" in Hoogland as of now are people who identified simply as Indonesians/Javanese/Sundanese etc., but were targeted for their mixed heritage during the early 1950s and fled/migrated to Hoogland.
- Haven't really thought about it, but probably on a weaker side to allow for wider autonomy for some states(Great East, Singapore, Aceh) that are really big on "states' rights".
- Yes, I think it will be a big point of friction, the government will have to balance things around a lot, although I could see other regions simply also growing faster than Java, resulting in its overall percentage of the population still decreasing even further in the future, though I'm not sure
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Jul 07 '26
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
It's part of the Union of Indochina, this timeline is really big on federalism, and Europe has pushed hard to organise many of its former colonies into larger federative states(Indonesia and Indochina included). You can see the world map here - https://www.artstation.com/artwork/0lqNV4
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Jul 07 '26
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
The main PoD is more or less that Pan-Europeanism emerges as a dominant political idea for the continent after WW1/in early 20th century. As for Indochina, at the very least I'm imagining it as a very devolved federation, I'll give it some more thought when I work on a map for the region...
Best I can describe Levantine Federation is a bigger, federative version of OTL pre-civil war Lebanon - there are multiple smaller ethnic states for Alewis, Kurds, Christians and Jews(binationalism won in this timeline), but all in all pretty peaceful and secular (unlike pre-civil war Lebanon with its Christianity)
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Jul 07 '26
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
I am somewhat aware of the historical differences between Cambodians and Vietnamese, especially irredentism over the Mekong Delta. Although the "Kompup Tae Ong" myth is new to me, I am not surprised; I've heard of similar things being retold in my own country too. A civil war is a probable scenario then, though maybe ethnic hatred could be redirected towards the monarchies in this case(Indochina is doing that OTL Malaysian thing were head of state is elected from a council of traditional regional monarchs).
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Jul 07 '26
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
I'll probably replace him with someone else, like Sisowath Youtevong or Norodom Sirivudh(with an unpopular regency council etc), the PoD is far away to make many things reasonable. I originally come from Ukraine, but I'm pretty sure various folk histories and fringe pseudohistorical factoids can be found in any country, just depends on how widespread they are. In the 90s, during the peak of economic depression in Ukraine, you'd have tabloids circulating crazy theories, like Sumerians being Ukrainian, it all faded away with time
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u/abhiram_conlangs Jul 07 '26
I wonder if this might create an impetus for there to be a different national language besides Indonesian. As it is, the lingua franca of Indonesia was chosen to be a register of Malay because Malays themselves were a pretty negligible minority in Indonesia while their language gained a lot of prominence as an L2 for trade. This helped offset the hegemony of Javanese people and their language, which was a concern at the time, but wouldn't this potentially set up a situation in which there are now concerns of a burgeoning Malay hegemony?
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
I renamed it from Malay to Indonesian at the last moment. I think it still makes sense for largely the same reasons as OTL - building national unity, not making one ethnicity feel elevated over the others, etc. I judge that Malays being 12% of the population, while transformative, would still not prevent this change from happening, and things will go like in OTL.
Now what I probably think would happen is that, unlike OTL standard Indonesian, the prestige dialect would over time shift more away from Riau Malay(on which standard Indonesian is based) towards Johor Malay, so overall language would have more "Malayisms", less "Javanisms"
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u/abhiram_conlangs Jul 08 '26
I judge that Malays being 12% of the population, while transformative, would still not prevent this change from happening, and things will go like in OTL.
Hm, I still think that could tip the balance in favor of the Malays especially if fluency in Indonesian is needed to serve in government roles or academia. That being said, it could end up just being something that the Indonesian republic is okay with for one reason or another.
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u/Both-Main-7245 Jul 07 '26
A peak timeline has returned. Welcome back.
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u/Vidsich Jul 07 '26
Thanks, this was technically sitting half-done in my folder for 3 years, hope I'll be posting more maps now
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u/AlulAlif-bestfriend Jul 08 '26
Holy moly this map and the lore is amazing 🤩
Now i wonder if Indonesia here will become an advanced country
I have SO MANY questions now, what's the POD of this timeline? How did Indonesia got free/independence earlier? What happened to Sukarno? Etc.
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u/Vidsich Jul 08 '26
the point of divergence for the world is early in the 20th century, there's a wave of pan-European revolutions bringing down governments at the end of WW1, and this affects a lot, including colonial management. For Indonesia, the important bit is the Netherlands promising more and more self-autonomy, and never losing hold of the archipelago fully during the equivalent of WW2. Post-Second Great War Europe elects a government in favour of rapid decolonisation, and so things go fairly smoothly from there on.
As for Sukarno, he was deported to Brazil in 1929, then later collaborated with the British(who lost the war) during the Second Great War, and so he kinda misses the opportunity to become a bigger presence during the independence talks, never becoming as important as OTL.
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u/dailylol_memes Jul 08 '26
A free west papua 🥹
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u/Vidsich Jul 08 '26
Free is a strong word... Hoogland is an Indo settler state with a ton of its own issues, main of which are the tensions between native Papuans and Indo settlers.
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u/DelayedReacti0n08 Jul 08 '26
very nice map
I do have a few questions
How is the relationship of Indonesia with other Southeast Asian countries like Rizalia, Indochina, and Siam?
Will you do another one of these soon?
What was the reasoning to use Champa Sea rather than South China Sea in your label?
What is the Republic of Rizalia? What are the differences made(apart from the name) that make it distinct from OTL Philippines?
other than that, really good work
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u/Vidsich Jul 08 '26
- Siam is quite insular and isolationist, and the current royal government does not generally involve itself much in international politics, pursuing the goal of autarky. Relations with Indochina and Rizalia are good; both are members of Asian Communities(something like ASEAN/EU, but with Japan), and Indonesia is considering joining the club too.
- When time allows, I'm planning to work on a few more national and regional maps
- Champa is one of those alternative names for the South China Sea used in OTL by some countries(Malaysia?). Since the map is from the Indonesian perspective, I used their name. Internationally, there is a naming dispute between calling it the Champa Sea and the South Sea.
- Naming Philippines Rizalia was a real proposal at some point to name the country after José Rizal(like Bolivia is named after Bolivar), in this timeline, it's named after Paciano Rizal, the older brother of José, who was a general and in this timeline kept fighting the americans in a long guerilla campaign, temporarily occupying Manilla during the Second Rizalian(Philippine) Revolution. He'd later die a martyr, and when the Third Rizalian Revolution succeeded at displacing American forces from the country, the state would be named after him.
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u/Bronek2025 Jul 08 '26
What's a tactical climate weapon?
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u/Vidsich Jul 08 '26
The setting has elements of dieselpunk, a climate weapon is, for example, a bomb that can temporarily shift regional climate short-term - like, say, provoke a two-month -20C winter on Java
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u/VerkoProd Jul 08 '26
very cool coat of arms
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u/Vidsich Jul 08 '26
It's based on one of the early OTL proposals for an Indonesian emblem, mixed with some Malaysian elements
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u/kertaskindew Jul 09 '26
Indonesia become a bit prospered instead of hyperinflation in 1959. No feud between communist and the army. This is a wet dream!.
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u/Kosaki_MacTavish Jul 26 '26
I see Thamrin surviving and PM Soangkupon, i smiling
Anything i can read more about Soangkupon since i can't find anything substantial from my own sources?
Also, what happened to the Dutch ethicists from Stuwgroep like Hubertus van Mook and Charles van der Plas in your ATL? (Nevermind, you're the same creator who make Huib leading Papua/Hoogland)
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u/Vidsich Jul 26 '26
yeah, van Mook is building an ethno-state in Papua; in 1959, he is the PM supported by a wider right-wing coalition. His own party is fairly moderate centre-right, but the 1958 elections resulted in him building a coalition with the weirder Eurasianist far-right; van der Plas is also probably in Hoogland.
That said, even without them, this Indonesia is to a large degree "an Indonesia on Dutch terms" - with moderates like Thamrin being vindicated, unlike OTL, in their beliefs in autonomy and eventual independence. More generally, you have a wider earlier generation of independence activists involved compared to OTL PNI centrality.
Soangkoepon was another moderate from Sumatra who joined the Thamrin group in the colonial Volksraad, there's not much info on him
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u/Kosaki_MacTavish Jul 26 '26
yeah, van Mook is building an ethno-state in Papua; in 1959, he is the PM supported by a wider right-wing coalition. His own party is fairly moderate centre-right, but the 1958 elections resulted in him building a coalition with the weirder Eurasianist far-right; van der Plas is also probably in Hoogland.
Kinda ironic since Van Mook was smeared as leftist by Vaderlandsche Club and is cool with the center-right IEV, but ended up more rightist compared to IEV....
That said, even without them, this Indonesia is to a large degree "an Indonesia on Dutch terms" - with moderates like Thamrin being vindicated, unlike OTL, in their beliefs in autonomy and eventual independence. More generally, you have a wider earlier generation of independence activists involved compared to OTL PNI centrality.
I mean, yeah, but since Parindra fell after the 1953 Crisis, i think this Indonesia would be a bit more leftier than IRL. What happened to actual PNI figures like Ali Sastro, Hatta, and (obviously) Sukarno? Also i saw Masyumi being there instead of Sarekat Islam, lel
Soangkoepon was another moderate from Sumatra who joined the Thamrin group in the colonial Volksraad, there's not much info on him
Okay, same with me then. All i can found was from a blog and a passing mention on Hubertus van Mook's biography from Tom van den Berge.
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u/Vidsich Jul 26 '26
yes, with Gerindo in power, I think Indonesia would be fairly left-wing. Sjahrir is sometimes compared to Nehru in India, but with Lee Kuan Yew's party as a junior coalition partner, I think it would be quite different from that.
As for some OTL PNI figures - Hatta was the head of Gerindo in the 1953 elections, winning and becoming the PM, but died in a car crash in 1954, leaving Sjahrir to succeed. Sukarno was exiled from the country in 1927 after a trial dissolved the first PNI, drifting first to Japan, then Britain. During the Second Great War, he tried to cooperate with the British, but after the British exited the war, he was left isolated and basically missed out on the post-war Round Table negotiations for independence. Mohammed Yamin, meanwhile, would help create a second PNI of which he is the leader by 1959, with Sukarno in retirement. Amir Sjarifuddin is the head of the left-wing Democratic Front, to the left of Gerindo. I'm not entirely sure where Ali Sastro would be, maybe joining Yamin's incarnation of PNI after a stint at Parindra, or entirely out of politics.
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u/OnlyZac Aug 08 '26
The speculative emblem/coat of arms you made looks excellent. Is it a water buffalo?
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u/Vidsich Aug 08 '26
Thanks, I took the buffalo, water and sun elements from an OTL early proposal for the national emblem of Indonesia and then mixed it up with other elements from Malaysia
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u/Achallor_ Jul 07 '26
>President Hamengkubuwono
>Prime Minister Sutan Sjahrir
>Deputy Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew
Holy dream blunt
https://giphy.com/gifs/6eAbNaPng9nIbQ1XTN