After the victory was established, the battle lasted until the evening of the fourth day.

Several remnants of the Dutch army fleeing south fled more than 100 kilometers and reached the jungle of West Sumatra Province in the south, where they were immediately surrounded and annihilated by the Imperial army that followed.

In this large-scale battle that broke out at the end of August 1898, the Tang and Dutch sides invested a total of more than 110,000 troops to compete in the upper Indragilli region of central Sumatra, and finally won the victory with the overwhelming superiority of the Tang Empire's army.

Before the war, the Dutch were full of confidence to teach the Tang Empire a hard lesson, but they were shocked and simply lost their bottoms.

post-war inventory;

Of the total 62,000 troops of the Dutch army participating in the war, more than 21,600 were lost, of which 15,720 were killed or wounded, 5,641 were missing, and more than 40,000 were captured.

Some of the missing people may have been torn apart by shells, buried in collapsed chests, drowned, absconded into the mountains or shed their military uniforms and blended into the crowd posing as local indigenous civilians.

For a moment, it was difficult to tell.

Fortunately, the main force of the white troops of the Royal Dutch Army was captured, and out of a total of 27,300 white Dutch troops, 4,011 were killed and wounded, and the remaining 23,300 were captured.

The army of the Tang Empire suffered 3,286 casualties in this battle, including 1,379 killed and 1,907 wounded, achieving an out-and-out brilliant victory.

Most of the officers and soldiers killed and wounded by the empire were lost in the previous artillery coverage and the post-war pursuit battles, especially the fierce resistance of the white remnants, which caused considerable losses.

For this reason, the Second Corps of the Royal Praetorian Guard, which never refused to suffer, launched a fierce revenge, and the captured wounded were basically untreated, and nine out of ten died of wound infections and other diseases.

The same was true of the captured white troops, some of whom were brutally ill-treated after being captured. The number of people quietly disappeared by nearly a thousand, which is not enough for outsiders.

The captives, whether white or native, were immediately assigned to the forced labor camps, where they undertook the ensuing large-scale construction and widening of highways, the reconstruction of ports and wharves, and some urban construction projects.

According to the edict of the emperor of the Tang Empire;

The imperial army is not only a powerful armed force, but also should be the pioneer of colonization, the pioneer cattle who build a new homeland for the Chinese, the messenger of spreading the advanced civilization and well-being of China, and the loudest note of imperial power.

As His Majesty's most ardent followers, the Royal Janissaries of the Sumatra Legion followed the oracle to the letter. While attacking the city along the way, large-scale construction of the island began.

In addition to more than 40,000 prisoners of war, there were also 130,000 local male young and middle-aged natives in the new camp, forming a huge construction army.

As for the large number of young and middle-aged natives in the area, why were they assigned to coolie camps?

As vanquished people, perhaps this is their original sin.

At the end of the 19th century

The wave of worldwide colonization reached its climax with the influx of world powers into Africa after the Treaty of Berlin to compete for new colonies, and no one cared about the rights and interests of the colonial people.

In the era of the awakening of modern civilization 10 years later, a very small number of European scholars and descendants of the indigenous peoples living in Europe raised this question to the core, demanding a public apology from the imperial government.

However, he was quick to be overwhelmed by all kinds of accusations and plots and remarks that he thought had ulterior motives in the public opinion circles, and he himself was also suppressed and excluded from all kinds of things, and did not make much waves.

Early September

The first Chinese migrant ship to arrive in Sumatra docked at Palembang and disembarked 2,213 new immigrants who were the beginning of a wave of Chinese immigration to Sumatra at the end of the 19th century.

In order to cooperate with the colonization strategy of the East Indies, the colonial department of the Tang Empire basically abandoned the traditional migration routes in the central Pacific and focused on immigration to the East Indies.

As a matter of fact

Since the emperor of the Tang Empire divided the feudal kings in a big way, Chinese immigrants from the central Pacific migration route have not set foot in the empire for 12 years.

Most of them were added to the 15 vassal states of South America, as well as the Kingdom of Cuba, the Kingdom of Luzon, the Kingdom of Cebu and the Kingdom of Mindanao, which changed the local demographic structure to the greatest extent and stabilized the political situation of the vassal states.

12 years so far

The above-mentioned 19 feudal states have supplemented a total of 6.82 million new Chinese immigrants through the golden migration route in the central Pacific, at an average annual rate of 550,000 to more than 620,000 people.

This greatly improved the local population structure, strengthened the mainstream Chinese social forces, stabilized the governance structure of the vassal state from top to bottom, and formed a population distribution dominated by Chinese society, and the effect was extremely obvious.

After the decisive Battle of Upper Indelagi, the Imperial Army immediately began the process of emigration.

With the full cooperation of the Imperial Colonial Department, in the next 5~7 years, the total number of immigrants in the central Pacific Ocean will average more than 600,000 per year, and the focus will be tilted towards the East Indies.

It is expected that 7~8 percent of them, that is, about 480,000 people per year, will be successively settled in the Sumatra Islands, Kalimantan Islands and Sulawesi Islands to strengthen the empire's dominance over the region.

Among them, Sumatra is the top priority for immigrants.

Because Sumatra has more than 1,000 years of farming tradition and a relatively complete farmland and water conservancy foundation, the island is full of towns and towns, and the natural conditions are superior.

Although agricultural production has withered due to the devastation of the 25-year-long Asian war, a large number of towns and villages and farmlands have been abandoned, and hundreds of thousands of people die every year due to disease, hunger, and even various famines.

However, Sumatra, located in the tropics, has excellent natural conditions, abundant sunshine, rivers, and complete farmland and ditch facilities.

In order to cut off the logistical support of the Aceh rebels, the Dutch colonists forcibly annexed villages and towns to the island's indigenous populations to strengthen military control.

They forcibly drove the indigenous population away from their ancestral lands, where they had lived for hundreds of years, and concentrated them in a few large towns, regardless of whether they lived or died.

As a result, the local indigenous people have land that cannot be cultivated, and can only be crowded on the fringes of large towns, forming slums of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands.

As a result of the harsh environment in the slums, sewage flows, tropical diseases and epidemics, hunger and violent crime, lead to the deaths of more than 100,000 people every year.

After the Battle of Upper Indragili, which ended in early September, the victorious Sumatran Corps took a three-day break and swept across the central and northwestern parts of Sumatra in two routes.

to the end of the year

The gunfire on the island gradually subsided, and the Sumatra Corps took complete control of the situation on the island, which meant that the neo-colonial war was also coming to an end.

Back in early August

After more than 10 days of fighting, the Kalimantan Corps gathered heavy troops, completely annihilating more than 30,000 Dutch troops gathered on the front line of Sampet and Palangkaraya, the capital of Central Kalimantan Province, and took control of the situation on Kalimantan Island in advance.

The expeditionary force deliberately blocked the news of the defeat at the Governor's Palace of the Dutch East Indies in Batavia (Jakarta), Java, until late November, which caused earthquake-like panic among the Dutch colonists there.

Although there have been various ominous speculations for a long time, when the news was confirmed, pessimism and great fear quickly spread, as if it were the end of the world.

Despite the wails on the island of Java, the newly occupied islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan by the Imperial Legion have begun to undergo a seismic transformation......

After 25 years of war and more than half a year of the Tang-Dutch War, the total population of Sumatra has been drastically reduced from more than 3.7 million to more than half, that is, less than 2 million.

As soon as the Sumatran Legion took control of the situation, it began to recruit indigenous young adults from the urban slums and put them directly into the forced labor camps, and began to build the island's infrastructure on a large scale.

The so-called general recruitment of indigenous young adults is crude and simple.

That is, the army directly blocked the entrances and exits of the slums on the edge of the town, and then sent soldiers into the squads to arrest people, and the resisters were killed on the spot.

In one fell swoop, this military campaign emptied the local slums of young male indigenous populations.

How to survive the rest of the old, young, and old women and children is not a question for the army to consider.

When Chinese immigrants entered in large numbers, local indigenous women were forced to follow as long as they were given a piece of bread, thus forming a new family.

The military's vigorous action has completely eliminated the high crime rate in the area, which is a bonus.

When 100,000 indigenous young adults are sent to the forced labor camps, it means that 100,000 local indigenous families have lost their breadwinners, and it means that no one robs, steals or kills anymore, and no one takes up arms to resist.

The source of these unrest was all in the hard labor camps.

The 25-year-old Aceh War was quietly resolved, and the indigenous young men were also sent to the forced labor camps, where they toiled day in and day out.

Those who pick up guns are rebel fighters, and putting down guns are the same as civilians will not work.

The colonial methods of the wealthy Tang Empire were tough, simple and crude, but the effect was extremely significant, so that other old colonial countries could not catch up.

On the island of Sumatra, 10 highways have been built on a large scale, with a total length of more than 23,000 kilometers of various trunk and branch roads, as well as the Sumatra railway line that runs through the island.

Thousands of bridges, dozens of dams and nine piers are being built at the same time, and 10 migrant boats arrive every month, bringing tens of thousands of new Chinese immigrants.

Sumatra was originally home to more than 350,000 early Chinese immigrants and their descendants, who witnessed the earth-shaking changes that the island has undergone in just one or two years.

The flat, wide road is asphalt-hardened, and the road is lined with lush street trees, making it easy to get to the towns.

Farmland and water conservancy facilities have been renovated, Chinese villages and towns have sprung up all over the island, and there are more and more rice fields, fruit trees, chickens, ducks, cattle and sheep, and life has improved visibly.

Demographic markets in towns and cities are bustling, with many local indigenous women volunteering to put in straw stickers, and young, healthy women are quickly bought by Chinese immigrants for ridiculously low prices.

In just two or three years

More than 100,000 new Chinese families have been established, which has become the most basic social structure in Sumatra, and Chinese schools have been established one after another, and the society has returned to the track of stable development.

The colonial problems that the Dutch could not solve for 300 years seemed to be solved in the face of the powerful Tang Empire.

But how much blood, tears and sadness are behind this, how much bloody oppression and cruel persecution are another matter.

By the end of the decade of the 20th century

In the imperial territories of the East Indies, mainly Sumatra and Kalimantan, the local Chinese population has accounted for more than 90% of the society, and the local people believe in Taoism and Buddhism, Chinese is the first official language, and English is the second largest language.

About 3.2 per cent of the remaining population are whites and their descendants, about 5.4 per cent are Malay Bumiputera and their descendants, and less than 0.7 per cent are Southeast Asians and Indians.

The news of the Tang Empire's full occupation of Sumatra and Kalimantan in the East Indies reached Europe in early 1899 and did not make much waves.

This time

Britain's massive military build-up into South Africa was undisguised, with more than 100,000 troops transferred from the colonies to South Africa, and war against the Orange Free State and the Transvaal Republic was imminent.

In 1899, Europe launched a large-scale campaign of sympathy and solidarity with the Boer Republic, and the public opinion circles carried a series of reports that attracted the attention of the vast majority of Europeans.

The Netherlands and Belgium formed numerous civil society groups, solicited donations, published articles, established foundations, donated wartime mobile hospitals and medical equipment to the Transvaal, and strongly condemned Britain's war attempts to bully the weak.

Thousands of volunteers from the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France, the United States, Russia, Ireland, Italy, and Scandinavia crossed the ocean to the Transvaal, ready to fight alongside the Boers.

In the midst of all this turmoil and disturbance, the bad news of the defeat of the Dutch in the East Indies did not have much repercussions to the countries of Europe, except for the great shock caused by the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

The strongest reaction was only from Germany, where Kaiser Wilhelm II said in a resolute tone when he received a delegation of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in a palace outside Berlin;

"The Tang State's shameless invasion and war behavior is another great damage to the white world, and it is not the first time that they have done so, and the international community, mainly European, should unite to face this great threat."

"Britain and the Tang Dynasty are in cahoots and do not hesitate to harm the interests of other countries to satisfy their own colonial aspirations, which is the biggest cancer in the international order today."

"Sadly...... Europe cannot be united. ”

Under the heavy pressure of the threat of war, in early 1899, the President of the Transvaal Republic, Kruger, told Milner;

The Government could consider reducing the period of residence of aliens granted Transvaal citizenship from 14 to 5 years, but demanded that Britain henceforth cease its claims to suzerainty over the Transvaal Republic, immediately cease the transfer of troops to South Africa, and withdraw troops from the British colonies.

Influenced by domestic public opinion, the British Parliament said in its reply to Kruger:

“…… Her Majesty's Government considers the response of the Government of the Republic of South Africa to be negative or inconclusive...... Her Majesty's Government reserves the right to reconsider the current situation and to take a final measure accordingly. ”

In order to increase the military pressure on the Transvaal, from the beginning of the year, the British sent 2,000 troops each from India and the Mediterranean to reinforce the Natal colony, which led to a significant increase in the strength of the British army there.

Early 1899

Lord Pous, Governor of the Dutch East Indies, stated in a letter to the Government of the Kingdom of the Netherlands;

"The Doge's Palace has lost its transport and communication capacity with the islands, the latest information indicates; 42,000 white captives were tortured and abused in the camps, and every day someone died in agony. ”

"The colony could not afford such a loss, Java was enveloped in great fear, and fleeing the island was the voice of all white people, who had lost more than 17,000 people in just a few months."

"The foundations of colonial rule have been shaken, the Governor's Office is unable to launch an effective resistance, and it urgently needs outside support and all supplies, including munitions......"

"The situation has deteriorated to the point where there is no further progress, war or peace, and the Royal Government must make a decisive decision, and further delay will only lead to a more serious disaster."

Unlike the panic of the Viceroyalty of the Dutch East Indies, in less than half a year, the Empire emigrated more than 270,000 people to the newly occupied colonies of the East Indies.

New year

Due to the proximity, the Tang Empire's Colonial Department set a target of 600,000 immigrants to the new colonies, including 435,000 in Sumatra, 145,000 in Kalimantan, and 20,000 in Sulawesi and other islands.

A large number of roads have been completed, and farmland water conservancy facilities and new pioneering projects have been built one after another, greatly enhancing the ability to accept new immigrants.

This also made it possible to immigrate on a large scale, and with the massive injection of imperial funds, thousands of factories sprung up, such as rice mills, flour mills, oil mills, sugar factories, tobacco factories, wood processing factories, cement factories, brick factories, sand and gravel factories, etc., and a large number of Chinese merchants came to inspect and prepare to set up a series of enterprises such as textile mills, dyeing and finishing factories, steamship companies, shipyards, etc.

The Tang Empire, with its strong industrial economy, was not short of capital, and the blank industrial field in the new colonies was a new field and a new market for the imperial capital, as well as a new stage for them.

Geographically

Sumatra's proximity to the whole of Southeast Asia and South Asia made it the most important place for the imperial industrial capital, which could radiate to the whole of South Asia and the Indian Peninsula.

Because of this, some of the empire's multinational capital also landed, and at the end of the 19th century, there was a wave of investment in the new colonies of South Asia.

For example, the empire's eight major banking consortia, the five major oil giants, and the three major multinational telegraph companies have set up their South Asian headquarters and branches in Sumatra, further expanding the market in a big way.

The colonization of the Tang Empire was never a simple military operation, but a comprehensive expansion of the military, politics and economy, and the colonial effect was extremely significant.

At the same time as hundreds of thousands of Chinese immigrants landed, a large amount of imperial capital poured in, and the East Indies ushered in a sea change not seen in hundreds of years.

Every day, there are new changes, new factories are springing up, new roads are being extended, and a varying number of local indigenous people are melting like snow and disappearing into history.