Memories of a dinner party where diplomacy, commerce and principle collided (c. 1960).By P. R. Boele van Hensbroek, Brookfield, Brisbane, 1995
Abstract
In this memoir, retired Dutch naval officer and migrant Pieter Robert (Robby) Boele van Hensbroek revisits one of the most striking episodes of his post-war life: a dinner party in Melbourne in the late 1950s, where the future Governor-General of Australia, Richard Casey, then Minister for External Affairs, was confronted with a Dutch proposal to withdraw support for the Netherlands’ continued administration of West New Guinea.
The account situates the event against the wider geopolitical and moral context of the time. In the aftermath of Indonesian independence, the Netherlands retained control over West New Guinea with the declared aim of preparing its Papuan population for eventual self-rule. By the mid-1950s, Dutch policies had established schools, health systems, and a nascent parliament—seven years ahead of neighbouring Papua and New Guinea under Australian administration. Many Papuans embraced democratic practices rooted in their village traditions, and Dutch officials believed a pathway to independence was realistic.
Yet international pressures mounted. Indonesia, under President Sukarno, made the incorporation of West New Guinea a central national claim. The United States and Britain, increasingly concerned with Cold War alignments, leaned toward placating Jakarta. Within the Netherlands itself, Boele recalls, there was division: while Foreign Minister Joseph Luns insisted on defending Papuan self-determination, groups of businessmen, politicians, and bureaucrats quietly favoured concessions to Indonesia for the sake of trade and diplomatic relations.
It was on behalf of this latter current that former ambassador Jan Schuurman, over brandy and port in the Arriens family’s Melbourne dining room, appealed directly to Casey. Schuurman argued that New Guinea was “not worth” a confrontation, suggested that promises to Papuans could be set aside, and assured Casey of Indonesian guarantees. To Boele, present as a guest and former officer, this was nothing less than disloyalty—an attempt to undermine the stated policy of his own government in the presence of a foreign minister. His interruption of the discussion underscored his lifelong conviction: that the Dutch had made solemn promises to the Papuan people, and that abandoning them was a moral failure.
The essay moves beyond the dinner table to broader reflections. Boele defends aspects of Dutch colonial governance, arguing that in comparative terms the Netherlands East Indies was relatively advanced, and that the colonial era, though flawed, contributed to modernisation across Asia. He rejects what he calls a misplaced Dutch “guilt complex” over the past, but acknowledges that the forced handover of West New Guinea in 1962—under international pressure—was a moment of genuine shame: the abandonment of a people already on the path to independence.
This paper thus combines personal testimony, political memory, and historical argument. It offers insight into the dilemmas faced by mid-20th-century Dutch officials, the contested narratives of decolonisation, and the place of small nations like the Netherlands within global power struggles. For Dutch-Australian readers, it also opens a window onto how such debates reached Australian living rooms, involving future national leaders, and how migrants like Boele carried their principles into their new country.
