![]() Up to the end of the 1970s, in Dutch government circles the decolonisation war in Indonesia was referred to as a ‘police action’. The US involvement in Korea (1950–1953) and its defeat in the Vietnam war (1957–1975) posed similar problems of representation in the public realm, yet the difference is that in the European context the wars were considered internal affairs, whereas the US involvement in warfare is connected to its role as a superpower and its ambition to impose a specific world order through the use of force. ![]() Besides the Dutch–Indonesian decolonisation war (1945–1949), which is the subject of the present case study, I am referring to the French War in Indochina (1946–1954), the French Algerian war (1954–1962), the British involvement in the Malaysian communist insurgency (1948–1960), the Portuguese–Mozambique decolonisation war (1964–1975) and the Angolan–Portuguese decolonisation war (1961–1975). I am indebted to Simona Sideri, Tom Mateson, Frances Gouda, Gary Price, Bill Frederick and Peter Schumacher for their invaluable support, their suggestions and the editing of previous drafts of this article.
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