Understanding the Great Game and role of India & Asian stability

ShauryaT · Post by **ShauryaT** » 20 Jul 2008 00:14

Acharya wrote:
ShauryaT wrote:Acharya: The Russian threat was recognized at least as far back as 1860, at the very onset of the great game. It is Oil that changed the nature of the game, in the region. So, the game changed becuase the pot of gold changed. From India to the Middle East.
This is correct. So the first world war was actully to protect the me and control the iraq

WW1 was an overlapping time period. Oil gushed out for the first time in the ME from Iran in 1908. WW1, India was still valuable by itself. India was the anchor from which the defense of the ME and a 1000 miles from India's borders was organized during WW1. 1935, seems to be the marking year, when the pot of gold changed for good, from India to the ME. It coincides well, with the culmination of Morley-Minto process started in 1908, with the first constitution for India and first real marker, for the change of British interests in the region.

1940 onwards, it was clear that Britiain would not co-operate and would work against the goal of a United India. The partition plan was largely as Wavell envisioned.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 20 Jul 2008 05:19

just around WWI the Royal navy started conversion from coal to oil for its boilers and Churchill was the First Sea Lord. The oil was from the Iranian fields. A company called Anglo-Iranian Oil was formed.

IN Churchill's book on World War II there are pictures of Indian troops used to oust the Iraq dictator Razzak who was supposed to be sympathetic to Nazi Germany. during WWI a conf of the Allies was held in Tehran.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 20 Jul 2008 05:43

X-posted from Army Discussion thread. Originally posted by K prasad.. I dint use the quote feature as there are font size problems.

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Speaking about the China threat and mountain warfare, i have updated the Indian section for Mountain Warfare on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_warfare). Please Check it out and let me know if there are any errors or changes.

Also, this declassified letter by a US diplomat on our weaknesses vis-a-vis China is an interesting read... What is amazing is that the letter, written in 1962, could very well be 5 years old. I only hope it doesn't apply even now.

http://www.rand.org/about/history/wohls ... 10703.html

Some Juicy parts below:

Quote:
The China section of the Ministry of External Affairs is dominated by a pro-Chinese group of which R. K. Nehru is a leading member. The Indian policy regarding China is based on a continuing belief that China does not want war. Until such time as this pro-Chinese group may be removed from the Ministry, no serious policy planning is likely to take place. The main obsession continues to be Pakistan, especially on the part of Menon.
....
....
Chinese aggression against India commenced within three months after the signing of the 1954 Indo-Chinese Treaty. The Army favored resistance, but was overruled by Menon who insisted that Pakistan was the real enemy. Desai claimed that supplies were deliberately withheld from Indian troops in the affected areas and that they were ordered not to retaliate.
....
....
I have found no confirmation of Desai's statement that there has been any kind of open rebellion in the Indian Army: morale is apparently low, however, as a result of the political maneuvering.

Effective Indian defense against the Chinese requires three military capabilities:

(1) Sufficient lightly equipped and highly mobile mountain troops to check Chinese expansion in the Himalayas by taking advantage of the terrain

(2) Sufficient heavily armored, motorized troops on the Indian plains to check any Chinese units which manage to break through the Himalayas.

(3) Enough trained guerrilla units to harass China's vulnerable lines of communication through Sinkiang and Tibet, and to tie down large numbers of Chinese troops in these areas and in Chinese occupied portions of India.

A former Chief of the Indian Army Staff has recently written that in his opinion India is deficient in all three of these capabilities in relation to the Chinese threat.

Deja vu anyone??

--------------------------------------
Were Menon and co working on reversing the GG and PRC intervention came at a very bad moment?

ShauryaT · Post by **ShauryaT** » 20 Jul 2008 06:30

ramana wrote:Also explains all those Lords supporting the Kashmir cause in London. The game aint over yet from their side.

I used to discuss with a fellow member that the creation of TSP had cutoff India's access to the Middle East which is a natural frontier for India. My thoughts were not fully formed then but now I see why its important to follow that line of thought. The importance of Kashmir is that its the link area between these regions. India would be totally cutoff if Kashmir is lost to TSP or to others. Cleaning up POK is the first step and nothing should deviate from this goal.

Thank you for saying this ramana. My very first post on BR, under another ID was about the strategic importance of the NA and why should India rightfully take it back. I was almost hounded out by an ex admin and was hugely disappointed. So, thanks for saying this. I also think, the strategic end of TSP, lies in India taking this region back and think it is possible under the nuclear threshold.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 20 Jul 2008 07:42

Paul wrote:Google results for offshore balancing

It is a well known strategy. It is used in India too....my relatives use it to keep me off-balance as well.

Read this book to understand what they thought of Indian in 1961

India and Pakistan: A Political Analysis
by Hugh Tinker. 232 pgs.
CONTENTS

I TRADITIONAL SOCIETY AND AUTHORITY 9
II POLITICAL MOVEMENTS AND INDEPENDENCE 22
III INDIA: A NATION IN THE MAKING? 41
IV PAKISTAN: TRIALS OF DEMOCRACY 69
V THE PARTIES: ORGANISATION AND POLICIES 96
VI THE POLITICS OF LANGUAGE AND CASTE 123
VII THE PUBLIC SERVICES 151
VIII THE CHECKS ON GOVERNMENT 168
IX THE SILENT PEOPLE 188
X FUTURE INDICATIVE 202
Appendix: Kashmir and the Borderlands 209
A Guide to Further Reading 217
Index 221
Political Divisions, 1962 and 94
Major Languages and 146

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_q ... tBody;col1

Obituary: Professor Hugh Tinker
Hugh Russell Tinker, scholar of Southern Asia and political activist: born Westcliff, Essex 20 July 1921; Lecturer, then Reader, then Professor, School of Oriental and African Studies, London University 1948-69; Director, Institute of Race Relations 1970-72; Senior Fellow, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London University 1972-77; Professor of Politics, Lancaster University 1977-82 (Emeritus); married 1947 Elisabeth McKenzie (nee Willis; two sons, and one son deceased); died Hornby, Lancashire 14 April 2000.

Independent, The (London), May 4, 2000 by Peter Lyon
HUGH TINKER was a prolific author who became an authority on Burma, Southern Asia generally (but especially India and Pakistan) and the Indian diaspora. He was briefly and controversially Director of the Institute of Race Relations in the early 1970s. He then resumed an active academic life and authorship, which he sustained, despite serious afflictions, in his retirement years. He contested parliamentary elections unsuccessfully three times in the Liberal Party's cause.
He was born at Westcliff, Essex, in 1921, the son of a shipping insurance broker, and went to Holly School, Sheringham, and Taunton School. He trained as a librarian and soon tried to join first the RAF and then the Army, before enlisting in the Royal Armoured Corps on 3 October 1939. He served in Burma and on the North-West Frontier, and was commissioned in 1941, eventually becoming a captain. He was seconded to India's civil administration in 1945 and then acted as a First Class Magistrate in Uttar Pradesh.

On demobilisation he went up to Sidney Sussex, Cambridge, to read History. He obtained a Second in the First Tripos in 1947, and a First in the Second Tripos in 1948. He won the college Essay Prize for an essay on "The British Achievement in India, illustrated by a study of the Punjab administration 1840-1870".

Tinker's tutor, the one-time athlete David Thomson, wrote of him in 1948:

Personally he is a man of great energy and industry, of real intellectual and practical ability, and of attractive personality. He is mature and sound in judgement, and has considerable experience in administrative and judicial work in India. He can be relied upon to complete any task he undertakes with good sense and efficiency.

Tinker corresponded with Thomson about staying in Cambridge and taking up the BA scholarship his college had awarded him but he was now married and he was appointed Lecturer in the Modern History of South East Asia at the School of Oriental and African Studies (Soas) in London University, the same year as he obtained a mark of distinction in the Diploma in Public Administration of London University.

Tinker's first book, The Foundations of Local Self-Government in India, Pakistan and Burma (1954) sprang from his doctorate (supervised by D.G.E. "George" Hall, the doyen of British historians of Burma and South-East Asia). Wide-ranging and lucid, Tinker's book adumbrated a number of themes he was to work out in subsequent articles, chapters in scholarly symposia and in his own many books.

Burma had featured in his wartime experience, his PhD and thus his first book. He was to go on to be Britain's foremost historian of his day of modern Burma. A spell as Visiting Professor in the University of Rangoon, 1954-55, led to his authoritative study The Union of Burma: a study of the first years of independence (1957).

Tinker recounted Burmese efforts to "create a parliamentary democracy in the face of heavy pressures known and unknown internal and external" only two years before the relapse into military rule, thus giving particular piquancy to his assertion that "strenuous unemotional thinking is earnestly needed in Burma in the years immediately ahead".

In the late 1950s at Soas he sought to demonstrate Abraham Lincoln's conviction that "the ballot is stronger than the bullet" and he popularised the phrase "broken-backed state" to designate the condition of invert polities. In the early 1980s he edited two volumes of British papers, based on India Office library records, on the demission and transfer of power, Burma: the struggle for independence 1944-48 (1983-84), recognised as a standard source on this subject. Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel laureate, was one of his students.

In 1970 Tinker became Director of the Institute of Race Relations, succeeding Phillip Mason, its founding director. This was an acrimonious penny-pinching time for the institute and for race relations generally. Class and generational conflict between the council and some of Tinker's youngest radical staff had a wrenching effect on his own life style and his writing plans suffered. But he was convinced that IRR should be frank and open about policies and their implications.

In 1972 with some sense of relief he found a new but familiar base at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies in London University and embarked on a remarkably productive five-year period, even by his own high standards. Funded by a grant from the Ford Foundation to write a trilogy on the Indian diaspora, he wrote at least four books on this theme and also entered fully into the life of the small research institute. But, whether at ICS, the India Office, at home in Mill Hill, north London, or at the cottage in Buckinghamshire, he kept on writing.

He was then Professor of Politics at Lancaster University for five years from 1977 until his retirement in 1982. With the move to Lancashire, Hugh and Elisabeth Tinker bought a house in Hornby, and both of them became active in local village and church affairs.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 20 Jul 2008 07:48

ShauryaT wrote:
ramana wrote:Also explains all those Lords supporting the Kashmir cause in London. The game aint over yet from their side.

I used to discuss with a fellow member that the creation of TSP had cutoff India's access to the Middle East which is a natural frontier for India. My thoughts were not fully formed then but now I see why its important to follow that line of thought. The importance of Kashmir is that its the link area between these regions. India would be totally cutoff if Kashmir is lost to TSP or to others. Cleaning up POK is the first step and nothing should deviate from this goal.
Thank you for saying this ramana. My very first post on BR, under another ID was about the strategic importance of the NA and why should India rightfully take it back. I was almost hounded out by an ex admin and was hugely disappointed. So, thanks for saying this. I also think, the strategic end of TSP, lies in India taking this region back and think it is possible under the nuclear threshold.

Amen to it... when I suggested similar thoughts recently some gentleman opinioned that it would be a preposterous idea for India to go full fledged and reaquire POK & NA to gain access to CAR. If BR members of such opinion, then think about ordinary citizens of India... we need to reeducate the entire population (especially in strategic thinktanks) that this should be the immediate goal of GOI.

Thanks

vishwakarmaa · Post by **vishwakarmaa** » 20 Jul 2008 11:45

Indian population is all for going to POK and getting NA. But, its spineless elite which is the problem. They stand on support of business affliliations with british and western industries, which goes back to slavery-days.

In fact, this elite section calls those days as "golden days". They apposed freedom movement too!

These elites like easy-going life. They hate wars with pak because their gora friends then mock them and threaten with loss of business. This is what happened when they pressurized vajpayee to pull back. It wasn't Indian masses, never it was. Its just this very small section of big bad-fat.

If there is anything masses need to know then it is, this nexus between gora and their chamchas in india who funds and controls even India's foreign policy.

This is precisely one reason, I always appose opening economy, before domestic MNCs shape up nicely, on their own, without foreign dependance. Otherwise, after 10 years, situation will be same - there will be Indian MNCs for namesake, but with "gora" money-control.

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 20 Jul 2008 23:11

ramana wrote:
Forum Moderator

Joined: 01 Jan 1970 12:00 am
Posts: 3736 paul, Readig the footnotes in the Offshore balancing pdf you posted I realised how Churchill got his wilderness years- he voted against the party line to prevent Dominion status for India. He only got out of the doldrums due to WWII.

ShauryaT wrote:1935, seems to be the marking year, when the pot of gold changed for good, from India to the ME. It coincides well, with the culmination of Morley-Minto process started in 1908, with the first constitution for India and first real marker, for the change of British interests in the region.

Ramana and ShauryaT: Collating your comments together, it appears Churchill refused to acknowldge this change in the game rule(he has been described many times as a 19th century politician), hence was banished to the doghouse for long years when WWII intervened to resuscitate his career.

In the WWI period, most royal navy warships were run on coal (The word lascar comes to mind here). I don't think Churchill had much to do with the Sauds coming to power either. As I recall it, the Hashemites had closer relationship with the British but I could be wrong here.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 21 Jul 2008 01:36

paul, That Chicago paper has the same in its notes section. I didnt know why he went to doghosue. Now I know.

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 21 Jul 2008 02:00

While talking of blaming the Indian elite, it would be incorrect to blame them for failure to safeguard Indian interests. Since independence we have managed keep all of India in one piece( Keeping in mind that this is n-one of the toughest neighbourhoods in the globe). We only lost Aksai Chin but since our leadership has taken not insignificant steps to safeguard Indian security. People point to China taking over Tibet but it should be remembered we have also added territories since 1947.

Sikkim, Arunachal pradesh, kashmir etc. all part of the Indian union while Nepal and Bhutan are in the Indian sphere of influence. It should be remembered that Tibet when it was independent had asked India to hand over Arunachal Pradesh back to them.

I believe that of all the major players in the game, India has the most potential to gain if it plays it's cards well in the coming years. POK is ripening up well and will fall in our lap sooner or later. Aksai Chin will also come our way as our potential starts reaching it's true value. Bangladesh will come around too and we are taking slow but sure steps to safeguard our interests in Myanmar.

Another thing to note is that it is not in Indian interests to let new players enter the maidan now or ever. It is for this reason that Iran should not be allowed to have nuclear weapons. There are other players in the CIS watching the situation in Afganistan-Pakistan closely.

Uzbekistan is another sleeping giant whose potential has been noted by all major powers. Al Qaida has made special efforts to spread it's influence in this vital country. Not for nothing is it called the cockpit of central asia. Most of the land invasions from the NW originate from the territories that comprise of presnt day Uzbekistan. Should PRC start losing it's grip on Xinjiang, they will most likely be the first to move in. In afghanistan they already have considerable influence through their surrogate Jouzjani militia (dostam). Xinjiang is the old moghalistan the non muslim mongols settled down. Uzbeks will see this as their natural lebenstraum. They will likely be India's neigbours in the future.

Need look up and identify not only present opportunities but take steps to forestall future threats as well.

Malayappan · Post by **Malayappan** » 21 Jul 2008 06:23

About time lest BR would not have been staying ahead of the curve!

I refer to Paul’s prescient observation - over the last say 1200 years, only in the last 300 or so years we have not had a major invasion from North West! Starting with Ranjit Singh and then the British, the buffers held. Indic Civilization had a break to recoup and regenerate. (The Paki actions in 1948, 1964, 1971, 1999, though detestable were after all nowhere in the scale of Ghazni, Ghor, Abdaeli or Nadir Shah)

Studying the forces, and deploying strategies to manage the changes is so very relevant!

Some key objectives:
- Weaken those forces that could potentially invade again
- Divide them to ensure inter se conflict prolongation
- Ensure as many friendly / benign forces as possible in the neighborhood

Some points to remember / rules of the game / objectives to set:
- Strategic interest of West and India do not coincide. There are commonalities but very limited coincidence. A reality and no point moaning or acting like a wronged child! They pursue theirs and we do ours. Wherever possible we coordinate! A lot of finessing necessary!
- Current state of Pakistan a crucial roadblock. It may also be contributing to the problem. Strategic circles in India might have so far worked on the premise that a hostile RAPE managed Pakistan would serve our purposes (a friendly Pakistan being an oxymoron). But such a Pakistan has been dying since Zia. Recent events suggest a speedier death, notwithstanding West’s efforts at oxygenation. They too dream of a RAPE managed Pakistan, but that looks more and more chimerical.
- Breakup of Pakistan should feature formally in all our calculations. This is in fact a major point of divergence with Western Interests. We need to manage the forces without openly conflicting with West (it will take up too much of energy otherwise!)– Finessing #1
- Defining a Pak break up action plan is crucial. This needs to be commensurate / in sync with Intelligence Capabilities and National Proclivities!
- Iran is crucial to our calculations. One is not sure how strong the ruling group will be 15-20 years from now. Our priorities should be – Intelligence Agencies, Strategic Community, People to People – Finessing #2
- Whatever happens to current Afghanistan, we should not have a repeat of the 1990s. Ability to influence (I am not saying control!) issues in crucial swathes of that territory is a huge national priority
- Israel is important. Iran should go nuclear eventually. That should stir up many things there. We have more commonalities of interest with Israel than with West. OTOH we need Iran, and hopefully benignity of at least some Gulf players – Finessing #3

Lots of energy required! As a matter of fact a key National Enterprise else it could be back to the hordes! And this time the civilization may not survive!

ShauryaT · Post by **ShauryaT** » 21 Jul 2008 08:36

Paul wrote:What I am trying to is to find evidence linking actual happenings on the ground in the run up to Independence to the framwork of the great game to start with.

Narendra Singh Sairila’s book would be a good read for this.

I also believe their is a black hole in the period 1942- 46 on reasons for partition.

This was the WWII period, Britain and the west, did not want to hear anything beyond their immediate objectives from the region for the war. This translated to recruitment of personnel to the tune of nearly 50,000 a month, relative law and order in the country, which they were able to achieve by ensuring the jailing of most of the country’s leaders and buying off the others with sops.

Something changed after WWII (identification of the USSR as the next threat?). What was it?

The Russian threat was always there, at least since 1860. Britain was weakened after WWII but that alone was not it. By WWII, the UK had milked India, for what it was worth and the continued holding of India was not worth the effort. The cheese had moved, to the ME and hence the actors moved on.

Why did Cawthorne head the Pakistani side of the Kashmir CFL talks with India in 1948? Was this a mere coincidence?

I do not have the exact numbers with me but a large chunk of the officer cadre of the Pakistan and Indian army were filled with British (common wealth) officers and Cawthorne was an Australian version. He played a key liaison role between Laiaqat Ali and the Atlee government. So, no co-incidence here. Part of the reason for the embarrassment of the British on the J&K war and their desire to get it to an end was that the militarty leaders on both sides were British. They also wanted to ensure that as they left the region, they had enough assets to continue to play the game.

How come the northern areas went to Pakistan in 1948?

The Northern areas were the link to Sinkiang, a sort of no man’s land, on which the Kuomintang’s government authority was crumbling. Sinkiang was deemed essential to watch soviet forces (remember the U2 flights from TSP). Nehru had declared even before independence that India would not have anything to do with British concerns. Jinnah was more than willing to have a defence alignment with Britain. Hence, the coup by Major Brown and his team on the Gilgit representative of Maharaja Hari Singh, Governor Ghansara Singh, immediately after the treaty of accession was signed.

This betrayal of the British officers (alledgedly in their individual capacity but rewarded by the British government nevertheless), who led the Gilgit scouts is well hidden from Indian history. The irony is no one in our leadership, at that time, seems to have understood the importance of the region and demanded its return strongly. The betrayal of the British chief of the Indian army along with Mountbatten during that time is another affair.

Why was Burma separated from the Indian dominion in 1938? the year seems very close to 1947.

I think the year was 1937 but I do no know why. The eastern part of the game and its linkages, if any, are not clear to me, yet.

Why did the soviets tell IG not to count on friendship treaty if India moved in on west pakistan?

Most likely a message relayed from the US. The US had fore warned that it would escalate if IG moved on to west Pakistan. The US, being the inheritor of the game was interested in that territory and the USSR was in no mood for an escalation in the region.

Moving on to more recent events Operation Malabar ( naval joint excercises in BOB - Why BOB? why not the arabian sea? Is there a pattern to this?

Most certainly. Pakistan was made a member of the British led Baghdad pact, soon after independence. This was later converted to US led CENTO to form the brick wall against the Soviet Union. The US Navy conducts exercises with the Pakistan Navy in the North Arabian. The equal-equal still exists to a large degree, where it matters. Let no one doubt it.

To try to second guess the trigger as you put it with a few posts would be a bit presumptuos don't you think?

Added later - The day we define the trigger of the game from India's POV is the day we can close this thread. This thread would have truely served it's purpose!

You do not do justice to the ten year running great game thread, going on in my head

Just use my comments as data points, if it helps well and good, if it does not ignore them.

ShauryaT · Post by **ShauryaT** » 21 Jul 2008 08:44

Paul wrote:it appears Churchill refused to acknowldge this change in the game rule(he has been described many times as a 19th century politician), hence was banished to the doghouse for long years when WWII intervened to resuscitate his career.

I am not so sure. Churchill went for the maximalist position, believing that India could not govern herself, but yet, was a pragmatic, when his maximalist positions did not find any takers. There are some suggestions that he was the very architect of the partition of India, along with Wavell and was the hand that supported Jinnah. Remember Atlee was his deputy. Mountbatten briefed Churchill before things were finalized. There is a lot that is yet unknown about the era. The Mountbatten papers are still classified.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 21 Jul 2008 09:40

ShauryaT wrote:
Paul wrote:it appears Churchill refused to acknowldge this change in the game rule(he has been described many times as a 19th century politician), hence was banished to the doghouse for long years when WWII intervened to resuscitate his career.
I am not so sure. Churchill went for the maximalist position, believing that India could not govern herself, but yet, was a pragmatic, when his maximalist positions did not find any takers. There are some suggestions that he was the very architect of the partition of India, along with Wavell and was the hand that supported Jinnah. Remember Atlee was his deputy. Mountbatten briefed Churchill before things were finalized. There is a lot that is yet unknown about the era. The Mountbatten papers are still classified.

Churchill joined the liberal party in 1904 since they supported free trade. Then again in 1932 he switched over to the Tories when Germany started rearming. From 1920 Churchill convinced Britian to have an alliance with USA breaking the Anglo-Japan alliance in the east. For 10 years from 1920 Britian continued to reduce its naval tonnage to appease the Americans as their price for the alliance. Churchill blamed this period for Britians lack of preparedness during the WWII

THE LAST LION Winston Spencer Churchill: Alone, 1932-1940. By William Manchester. Illustrated. 756 pp. Boston: Little, Brown & Company. $24.95.

THE second volume of William Manchester's biography of Winston Churchill, covering the years 1932 to 1940, begins with Churchill still a Conservative Member of Parliament but excluded from the Cabinet of the Conservative Government. Stanley Baldwin, who was Prime Minister in the 20's and again from 1935 to 1937, continued to dominate the Government in the intervening years even when he did not occupy 10 Downing Street. Churchill, as described by Mr. Manchester, is attacking Baldwin for condoning the rearmament of Germany, forbidden by the Treaty of Versailles, and for appeasing Hitler and Mussolini - a policy that, Churchill predicts, will bring about a second world war, resulting in the destruction of democracy in Europe. The book ends with Hitler's invasion of France, the fall of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and his replacement by Churchill.

The eight years in between is the story of how Churchill did his utmost to convince the people of Britain of their mortal danger, and failed. In the event it was what Hitler did, not what Churchill said, that brought the British people to their senses.

It is clear from these 700 or so pages that Mr. Manchester has a warm and affectionate admiration for Churchill. But he also gives us his failings. These are important, not only in the interests of historical truth, but because they have a bearing on a major historical question: why did the British people not listen to Churchill, and why did they oppose the idea of his being given the reins of power until it nearly was too late?

Mr. Manchester emphasizes the fact that most people in Britain did not want to hear what Churchill was saying. Baldwin thought that if he echoed Churchill and announced a major rearmament program, he would lose the election that was due in 1935. His successor, Neville Chamberlain, did not want to endanger his personally conducted foreign policy by antagonizing Hitler or Mussolini. The British people did not want to believe that any European government would go to war. There was, in the early 1930's, an unrealistic faith in the power of the League of Nations, and a widespread, though not dominant, mood of pacifism.

Volume Two of ''The Last Lion'' describes this well. The author might, however, have given more weight to the possibility that if Churchill in these fraught years had been regarded generally as a man of judgment and not by so many people as an irresponsible maverick, more people would have heeded his warning. As it was, the formidable information about Hitler's aims and Germany's rearmament that was leaked to Churchill by the Foreign Office, and divulged by him in Parliament and in the press, was greatly discounted. Much in his record - and Mr. Manchester gives an account of it - provided a case for not listening to him.

Mr. Manchester notes many sources for the information on which his book is based, thanking in particular Martin Gilbert, the distinguished Oxford historian whose official eight-volume biography of Churchill - six volumes up to 1941, and a vast collection of documents - constitutes a library in itself. He also quotes from an impressive number of personal interviews with men and women who knew Churchill well, including Lady Soames, Churchill's daughter.

Thousands will read this book with great satisfaction. Historians will have criticisms. Some, for example, will not accept Mr. Manchester's account of the events that forced Chamberlain to give up being Prime Minister and might have led to his being succeeded not by Churchill but by Lord Halifax, the Foreign Secretary, who was as committed to appeasement as Chamberlain had been. As late as May 1940, when France was being overrun by German tanks, Halifax favored peace talks with Hitler.

ON this fateful matter of the succession, the opinion of Clement Attlee, the leader of the Labor Party, was crucial. Mr. Manchester gives me the impression - he seems to be relying, ill-advisedly, on an interview with Harold Macmillan - that he thinks Attlee would have accepted Halifax and was opposed to Churchill. This was not so. In an appreciation of Churchill written for The Observer in 1958 and published in 1965, Attlee said: ''I saw nobody around who could qualify except Winston.'' There is ample evidence to support this expression of opinion.

So long as Mr. Manchester follows or parallels the trail laid down by the definitive Gilbert biography, his history is safe. When he explores on his own, it is sometimes at risk. But, after all, he essays to climb not a peak but a mountain range. Good luck to him as he completes his work in the third volume.

ShauryaT · Post by **ShauryaT** » 21 Jul 2008 10:05

Acharya: I read that biography by Manchester, many years ago. Forms the basis of my understanding of Churchill apart from how own writings.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 21 Jul 2008 10:22

ShauryaT wrote:Acharya: I read that biography by Manchester, many years ago. Forms the basis of my understanding of Churchill apart from how own writings.

Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World by Patrick J. Buchanan (Author) is very good to understand what was in the mind of the leaders of Europe, Britain and USA during the 50 year period.
Read along with this book the Grand Strategies in War and Peace by Paul Kennedy (Paperback - Sep 10, 1992)

His Father's Son
In 1900 Churchill began a remarkable career in the same political world where his father, Randolph, had left a brilliant, if brief, impression. Elected to Parliament as a hero of the Boer War, Churchill soon became known for his indefatigable energy and rhetorical eloquence.

The Dance of Politics
A fervent advocate of free trade and low tariffs, Churchill switched his political affiliation from Conservative to Liberal in 1904. Many viewed his action as disloyal and opportunistic. Churchill's subsequent career, however, revealed strong inclinations toward social reform and a concern for the welfare of the less fortunate. Churchill's ascent to power became even more rapid after the Liberals won a decisive electoral victory in 1906. In swift succession, his party's leaders entrusted to him a series of important positions leading to a seat in the Cabinet. By 1911, at the age of thirty-six, he was serving as First Lord of the Admiralty--the civilian head of Britain's navy. On the eve of World War I the young politician had established himself as one of his nation's most influential public figures.

Fall From Power
The outbreak of World War I in 1914 offered Churchill his first opportunity to influence events on a global scale. Dismayed by the development of the bloody stalemate in Europe, Churchill, the energetic First Lord of the Admiralty, promoted the development and use of such new weapons as airplanes and tanks. He also sent an expedition to attack Germany's ally, Turkey, through the Dardanelles Strait. This military effort failed, contributing to his fall from power. Widely blamed and thoroughly disheartened, Churchill volunteered for six months as an infantry officer on the western front.

"Chequered Fortunes"
In 1917, what Churchill called his "chequered fortunes" changed, and he was returned to public office. Churchill took charge of Britain's armaments production and worked closely with his American counterparts until an armistice was concluded on November 11, 1918. Following World War I, Churchill assumed even more responsible political positions. As his government's special emissary, he had mixed success in coping with war-related disruptions in such widely separated places as Russia, Ireland, Palestine, and Iraq. By 1924 Churchill, a Conservative once more, had become Chancellor of the Exchequer, a post once held by his father and considered to be second only to that of prime minister. He would remain in this post until 1929, when the Labor Party returned to power.

"The Wilderness Years"
Though he was without an official position, Churchill spent much of the 1930s warning Britain and the world of the danger of Hitler's Nazi Germany. Churchill also continued to express his opinions on domestic British politics. In 1937, when Edward VIII was pressured to resign the throne over his determination to marry the American divorcée Wallis Simpson, Churchill was one of the few who defended the King. Churchill's support of the King was damaging to him—he was shouted down in Parliament and appeared out of touch with mainstream politics.

Prime Minister
In September 1939 Germany invaded Poland. The attack touched off the world struggle that Churchill would later call "The Unnecessary War" because he felt a firm policy toward aggressor nations after World War I would have prevented the conflict. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain brought Churchill into government again as First Lord of the Admiralty. On May 10, 1940, as the Germans were beginning to attack the British and French ground forces arrayed against them, Churchill became Prime Minister and Minister of Defense. He later wrote, "I felt as if I were walking with Destiny, and that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and for this trial."

Dropping the Pilot
Toward the end of World War II, Churchill's governing coalition dissolved, and he was forced to undertake a political campaign while the sole remaining Axis enemy, Japan, was yet to be defeated. In the middle of the final wartime conference, held in Potsdam, Germany, he learned that the British electorate had turned him and his Conservative Party out of office. After his defeat, his wife Clementine told him, "It may well be a blessing in disguise." Churchill replied, "At the moment it seems quite effectively disguised."

Return to Office
In the late 1940s, Churchill continued to speak out on the great issues--the Cold War, the atomic bomb, and European unity--always stressing the importance of a "special relationship" between the British Empire and the United States. Then, in October 1951, the Conservative Party won the general election, and he returned as Prime Minister. During his second premiership Churchill worked hard to strengthen Anglo-American relations, retain British global influence, and, above all, initiate a summit meeting with Stalin's successors in the Kremlin.

Retirement
Churchill finally retired from public life in April 1955, at the age of eighty. Although he no longer played an active role in politics, Churchill retained his seat in the British Parliament until 1964. His final years were devoted to writing, painting, travel, and reaping the rewards earned by a lifetime of accomplishment.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 21 Jul 2008 10:58

Malayappan wrote:About time lest BR would not have been staying ahead of the curve!

I refer to Paul’s prescient observation - over the last say 1200 years, only in the last 300 or so years we have not had a major invasion from North West! Starting with Ranjit Singh and then the British, the buffers held. Indic Civilization had a break to recoup and regenerate. (The Paki actions in 1948, 1964, 1971, 1999, though detestable were after all nowhere in the scale of Ghazni, Ghor, Abdaeli or Nadir Shah)

Good writeup. This 300 years is what the British took control of India as part of their strategy to contain Russian expansion from 1700 towards Central asia and East Asia. They siphoned off more than $1T in wealth from India during this period to keep India week. Rapid fall of Indian std of living and large scale deaths due to famines upto 40M created misery in India not seen in centuries during this period. The recovery is only in the last 60 years of this 300 year period.

RayC · Post by **RayC** » 21 Jul 2008 11:20

On the issue of the elite being the impediment to take over POK and NA, I would say that ground realities indicates it is not feasible.

The terrain, the time slot given for a war by international powers that be, the nuclear threat are the obstacles to such a scheme.

Just as an example - how long did it take to take over the areas occupied by Paksitan in Kargil? It is not that the nation or the Army was not eager to ''throw the Pakistanis out'', it was just that the terrain made operations intensely difficult to accomplish in a jiffy. Now, given the same type of terrain all the way, just calculate how long it will take and while Pakistan could not counter attack in Kargil, would they just sit pretty as they see their area being taken over? Add that factor. How long will that take to take over POK and NA?

One has to be realistic.

Further, these areas are very under developed. If artillery and logistics cannot keep pace with the attack because of a lack of roads, then how will one take over NA and POK?

Ideal would be to encourage sub nationalism in Paksitan and to will crumble on its own.

To paraphrase Sun Tsu, the acme of skills it to make the enemy capitulate without a fight!!

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 21 Jul 2008 13:28

Which is what the Chinese are trying to do with us right now,weaken opur will to counter the "creeping" Chinese expansion and territorial claims of our territory.They have seized upon the period of the weakest ever PM in Indian history to accelerate their mischief.

p_saggu · Post by **p_saggu** » 21 Jul 2008 22:23

Yes. Our military build up was pakistan centric all along. We can whup paki a$$ no problem. This bracketing with pakistan all these years extended the thought myopia towards the western direction. I thought only we aam junta didn't think of the chinese as the enemy no 1 all these years. Turns out the government and the armed forces were myopic too.

But tell me, if I remember correctly, IRS satellites were instructed to keep tabs on the missile build up in tibet in the 90s Didn't they see 20kms from our borders and see the infrastructure build up? I'm sure it was seen and I think the armed forces have been preparing accordingly. Me thinks the government knows a lot more than it is letting on

Govind · Post by **Govind** » 22 Jul 2008 13:31

Not sure if this is the right thread, but is it possible that chinese belligerence on the border is to scare us enough to sign the 123 deal and yet at the same time use its agents in india to drum up opposition so that the GOI believes firmly that 123 deal is indeed good. Maybe chinese interests are coinciding here with that of america's in this area.

Also...what is the connection between all the sedition movements after independence and why did they not exist prior to it. Why did regional chauvinistic and rationalist movements originate in Madras and not lets say blre, hyd or trivandrum and then subject the south with EJ assault. Why did naxalbari, chicom movements come out of calcutta and not patna? These cities are anglo creations and there must be a link. would be grateful if anyone directs me.

Tibet existed as buffer as along as the raj was there. Once gone and to turn the power of asia on to itself, I believe that China was allowed to takeover tibet and India prevented from giving help. also in 1962, chinese withdrew from NEFA but not Aksai Chin. This is probabaly to cut off any access to central asia. Its like China playing to a script drafted by anglos. The great game saw failures on the anglo side too. The did loose wars in afghanistan and were lured into it by russia and when the time came, anglos returned the favour in 1979

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 22 Jul 2008 20:02

When India moved inot Goa, the West thought that India was getting serious about increasing the stability of India by gettng rid of last vestiges of colonial power. The take over of Goa did leave a searing mark on the West and its not given much importance by Indian commentators.

Jaspreet · Post by **Jaspreet** » 22 Jul 2008 20:11

Not sure if this is the right thread, but is it possible that chinese belligerence on the border is to scare us enough to sign the 123 deal and yet at the same time use its agents in india to drum up opposition so that the GOI believes firmly that 123 deal is indeed good.

No offence, but this assumes that Indian officers all the way from PM down are stupid, don't know how to separate wheat from chaff, don't have enough intelligence input or don't act upon it. I would say that if what you say is indeed what happened then it deserved to happen.

Virupaksha · Post by **Virupaksha** » 22 Jul 2008 20:33

I was wondering, if we are looking at the whole picture. We are fixated on the west borders, but India had buffers on the east side too. It was India which stopped the advance of Japan on the east side. In the WWII, Japan reached the borders of India. At that time, China was not a threat. Now china is.

What were the threat equations on the east side then and now?

Rishirishi · Post by **Rishirishi** » 22 Jul 2008 20:39

Acharya wrote:
Malayappan wrote:About time lest BR would not have been staying ahead of the curve!

I refer to Paul’s prescient observation - over the last say 1200 years, only in the last 300 or so years we have not had a major invasion from North West! Starting with Ranjit Singh and then the British, the buffers held. Indic Civilization had a break to recoup and regenerate. (The Paki actions in 1948, 1964, 1971, 1999, though detestable were after all nowhere in the scale of Ghazni, Ghor, Abdaeli or Nadir Shah)
Good writeup. This 300 years is what the British took control of India as part of their strategy to contain Russian expansion from 1700 towards Central asia and East Asia. They siphoned off more than $1T in wealth from India during this period to keep India week. Rapid fall of Indian std of living and large scale deaths due to famines upto 40M created misery in India not seen in centuries during this period. The recovery is only in the last 60 years of this 300 year period.

To be fair, they also dismatled the Mongule tyrany and brought contemprary government administration. They left behind English, which helped India learn from the world.
Me thinks the real blunder was done by Gandhi/Nehru after Indipendance. First blunder was implementing a quasi secular thinking, and the second blunder was on the economic front. The half century from 1947 ti 1997; is when India could lost the great opportunity.

surinder · Post by **surinder** » 22 Jul 2008 21:11

It is amazing that so many Indians still think that it was the British who rid us of Mughal empire, they did not. Sikhs & Marathas had alread destroyed the Mughal empire. In 1760's or so, Marathas had occupied Delhi, later in 1780's approximately Sikhs had defeated the titular Mughal king and extracted reparations. There were no Mughal-British wars: The defining wars of British in India were with the Marathas and the Sikhs.

Regarding english, it merely a language. We could have learnt it ourselves. Chinese, Japanese etc. all speak english and all are doing better than we are. Besides, India is a linguistically advanced country. For us to learn other languages is a natural talent. We do not need to thank the British for that. A typical Indian kid can easily slip between multiple languages. A typical Indian adult speaks and writes at least 3 or 4 languages. We are the home of the most advanced language in the world (Sanskrit), the best script in the world (Devnagairi). It is shameful for us to thank the British for teaching the English, when we are quite capable of learning that and every other language in the world.

(You did not mention the other "gifts" of the British: Democracy & Railways .... my favorite acronym: English gave us DER --- Democracy, English, Railways).

munna · Post by **munna** » 23 Jul 2008 00:54

Excellent post Surinderji, the fact that later Mughals actively sought backing of Maratha and Sikh rulers to settle their court intrigues is well known and has even been validated by our progressive historians (phew). Mughals were no authority or power to reckon with for quite a while before British came over. If not for the disunited confederacies that Sikh Misls/Sardars and Maratha clans were British would not have overwhelmed India completely. So the myth of Islam losing power to TFT Britishers is really a canard spread by Bakis to please their own H&D and to propagate the myth of TFTA superiority and SDRE inferiority.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 Jul 2008 01:10

surinder wrote:It is amazing that so many Indians still think that it was the British who rid us of Mughal empire, they did not. Sikhs & Marathas had alread destroyed the Mughal empire. In 1760's or so, Marathas had occupied Delhi, later in 1780's approximately Sikhs had defeated the titular Mughal king and extracted reparations. There were no Mughal-British wars: The defining wars of British in India were with the Marathas and the Sikhs.

It usaully takes more time to remove the effects of the colonization of the intellectual mind. The Indian education taken over by the internationalists after independence has perpetuated this myth. Especially when they say "to be fair the British have to be given credit" Now even in BR after many years this has not gone out of their system.Several books are given as reference to read in BR but it still takes a long time.

Regarding english, it merely a language. We could have learnt it ourselves. Chinese, Japanese etc. all speak english and all are doing better than we are. Besides, India is a linguistically advanced country. For us to learn other languages is a natural talent. We do not need to thank the British for that. A typical Indian kid can easily slip between multiple languages. A typical Indian adult speaks and writes at least 3 or 4 languages. We are the home of the most advanced language in the world (Sanskrit), the best script in the world (Devnagairi). It is shameful for us to thank the British for teaching the English, when we are quite capable of learning that and every other language in the world.

(You did not mention the other "gifts" of the British: Democracy & Railways .... my favorite acronym: English gave us DER --- Democracy, English, Railways).

This is the best write up for this myth of English being the best language. I was talking to an American in a library few years ago. I told him I was researching what would have happened if French had defeated English in 1750s and what would be the effect on colonized countries and the world. He was straight and frank and he told me that I would be speaking in French right now. That is the impact of colonizing a large population in the world and having large world trading system like the British for 300 years. The colonized people have taken this language to be their own.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 23 Jul 2008 01:27

A, No matter never give up talking to people for one learns a lot without seeking to do so. People might call it CT but thats how you know. BTW, atleast you can say that you know a deal fixer in person while others can only give hearsay!

BTW you were right on the vote.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 23 Jul 2008 02:44

So Churchill really presided and managed the decline of the British Empire and ensured smooth handover. It must have been painful for the old bulldog who knew the bark was getting long in the tooth. In his books on WWII he says that Morgenthau the US Secy of Treasury who came up with Lend-Lease ensured that the GB paid for the supplies with assets in NY and after they ran out he proposed the bases for arms deal.

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 23 Jul 2008 03:09

The game between two imperial powers; Tsarist Russia in the north and British in the south, was fought across desolate terrain from the Caucasus, over the
passes of Pamir and Karakoram, in the blazing Kerman and Helmand deserts, and through the old caravan towns of old Silk Road – in so doing, both powers were
scrambling to control access to the riches of Indian and the East. In the beginning, the frontiers of Russia and British India lay 2,000 miles apart; by the end, it had
shrunk to twenty miles at some points in Afghanistan.

No prizes for guessing as to where the 20 mile gap was/is.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 23 Jul 2008 09:49

is it between POK and Afghanistan?

Acharya wrote:
Paul wrote:The french have considerable interests in the Great Game as well...but they do not have the finesse/knowledge of the shopkeepers or the muscle power of Uncle.

They stand to lose more than the shopkeepers should Asia's share of the cake grow bigger.
This was understood after the defeat of the french in 7 year war between English and the French in 1763.
[quote]
The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) involved all of the major European powers of the period, causing 900,000 to 1,400,000 deaths.[1] It enveloped both European and colonial theatres from 1756 to 1763, incorporating the Pomeranian War and the French and Indian War which was fought from 1754 to 1763. Prussia, Electorate Brunswick-Lüneburg, and United Kingdom of Great Britain (including British colonies in North America, the British East India Company, and Ireland) were pitted against Austria, France (including the North American colony of New France and the French East India Company), the Russian Empire, Sweden, and Saxony. Portugal (on the side of Great Britain) and Spain (on the side of France) were later drawn into the conflict, and a force from the neutral Netherlands was attacked in India
The war ended France's position as a major colonial power in the Americas (where it lost most of its possessions on the mainland of North America, in addition to some West Indian islands) and its position as the leading power in Europe,[2] until the time of the French Revolution. Great Britain, meanwhile, emerged as the dominant colonial power in the world. The French Navy was crippled, which meant that only an ambitious rebuilding program in combination with the Spanish fleet would see it again threaten the Royal Navy's command of the sea.[3] On the other side of the world, the British East India Company acquired the strongest position within India, which was to become the "jewel in the imperial crown". The war was described by Winston Churchill as the first "world war",[4] as it was the first conflict in human history to be fought around the globe, although most of the combatants were either European nations or their overseas colonies. As a partially Anglo-French conflict involving developing empires, the war was one of the most significant phases of the 18th century Second Hundred Years' War.[5]
.

[/quote]

So when did British naval dominance end? Was it the Washington Treaty to limit battle ships size in 1920s?

hanumadu · Post by **hanumadu** » 23 Jul 2008 10:25

Acharya wrote:
surinder wrote:It is amazing that so many Indians still think that it was the British who rid us of Mughal empire, they did not. Sikhs & Marathas had alread destroyed the Mughal empire. In 1760's or so, Marathas had occupied Delhi, later in 1780's approximately Sikhs had defeated the titular Mughal king and extracted reparations. There were no Mughal-British wars: The defining wars of British in India were with the Marathas and the Sikhs.
It usaully takes more time to remove the effects of the colonization of the intellectual mind. The Indian education taken over by the internationalists after independence has perpetuated this myth. Especially when they say "to be fair the British have to be given credit" Now even in BR after many years this has not gone out of their system.Several books are given as reference to read in BR but it still takes a long time.

Regarding english, it merely a language. We could have learnt it ourselves. Chinese, Japanese etc. all speak english and all are doing better than we are. Besides, India is a linguistically advanced country. For us to learn other languages is a natural talent. We do not need to thank the British for that. A typical Indian kid can easily slip between multiple languages. A typical Indian adult speaks and writes at least 3 or 4 languages. We are the home of the most advanced language in the world (Sanskrit), the best script in the world (Devnagairi). It is shameful for us to thank the British for teaching the English, when we are quite capable of learning that and every other language in the world.

(You did not mention the other "gifts" of the British: Democracy & Railways .... my favorite acronym: English gave us DER --- Democracy, English, Railways).
This is the best write up for this myth of English being the best language. I was talking to an American in a library few years ago. I told him I was researching what would have happened if French had defeated English in 1750s and what would be the effect on colonized countries and the world. He was straight and frank and he told me that I would be speaking in French right now. That is the impact of colonizing a large population in the world and having large world trading system like the British for 300 years. The colonized people have taken this language to be their own.

And there are many non English speaking powers. Russia was and still is. Japan is doing fine. France, Germany and a whole lot of European countries which do not speak english are developed countries. There is no reason to believe why we would not have developed like Japan did if were not occupied.

--hanumadu

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 Jul 2008 10:30

So when did British naval dominance end? Was it the Washington Treaty to limit battle ships size in 1920s?

http://www.questia.com/library/book/ang ... ercher.jsp

[edit] Inter-war years

The Great War was the end of the Royal Navy's superiority, an eclipse acknowledged in the Washington Naval Treaty, when the United States and the United Kingdom were allocated equal tonnage quotas. U.S. policies on immigration and trade fostered a Pacific rivalry with Japan rather than an Atlantic rivalry. During the Great Depression, the United States was preoccupied with its own economic recovery and, espousing an isolationist policy, was only sporadically active in foreign affairs. After the Americans imposed a high Smoot-Hawley tariff in 1930, the United Kingdom, Canada and the Empire built up imperial trade preferences, thereby diverting trade internally and away from the United States. The United Kingdom engaged in appeasement of Nazi Germany whilst pursuing limited rearmament. The Abdication Crisis, while absorbing popular interest in both countries, did not become a foreign relations issue, with Mrs. Simpson seen as being rejected as unsuitable for religious reasons rather than as an American. Tensions over the Irish question declined with the independence of Éire, and with the successful ambassadorship of Joseph P. Kennedy in the late 1930s.[7]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington ... Conference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Naval_Treaty

The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, limited the naval armaments of its five signatories: the United States of America, the British Empire, the Empire of Japan, the French Third Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy. The treaty was agreed at the Washington Naval Conference, which was held in Washington, D.C. from November 1921 to February 1922, and was signed by representatives of the treaty nations on 6 February 1922.

The U.S. Senate ratified the treaty on 29 March 1922; President Warren G. Harding signed it on 9 June 1923; the ratifications were deposited with the U.S. federal government on 17 August 1923, and were proclaimed on 21 August 1923.

The terms of the treaty were modified by the London Naval Treaty of 1930 and the Second London Naval Treaty of 1936. By the time of the latter, Japan had declared it would no longer abide by the terms of the treaty and Italy was secretly ignoring it. Germany was never affected by the Washington or London treaties; its naval construction was controlled under the Treaty of Versailles, the peace treaty that ended World War I.

Background

In the aftermath of World War I the British Empire had the world's largest and most powerful navy, followed closely by the United States and more distantly by Japan. All three embarked upon large programs of new capital ships (battleships and battlecruisers). In 1920, the United States had declared an aim to produce a navy "second to none", and had already laid down keels for five battleships and four battlecruisers. Japan was at the start of an 8:8 program (eight battleships and eight battlecruisers). In early 1921 the British finalized the design and ordered four very large battlecruisers (G3 battlecruiser) with plans for four matching battleships (N3 battleship) to follow. This burst of capital ship construction kindled fears of a new naval arms race, similar to the Anglo-German Dreadnought race leading up to World War I.

At the time, the United States' economic power was considerably greater than its potential rivals'. Its Gross Domestic Product was approximately three times larger than the United Kingdom's (note that here the terms United Kingdom and British Empire are not synonymous) and six times larger than Japan's. While the United States had the wherewithal to outbuild the other maritime powers, rising isolationism meant that domestic political support for such an ambitious program was lacking. The Japanese and British Empires were linked by the Anglo-Japanese Alliance which included mutual defense. The prospect of a naval limitation treaty offered the American government a chance to appeal to isolationist sentiment at home while offering the Japanese and British governments a more favorable balance of power compared to the United States than they could have achieved on the building ways.
Terms
Tonnage limitations
Country Capital ships Aircraft carriers
United Kingdom 525,000 tons
(533,000 tonnes) 135,000 tons
(137,000 tonnes)
United States 525,000 tons
(533,000 tonnes) 135,000 tons
(137,000 tonnes)
Japan 315,000 tons
(320,000 tonnes) 81,000 tons
(81,000 tonnes)
France 175,000 tons
(178,000 tonnes) 60,000 tons
(61,000 tonnes)
Italy 175,000 tons
(178,000 tonnes) 60,000 tons
(61,000 tonnes)

After specifying some exceptions for ships in current use and under construction, the treaty limited the total capital ship tonnage of each of the signatories to the values tabulated at right. In addition, no single ship could exceed 35,000 tons (35,560 t),[1] and no ship could carry a gun in excess of 16 inches. (406 mm).

The "standard tonnage" was defined in the treaty to exclude fuel (and boiler water) because Britain argued that their global activities demanded higher fuel loads than other nations and they should not be penalized.[2]

Aircraft carriers were addressed specifically by the treaty. In addition to total tonnage limits, rules regarding maximum vessel size were imposed. Only two carriers per nation could exceed 27,000 tons (27,400 t), and those two were limited to 33,000 tons (33,500 t) each - this exception was in fact made to allow the reuse as carriers of certain battlecruisers being built, and gave birth to the USS Lexington and the Akagi. The number of large guns carried by an aircraft carrier was sharply limited—it was not legal to put a small aircraft on a battleship and call it an aircraft carrier.

As to fortifications and naval bases, the United States, the British Empire, and Japan agreed to maintain the status quo at the time of the signing. No new fortifications or naval bases could be established, and existing bases and defenses could not be improved in the territories and possessions specified. In general, the specified areas allowed construction on the main coasts of the countries, but not on smaller island territories. For example, the United States could build on Hawaii and the Alaskan mainland, but not on the Aleutian Islands. The various navies of the British Empire — considered under the treaty as one entity — were treated similarly and the facilities of the Royal Australian Navy (which had to give up the battlecruiser HMAS Australia) and the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy could be built up by their respective governments, but not the base of Hong Kong. Japan could build on the home islands, but not Formosa.

Treaty members were allowed to replace or build ships within the terms of the Treaty but any build or replacement had to be directly communicated to the other Treaty signatories.

On 29 December 1934, the Japanese government gave formal notice that it intended to terminate the treaty. Its provisions remained in force until the end of 1936, and it was not renewed.

‘The Great Game’
Book Review: A Century of War – Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order by William Engdahl
Reviewed by William Bowles • 31 December 2004

http://www.williambowles.info/ini/ini-0295.html
This rivalry between Britain and US over oil and control is the reason for the changes in the alliance from 1920s.

By 1912 oil was discovered in what is now Iraq and in the area that the Berlin-Baghdad railway would pass close to and it was proposed that a link be built that would connect the railway to the oil-producing area “making Germany independent in its petroleum requirements” (p. 28). Unfortunately, WWI intervened.

In 1913 the British government (again secretly) purchased a majority shareholding in the Anglo-Persian Oil company (now called British Petroleum) and from this point on “oil was at the core of British strategic interest” (p. 28). Engdahl makes it clear that if Britain could deny its competitors access to oil it could assure its continued pre-eminence as a world power and was even prepared to risk world war and toward this end created a secret military alliance with France and Russia that ensured that should Germany invade either Russia or France would inevitably involve Britain.

One cannot underestimate the Machiavellian nature of British dealings with its ‘allies’ as well as its enemies, dealings echoed a century later by the US. Take for example, the way the Brits manipulated France and grabbed Egypt, confronting each other in the unlikely location of Fashoda on the Nile, a mosquito-infested place with virtually no significance except for its location roughly midway between Egypt and the Indian Ocean. France had a plan to unify Saharan Africa from the West to the East and again, it collided head-on with British interests and as Engdahl puts it “Britain was stealing Egypt from under the eyes of France” first by feigning to ‘protect’ French interests in Egypt and second by reneging on yet another ‘agreement’.

By the end of the war, with Germany broken and no longer competition for Britain, the scene is set for what was to become on the one hand, the ascendancy of the ‘American century’ and the cementing of the Anglo-American alliance, an alliance based on two interlinked players, banking and oil. But as events subsequently proved, the alliance was also riven with competition over control of oil with the battle between Royal Dutch Shell/British Petroleum and Rockefeller’s Standard Oil virtually global in scope. Engdahl makes the point that for a period Britain owned or had exclusive concessions to oil in

…the United States, Russia, Mexico, the Dutch East Indies, Rumania, Egypt, Venezuela, Trinidad, India, Ceylon, the Malay States, North and South China, Siam, the Straits Settlements, and the Philippines. (quoting Sir Edward Mackay Edgar in 1919, p. 64).

However, rivalry between the US and Britain was to take centre stage in the struggle over the control of oil resources. The British ruling class, the masters of subterfuge and double-dealing, were able until WWII to outwit the US over Middle East’s oil and even challenged the US over oil resources in the Caribbean and South America, a struggle they eventually lost. Their student was learning to outwit the teacher.

The core of the book reveals the pivotal role played by the Wall Street/London financial axis that determined how the world of the 20th century developed, whether it was the competition between rival capitalist powers or the control of the vital resources needed to power the entire process. So for example, whenever it looked like there might some kind of challenge posed to the Anglo-American alliance such as that of Germany in the 1920s or Italy in the 1970s, ‘convenient’ assassinations of key players would occur, or ‘exposés’ that scuppered deals that would have endangered USUK hegemony.

Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the masters of the ‘Great Game’ as the rule of British Empire was so named, was dictated by oil and even though the by the post-WWII period, it was the de facto American Empire calling the shots, the alliance formed between the two remained solid, dictated by the seven great oil cartels and a handful of international banking corporations that between them were to control events including the inevitable slide into yet another war, again determined by oil, without which modern industrial capitalism was nothing.

U.S. and British cooperation in jointly controlling the world's oil sector was not forged easily in the 1920s, as the U.S. had to break the Anglo-Japanese alliance and achieve naval parity with England in order to win greater ownership rights in Mexico, the Dutch East Indies and the Middle East. As a result of Anglo-American coordination, Japan was colluded against and ultimately economically coerced into attacking the U.S. when it best suited U.S. interests. Since the end of WWII, Anglo-American hegemony in oil has been only marginally challenged by supplying states, who have yet to develop autonomous production and distribution systems. This paper will investigate whether the post-Cold War period is any different than the 1930s by asking if China's rising demand for oil autonomy is being met with cooperative overtures by the Anglo-American dominated oil companies. This inquiry leads to analyses of Chinese-Iraqi cooperation in the mid-1990s, Russian-Japanese-U.S. cooperation in Sakhalin island oil and gas development and Caspian Sea deals that have recently excluded the Chinese from participating. Final assessment of whether the U.S. is using its hegemonic position to shape private oil company developments to the detriment of China's autonomy will inform the debate between liberals, marxists and realists regarding the purpose of economic statecraft and the role of private companies amidst contending great powers.

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/kenanderson/ ... age19.html

It was because of the Americans that the British had given up the Japanese alliance and their hope was that the Americans would support them in the Far East. Their hope was never properly fulfilled. The Americans were deeply interested in trade with China and they had an almost sentimental paternalistic attitude towards the country. They also had an instinctive distaste for British imperialism. But although there was a dispute in 1929, about the number of naval cruisers which Britain, the United States and Japan should be allowed to build, British policy in the Far East was to follow the American lead.
As an official in the Far Eastern section of the British war Office remarked: “Instead of standing shoulder to shoulder with the United States as equals, our policy was to stand behind her like a well-trained dog.” The main concerns of the Empire, as it moved towards its end in the Far East, were with China, Japan and the United States. But there was one area of the Empire where there was some light relief - the tiny state of Sarawak, in Borneo. It had a population of half a million and an area of 48,000 square miles.

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/kenanderson/ ... page8.html
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-fr ... ref=slogin
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-fr ... 946195D6CF

Anglo-American Relations in the Twentieth Century: The Politics and ...
By Alan P. Dobson
Published 1995
Routledge
Great Britain
208 pages
ISBN:041511943X

Since the beginning of this century, Britain and the United States have succeeded in co-operating in every major crises from the First World War to the Gulf War. And while no other superpowers in history have managed to avoid hostility, it would be misleading to assume that there have not been difficult times. Anglo-American Relations in the Twentieth Centuryinvestigates the relationship between Britain and the United States in detail. It explores the defense, economic and political policies of the two countries since the turn of the century. Alan P. Dobson's detailed research undermines the common assumptions of US hegemony and the demise of the Special Relationship. His analysis leads him to conclude that this is the most important bilateral relationship in history. His book will be invaluable to all those interested in the history and politics of the two countries.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 Jul 2008 10:36

Churchill in India

India

Posted to Bangalore, India, in 1896, he ignored local conditions. His duties were done well before noon; apart from polo he did not socialize with his peers, who considered the slender, short, highly ambitious young man to be pushy, bumptious and not a proper gentleman.[4] Churchill became an intellectual, as he immersed himself in the classics, devouring the works of Adam Smith, Gibbon, Macaulay, Hallam, Lecky, and Darwin. He carefully studied the parliamentary debates of the 1870s to 1890s, adding to them his own imaginary speeches. He never learned Latin or Greek so he fashioned a prose style modeled on the two finest writers among English historians, Gibbon and Macaulay. A book on the evolution of civilization that ridiculed Christianity[5] led to his loss of religious faith; he believed in evolution and the inevitability of progress.

Between 1897 and 1900, with the aid of his mother's lobbying in London, Churchill fought in three imperial wars while doubling as a war correspondent and writing three books. In 1897 he joined three brigades in fighting a Pathan tribe. His lively account of the skirmishes proved he could write for the popular press; he received £5 per column from the Daily Telegraph and soon became the highest paid war correspondent in the world.
Image:WinstonChurchillRiverWar.jpg
The River War, one of Churchill's first books

In late 1899 Churchill went to South Africa as a war correspondent to cover the Second Boer War; his salary was a remarkable £250 per month plus expenses. Caught in an ambush Churchill was captured and held in a POW camp in Pretoria; he escaped--an adventure that made him a minor national hero. He rejoined General Redvers Buller's army on its march to relieve Ladysmith and take Pretoria. Churchill was one of the first British troops into Ladysmith and Pretoria. In 1900, he published two books on the Boer war, London to Ladysmith via Pretoria[6] and Ian Hamilton's March[7]

Churchill's mother used her connections with the prince of Wales to get the her son assigned to the force commanded by Lord Kitchener for the reconquest of the Sudan. Churchill arrived just in time to join the cavalry charge at the battle of Omdurman (2 September 1898), in which his regiment galloped by accident into a ravine crammed with armed men. Churchill, who shot and killed at least three of the enemy, was cool, courageous and lucky.[8] The Morning Post ran his stories, and the public snatched up his two-volume The River War: An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan (1899)[9]. It displayed a remarkably sympathetic history of the Sudanese revolt against Egyptian rule. A speaking tour of Britain, the U.S. and Canada in 1900 netted £10,000, proving the funding he needed for a political-literary career.[10]

mayurav · Post by **mayurav** » 24 Jul 2008 08:50

The game might shift to the Arctic Circle..

90 Billion Barrels of Oil and 1,670 Trillion Cubic Feet of Natural Gas Assessed in the Arctic
Released: 7/23/2008 1:00:00 PM

http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=1980

These resources account for about 22 percent of the undiscovered, technically recoverable resources in the world. The Arctic accounts for about 13 percent of the undiscovered oil, 30 percent of the undiscovered natural gas, and 20 percent of the undiscovered natural gas liquids in the world. About 84 percent of the estimated resources are expected to occur offshore.

India needs to press northwards.. the vast natural resources of Central Asia, Siberia and now the Arctic are necessary for a population our size.

vsudhir · Post by **vsudhir** » 25 Jul 2008 00:47

Turkey as the theatre for WWIII

Chan Akya in Asia times. like him or not, he does seem to have a very different and incisive (nonwestern) perspective.

Turkey has been sold to the Saudis at a bargain price for Riyadh's assistance to the George W Bush administration in pushing down the price of oil ahead of the United States presidential elections this year. The path chosen is the same as that used to turn Pakistan into a breeding ground for terrorists, with an accelerated timetable in keeping with a preset script. Around the corner, a civilizational war beckons.

How pakistan was sold on the cheap
...
India had just completed its first nuclear test in 1975, even as the Middle Eastern embargo on exporting oil to the West had caused a stunning descent into recession for many developed countries. It was perhaps at this stage that an ideological bargain was struck between the US and Saudi Arabia that paved the way for the removal of Bhutto from power. For his part, Bhutto believed that it was the US that wanted him dead for Pakistan's avowed intention to possess a nuclear device. He wrote of an alleged warning from US statesman Henry Kissinger ("make a horrible example of you") as the precursor to his incarceration [2].

Socialism as always failed to deliver as a substitute for nationalism, thus paving the way for a takeover by religion as the main guiding force of Pakistan. The wily General Zia ul-Haq, who staged a coup against Bhutto in 1977 and declared himself president, in due course set about re-establishing the authority of the military and Pakistan's elite businessmen. Keeping the restive public from embracing the next demagogue though would prove to be easier said than done, and this is where the embrace of Islam worked to the military's advantage.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and continued losses in the Kashmir "freedom struggle" in the backdrop of a giant sucking sound emanating from the economy all meant that the availability of cannon fodder to fight America's battles had suddenly increased exponentially. This is what the Saudi-sponsored religious schools and rich mosques helped to propagate in Pakistan. Unable to pay for any education in the face of its collapsing economy and escalating military expenditure, Pakistan in effect outsourced the training of its youth to the Saudis, who in turn turned to the Wahhabi establishment. The corrupt military were perfectly happy as long as they remained in power.

From there on, Pakistan's descent into a tragicomedy only accelerated. Split between the conflicting and contradictory forces of capitalism and socialism, military rule and democratic charades in the backdrop of an indifferent economy, people took whatever path presented the greatest opportunities in their particular existence. This is from where the steady supply of militants willing to commit suicide for the Wahhabi cause came.

Read it all.

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 25 Jul 2008 01:46

Ramana and Acharya: In light of the IUCNA pending approval, will this help India avert Talikota?

vsudhir · Post by **vsudhir** » 25 Jul 2008 01:51

Paul wrote:Ramana and Acharya: In light of the IUCNA pending approval, will this help India avert Talikota?

Pray, what is India's coming talikota this time?

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Jul 2008 02:01

Paul wrote:Ramana and Acharya: In light of the IUCNA pending approval, will this help India avert Talikota?

We have to look in the time frame 2015 and after 2025.
But the international system is breaking down. Read the history between 1920-1939 to get an understanding how things can deteriorate.
But international trade for India needs more stable period and it may not be available.