Text: Sukarno liberates the Indies.

Year: 26 October 1945.

Publisher: Metro.

Artist: Marten Toonder.

Additional information: The cartoon shows Indonesian nationalist leader Sukarno clumsily attempting to free the bound Indonesia. Japanese soldiers meanwhile march in the background. The cartoon was published on the cover of ‘Metro’, a Dutch magazine founded during the Second World War, and seems to be implying that Sukarno will inadvertently kill Indonesia by trying to free her. The issue was published at the start of the Indonesian National Revolution, specifically after fighting and mob violence had broken out in Java between Indonesian republicans on one side, and the Japanese, Brits and Dutch on the other (the Japanese having been obliged by the conditions of their surrender to maintain order in Indonesia ahead of their departure).