Dutch oilfield engineers and technicians went ashore close behind the attacking Australians carrying equipment shipped under Lend-Lease from the U.S.

At Borneo’s Tarakan Island last week Dutch oilfield engineers and technicians went ashore close behind the attacking Australians. With them they carried oilfield tools and equipment shipped under Lend-Lease from the U.S.

It was not by chance that the trained oilmen and their equipment were on hand for the Tarakan…

The Japanese reigned over the Netherlands East-Indies. Oil flowed towards Japan, and millions of Java schoolboys had to take Japanese language study and Nippon haircuts.

“It is difficult,” said the radio voice of Tokyo recently, “to tell you our objective in the south in simple words. I don’t know it myself.” Tokyo’s difficulty was suggested by news leaking out of Japan’s “Co-Prosperity Sphere”:

> The 550,000-acre Philippine sugar-cane industry, deprived of its U.S. market and…

It was rumored that trade negotiations between the Netherlands-Indies Japan were near breakup. Minister of Foreign Affairs Kleffens warned they would fight whoever attacked them.

There was more evidence than newspaper talk and statesmen’s declarations last week that Japan was taking some of its military blue chips out of China and staking them against the game farther south. Shanghai reported that Japan was already withdrawing troops from inner China toward the seacoast. Shanghai prophets predicted…

A Japanese mission went to the NL.-Indies to negotiate on oil, which ended unsatisfactory for Japan. Later a Japanese military spokesman said it would give the Dutch “one last chance.”

All the open spaces around the great naval airfield at Surabaya, Java, are set with bamboo stakes, about waist high, their tops whittled razor-sharp. A visiting journalist recently asked what they were for. The commander of the base explained that they were designed as an unpleasant reception for parachutists, and…

Royal Dutch-Shell had virtually agreed, under pressure, to supply Japan with 40% of her oil needs for the next six months out of their Netherlands East Indies wells.

The only important war material which the U. S. has not embargoed against Japan is oil. In the past Japan has bought about 75% of her oil from the U. S.; in the future she may get none. Last week Japan’s eagerness to find other sources for oil before the U. S. gusher goes dry…

Nazi ships near Curaçao are forced to anchor outside Willemstad’s drawbridged harbor, because the Dutch are afraid they might sabotage oil stored in the islands by Royal Dutch Co.

In November 1861, when the U. S. Civil War was just getting going. Captain Charles Wilkes of the Union Navy, commanding the screw sloop San Jacinto, fired a shot across the bows of the British Royal Mail packet Trent as she steamed along the Bahama Channel. The Trent hove to…

Every Dutchman fears that Japan may some day seize the large island oil reserves in the Netherlands-Indies. Minister Deckers said that the present fleet in the Netherlands Indies is sufficient.

Every Dutchman fears that Japan may some day seize the large island oil reserves of Java, Sumatra, Borneo and Ceram in the Netherlands Indies. Last week Dutch planters and oil men rejoiced to learn that Queen Wilhelmina is resolved to defend them to the last. Dutch Defense Minister Laurentius Nicolas…