Following the German occupation of Holland, the Japanese forced the Dutch Indies to supply them with oil and other valuable natural resources. The Dutch Indies governments were incredibly weak at the time and to avoid a total Japanese take over they paid their dues. It didn't last long. Japan eventually took over all of the Indies in their advance south. This was all done to fuel their war in China. The US, Dutch, British, and Australia all lost territories in this Japanese push. The Dutch were the last to surrender, which they did on March 9, 1942, with no land resistance. Part of the Dutch land consisted of the island of Java.
Conditions
After the Japanese take over, Dutch citizens refused to leave and they were thus sent to concentration camps. Inside these camps the survival rate was (according to some accounts) around 50%. Others outside the camps were forced into labor, raped, tortured or even thrown into sex trafficking. Starvation was common and more people die from it than Japanese bullets.
The occupation officially ended the day Japan surrendered. No allied forces ever came to liberate the nation, although their were plans for it. In the eyes of some, this was overall a better situation for Java. There was no battle to unnecessarily claim more civilian lives.
Java was not free though, the Dutch still controlled it for the next five years where hundreds of more lives were taken.
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