At 10 o’clock in the morning on August 17, 1945, in front of Sukarno's house in Batavia (or Jakarta), the independence of the Indonesian Republic was broadcast to the rest of the world. Sukarno, looking feverish and tense, with a sedate Mohammad Hatta standing nearby, introduced and then read the official proclamation of independence.The document had been typed the previous night from a hand-written piece of paper, containing several hastily made corrections.The text itself was composed during a contentious discussion that took place at the residence of Japanese Navy Admiral,Tadashi Maeda, whose role in the Indonesian archipelago after the Japanese surrender was diminished to the status of an adjutant at the beck and call of the Allied victors.At his insistence, the anti-Japanese rhetoric of an earlier draft had been removed during the course of the drawnout nocturnal debate. When the time came to make the document public, the audience listening to Sukarno's introductory comments and his reading of the proclamation was small in size, although some people in the crowd carried redand- white Indonesian flags or a large white banner with the text “Satoe Tanah, Satoe Bangsa, Satoe Tekad:Tetap Merdeka!” (One Land, One People, One Will: Independence Forever).

For a man who was known as a dazzling public speaker, capable of keeping his listeners spellbound for hours on end – or as the American war correspondent, Martha Gellhorn, remembered him, “a whizz-bang demagogue” – Sukarno's message on August 17, 1945, was uncharacteristically brief. Before delivering the short proclamation, he offered a rousing homily to the resilience of the nationalist movement; he addressed his audience with “All Brothers and Sisters… now the moment has come when we truly take the fate of our actions and the fate of our country into our own hands.Only a nation bold enough…will be able to stand in strength.” Sukarno then proceeded to read the proclamation.“We, the Indonesian people, herewith proclaim the independence of Indonesia,” he declared in a straightforward opening phrase. Only one more sentence completed the entire text of Indonesia's Declaration of Independence.“All matters pertaining to the transfer of power, etc., will be carried out efficiently and in the shortest possible time.”