Battle of Cape Rachado

Battle of Cape Rachado, anonymous depiction

Date	16 to 18 August 1606
Location	Off Cape Rachado, Portuguese Malacca
Result	Portuguese victory

Belligerents

Portuguese Empire

Dutch Republic

Dutch East India Company

Commanders and leaders

Martim Afonso de Castro

Cornelis Matelief de Jonge

Strength

20 ships

11 ships

Casualties and losses

2 ships lost
500 dead

2 ships lost
150 dead, many wounded

Dutch Republic

The Battle of Cape Rachado, off the present day Malaccan exclave of Tanjung Tuan in 1606, was an important naval engagement between the Dutch East India Company and Portuguese fleets.

It marked the beginning of a conflict between the combined Dutch/Johor forces against the Portuguese. It was the biggest naval battle in the Malay Archipelago between two naval superpowers of the time with 31 ships (11 of the Dutch VOC and 20 of the Portuguese). Although the battle ended with a Portuguese victory, the ferocity of the battle itself and the losses sustained by the victor convinced the Sultanate of Johor to provide supplies, support and later on much needed ground forces to the Dutch, forcing a Portuguese capitulation. 130 years of Portuguese supremacy in the region ended with the fall of the city and fortress of Malacca, almost 30 years later, in 1641.

Malacca, which was earlier the capital of the Sultanate of Malacca, was besieged and wrested by the Portuguese in 1511, forcing the Sultan to retreat and found the successor state of Johor and continue the war from there. The port city, which the Portuguese had turned into a formidable fortress, was strategically situated in the middle of the strait of the same name giving control to both the spice trade of the Malay archipelago and supremacy over the sea lane of the lucrative trade between Europe and the Far East. The Dutch East Indies Company (VOC) decided that to expand further to the east, the Portuguese monopoly and especially Malacca must first be neutralised.

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