Dutch East Indies aircraft colors

Black for anti glare, I’d guess this area would be black too? (kit instructions say green, like the photo, so they are useless.) Thought there was a panel between the pilots instrument panal and wind screen,but they are flush.) Found a photo of aTurkish one in a museum (not my preferred reference… never know what research they did. Even Bovington bollocksed up their Matilda tank and used 57 Chevy Belair Baby Blue as a camo color on it!) but … looks like NMF inthe wheel wells.

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It sounds sensible to do the area between cadet and trainer anti glare black too…

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Great find!

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Thanks Fred!

I take it you’ve found this article?

Here’s an automatic English translation.

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Jakko, thank you, I will have to read this when I get home today.

Very helpful. Should send it to Tamiya so they can fix their 60 year old SNAFU with the paint instructions for their 1/48 Buffalo kit. (Finemold has it righter. One scheme is green/ brown but I think that is an ex-RAF machine from Singapore/ Malaysia.

I came across it a couple of years ago when researching colours for a Brewster¹ I was building from the Tamiya 1:48 scale kit. It looks well-researched and dispels quite a few stories you see repeated everywhere about ML-KNIL aircraft colours.

FWIW, I painted that model with Vallejo Model Air aluminium on the underside, MIG 065 Forest Green for the camouflagegroen (“camouflage green”, commonly called jongblad but that doesn’t seem to have been the official name) and Tamiya XF-11 Japanese Navy Green for the donkergroen (“dark green”, AKA jongblad). However, I picked those colours largely because they were the closest ones I found in my paint collection that I figure are reasonable matches for my interpretation of the colours. American OD is definitely not suitable for donkergroen because the real colour was a dark green, not a greenish brown, and faded to green — whereas OD fades to brown.

That should be easy enough to spot: AFAIK, the RAF roundels would have been painted out with non-British paint colours before applying a Netherlands flag over them.


¹ In the ML-KNIL, these planes were known simply as “Brewsters” — never “Buffalo”, that was the British name.

Did the Dutch fly Brit Brewsters? I saw they sent some pilots to Singapore (training? Support? Though I’d think theyd want all their pilots at home) , but did they take aircraft or use the British ones there? I would doubt the Brits would let their aircraft be “reflagged”. (“Foreign” squadron in the UK (and MTO) … Poles, Dutch, French, etc. … had small flags on the aircraft , but national / sqn markings were RAF Reg.) The Finemolds kit is for 3 “beute” Buffalos in Japanese service at Tachikawa. Two are shown as 2 tone green (ex Dutch from DEI (?) and one in Dark Green/ Dark Earth. (Ex RAF from Singapore.(?)) Also doing a CW-22b in the two tone green. Using Vallejo 70.823 and 70.887 as called out in an IPMS article. (like you, I had them handy.) Markings for 75th Sentai (Sentai hack) but may go with Tachikawa markings. Allegedly the 75th markings are from mid /late 44, when they relocated to the Philippines. Question whether the CW-22 would have lasted that long or made the trip. Kit/decal instructions show just ML-KNIL colors with IJA markings. While they probably had ML-KNIL paints available (but maybe not handy at the location of aircraft) I’m leaning towards them having used IJA paints to cover the Dutch markings. #21 Midori Iro (green) and #1 Hairyokushoku (grey) Did tests on the outer wings of the CW-22. Upper wing with Vallejo 823/887. Lower, Lifecolor polished aluminum and IJA #1 “covering” the ML-KNIL markings.


Photo is a CW-22, CW-21, and B-17 at Tachikawa. Not clear enough to tell shades of paint.

Dutch aircraft were sent to Singapore to support the British. There was a pre-war (that is: from before the Japanese attacks on 7/8 December 1941) agreement between the British and Netherlands-Indies governments about this, so that on 9 December, a group of Martin bombers left Tjililitan for Singapore. On the 15th, the squadron of Brewsters stationed at Buitenzorg went there too. By 23 January, it looks like all remaining units had been withdrawn from Malaya, though. All this is according to De Militaire Luchtvaart in Nederlands-Indië 1914–1949 (“Military Aviation in the Netherlands-Indies 1914–1949”), Amsterdam: De Bataafse Leeuw, 1987, ISBN 90.6707.099.8.

On a quick look through that, though, I don’t see anything about Brewsters being transferred to the ML-KNIL by the British. There is mention of the twelve Hawker Hurricanes that were, but nothing about any Brewsters.

These were not RAF squadrons made up of Dutch personnel, though, but Dutch squadrons flying their own aircraft from RAF bases. They would have been marked exactly as what they were: ML-KNIL aircraft, with orange triangles as nationality markings (the red-white-blue flag was only ordered to be applied on 23 February, the book mentions — I was unsure of the date myself).

Thanks. The info on the change of national marking is good to have. I knew it was in 42 but was figuring about late March , April, May-ish … after things had “quieted down” and they were integrated into the US/ Aussie forces. Would have figured up until March 8 everybody was too busy to paint things. Plus most aircraft I’ve see with the red/white/ blue were P-40s/ B-25s. Question, why did the stick with the red. US, Aussies, Kiwis, and Brits (in Burma/India) all ditched anything red real fast. I read that some of the Brewsters were sent to Singapore , but did not know it was so many. What was left, fighter wise , in Java, Sumatra? CW-21s (but I read a number were grounded due to cracked landing gear). Curtiss Hawks. Only a hand full of Hurricanes made it. Heard of one ending up in Japan for T&E. (Recently saw what is claimed to be the only photo of a Dutch Hurricane, sans wings, being towed hrough a village.)

Here it be… 4871e756cbaad3b2c471a1bf0e98ac3c

I don’t know, but if I speculate: it was probably the simplest choice for repainting planes in a hurry in the middle of a war. The national marking had only been changed to an orange triangle in 1939, off the top of my head, but I suspect they wanted rid of that because it was too easy to confuse with the Japanese red disc? The only real alternative would be the pre-war roundel of red, white, and blue in thirds with an orange centre dot, but that would look pretty similar to that too, but a rectangle in red, white, and blue doesn’t seem as likely to be confused for an all-red disc. Anything else than these would probably cause more confusion among Dutch troops, but just painting a straight national flag on the plane should easily let even the dimmest ones recognise friendlies :slight_smile:

If you mean at any given time, then that would require a bit of careful reading in the book I mentioned, because it sets out the course of the war in the Netherlands Indies as a timeline of short paragraphs for the various dates.

However, it has an overview on page 29 of the disposition of air forces before hostilities:

I, II and III Vliegtuiggroep ¹ with Martin bombers:
3 Afdelingen ² at Tjililitan (Java)
1 Afdeling at Singkawang (Borneo)
²∕₃ Afdeling at Samarinda (Borneo)
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Tarakan
²∕₃ Afdeling at Tjililitan (Java)
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Singosari (Malang)

IV Vliegtuiggroep:
²∕₃ Afdeling at Tjililitan (Java), with Hawks
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Surabaya (Java), with Hawks
²∕₃ Afdeling at Bandung (Java), with Interceptors
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Surabaya (Java), with Interceptors

V Vliegtuiggroep with Brewsters:
1 Afdeling at Buitenzorg³ (Java)
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Singkawang (Borneo)
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Tarakan
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Samarinda (Borneo)

VI Vliegtuiggroep:
1 Afdeling at Tjikembar (Sukabumi, Java), with Falcons
1 Afdeling at Yogyakarta (Java), with Falcons
²∕₃ Afdeling at Kalidjati, aircraft type not mentioned
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Tjililitan (Java), with FK 52s [but I wonder if this is not a typo for 51]
²∕₃ Afdeling at Singosari, with FK 51s
¹∕₃ Afdeling at Yogyakarta (Java), aircraft type not mentioned

VII Vliegtuiggroep: at Andir, with Martin bombers

Yep, that’s the only photo I’ve ever seen of them, too. I’m kind of waiting for Border Models to release a Hurricane in 1:35 to build this as a diorama :wink:


¹ lit. Aircraft Group
² lit. Division; equivalent to a squadron
³ Now Bogor

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What type truck ? Would it be carrying the wings? :thinking:

Propeller blades for CW and Brewster are mentioned as green. Any thought on shade. Germans used RLM 70 Schwartzgrun. I’m leaning towards that. (Brewsters had yellow tips from the factors.

Close-up

A Dodge truck ?

H.P.

Trucks are not my specialty, sorry. But it does look too short to be carrying wings — I’d expect those to need a trailer of some kind, and in the photo, it doesn’t appear like the truck in the background is towing one of those.

It would not be a German green as such, of course. The Dutch text says:

Which translates as:

Since "donkergroen" in quote marks is used in the rest of the text to refer to the dark green used in the camouflage pattern, the one commonly referred to as oudblad, IMHO it means that that is also the colour used for the propeller blades.

Found this in my travels tonight. Might prove entertaining. The Dutch Air Forces in the Pacific War (pacificwrecks.com)

Truck question was mostly being a smart ass after the comment about the diorama. I’ll go with the "dark green"I have for the aircraft for the prop. Might be the Curtiss Hawks had aluminum props (the planes were NMF to start) that were painted (from what I know not as simple as it would seem. Balance was an issue.). Brewster and CW props came painted from the factory.

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If its coming down the road at you ANY truck should be a Dodge! Or it is apt to RAM you… (do they have that silliness in Europe. Knotheads that bought up Dodge renamed the truck division over here “Ram” ) Sorta like a Roll Hardly… Rolls down the hill, Hardly makes it up the next… Pic looks like one of the may ghost towns we have around here. (photo of Bodie ghost town in California … more like occupied Nevada!!!)

Not a truck but more artsy …