VJ Day 2025

[Hanno Spoelstra]

#OnThisDay 80 years ago the Empire of Japan surrendered to the Allied Forces, making World War 2 coming to an end.

My late Father’s family lived in the Netherlands East Indies, luckily they survived the horror of the Japanse internment camps and the ensuing “Bersiap", a gruesome period for the people in Indonesia. My family was shipped back to the Netherlands - see below - to establish a new life from scratch.

The people of Indonesia had to fight till 1949 to regain their independence after centuries of colonisation and 7 years of war.

Lest we forget!

#VJDay

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

An exposition about the MS Oranje (see link below) triggered a recollection of my late father, Rob Spoelstra. He lived in the Netherlands East-Indies (now Indonesia) from 1931-1945. After V-J Day, he fled from a Japanese interment camp and went looking for his father, mother and sister. Note: his family was separated: his father was in a mens camp, his mother and sister in a women and children camp. At 12 years of age, he was taken away from his mother and put in a boys only camp.

So, in August 1945 they hear the war is over and as a 14 year old boy my father and a friend decide to go and find their family. They had some letters via the Red Cross so they had a clue where they could be, not knowing if they were still alive. They traded some clothes for a couple of goose eggs, made a knapsack and crawled under the barbed wire and headed in the direction of their father's camp.

Out on the road they were stopped by a Japanese patrol (who were now tasked with protecting the Dutch against the Indonesians). They were about to be taken back to the camp, when a column of British-Indian Army trucks passed by. A British officer asked what was happening and after his explanation, my father and his friend were taken along by the British-Indian troops as they were heading in the direction of their father’s camp.
My father told me they “drove in trucks with peculiar back-slanted windows”, identifying them as Cab 13 CMP trucks. My father told me this story when I first showed him my Ford F15A CMP.

Luckily, my father was reunited with his father, mother and sister and they were repatriated to the Netherlands very much in the same was as can be seen in the link below.

https://www.facebook.com/24315614237...61874503832943

16DF58DA-512A-4A4A-A750-4DD31E9E2D71.jpeg

[Mike K]

VJ day has been in the news here, the local radio { BBC and ABC } have been widely reporting the event.

MLU member Lang, drove his GMC army ute up to Townsville for the VJ day events.

This morning, the ABC interviewed a author, he has written a book about the political situation in SE Asia during the surrender and he mentioned how the surrendered Japanese troops were widely used to control the uprising of the independence fighters, in Vietnam and Indonesia. The book. 1945: The Reckoning. a fresh perspective on Victory in the Pacific Day with Phil Craig, author of 1945: The Reckoning.

A preview is available online https://www.google.com.au/books/edit...sec=frontcover

[Little Jo]

Hi Hano

Yes mate, I remember as a kid in school when I first saw those kids coming to school and for the first time, I saw some who looked different to me, these were mixed Dutch/Indonesian kids and some Indonesian kids as well. I remember the teacher welcoming them into class and that they were all Dutch just like us and to make them welcome. I remember they were so shy, but when I got home my parents explained they were special and to play with them. Oh, memories they never leave you.

Cheers

Tony