Very Rare Jaeger LeCoultre Military A.D.R.I (Army of the Republic of Indonesia) Dirty Dozen W.W.W / Cal 885

The story goes, that as these watches were only delivered towards the tail-end of WWII, Britain was left with a significant surplus when the war ended and was keen to get rid of some. While they were celebrating victory on the other side of the world in the East Indies (modern day Indonesia), the K.N.I.L. army, fresh from defeating the Japanese occupation in the region, was back in conflict with the Indonesian freedom fighters who had declared independence. With a need for military goods, the Dutch looked to Britain. Despite being allies, there was a reluctance to sell to the Netherlands, as Britain didn’t support the conflict.. However, providing military watches seemed like a harmless concession and so was allowed, resulting in what is known today as the mythical reissued W.W.W’s with K.N.I.L. case backs.

But wait, the story goes deeper! What is even cooler, is that these reissued W.W.W’s were then re-reissued, again, and this time to the A.D.R.I. (Army of the Republic of Indonesia). These two armies were in conflict, which means that it could very well have been that the watch exchanged hands forcefully. You can see on the case back that K.N.I.L. has been scratched off, quite violently if I may say so, and instead A.D.R.I. engraved. What you end up with is a watch with military history in the British, Dutch and Indonesian armies! If you are talking about provenance, it doesn’t get much better than this.