Nazi Graves and the Story of Deutsche Schule
GERMAN author Horst Henry Geerken follows the trace of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi ideology in Indonesia through the third and fourth volume of his book Hitlers Griff nach Asien. These two newest editions, published last year, continued what Geerken started in his previous volumes with the same title. In his recent books, Geerken delved into the diaries of Otto Coerper, which gave detailed descriptions on some 300 Germans who had been jailed in the Dutch Indies. According to Coerper’s notes, those prisoners were released after the Japanese entered the territories in 1942. They then settled in Sarangan by Mount Lawu in East Java, and set up a German school, or Deutsche Schule. Coerper also formed an officer’s training academy for military police.
The president at the time, Sukarno, sent navy cadets from Yogyakarta to learn German at the Deutsche Schule, so that they could understand military equipment, many of which originated from Germany. Among alumni from the Deutsche Schule are Raden Eddy Martadinata dan Donald Isaac Pandjaitan.
Isma Sawitri
May 10, 2021
THE cemetery by Mount Gede Pangrango, West Java, has an unusual site. Underneath tall rubber and kencana (Terminalia mantaly) trees are 10 graves with the Eisernes Kreuz symbol: the distinctive steel cross of the Nazis, or the Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterspartei (National Socialist German Workers’ Party). This area measuring some 20 X 50 meters is located at Arca Domas, Sukaresmi village, Megamendung subdistrict, Bogor Regency. In old Su
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