Bharat Rakshak

The Challenge of China

D. Ramana



The end of Cold War and followed by the collapse of Soviet Union have transformed the geo-politics globally. Consequently, ideological confrontation has been reduced to a competition between states. While the prospect of nuclear confrontation in Europe has significantly diminished, there remains the problem of reforming of Asian socialism, limited as it may be to China, Vietnam and North Korea. Recent initiatives by the United States to draw North Korea into the world community are encouraging and should be continued. However the moves seem to be driven by need for reducing instability in the Pacific Rim due to continuation of intransigence of the North Koreans. The impact of North Korean behavior in other regions due to propensity to proliferate WMD technology should be taken into account. They have been a source of missile proliferation to rogue states in the Middle East and South Asia (Pakistan). The profile of these transfers notwithstanding, North Korea was and remains a surrogate of People’s Republic of China, and it the latter that requires a closer examination.

The Chinese Challenge

In order to understand the challenge that China represents, one needs to understand the challenge that the Soviet Union, another totalitarian state, once posed. The superpower label used to describe the Soviet Union was misleading, in that Soviet Union was chiefly an ideologically driven military and political power. Despite its prodigious output during World War II and after, the Soviet Union was by no means an economic power. Its inability to successfully transition from a war economy to a peacetime consumer economy ultimately proved to be its undoing. The West, led by United States, formulated the ‘Containment’ policy in order to contain the spread of Soviet power with its system of alliances. However one has to realize that the Soviet Union had already reached its limits of its power soon after end of WWII. Its expansion in Eastern Europe was due to the quest for buffer territory from Germany and later Western Europe. Its forays out of its ‘near abroad’ were limited and reciprocal. The Afghan war stretched its resources and sapped its morale. The economic collapse that followed the intervention led to its implosion and collapse as the ‘other superpower’.

China in contrast is both a rising economic and political power. Its military though modernizing is limited to strategic weapons and does not have any real capability to influence any major event in the near term. Unlike Soviet Union, which was implementing a Western ideology, China's political thought is rooted in nationalism. It has been beating back invaders for over 3000 years. Few nations can boast of its continuity in history and a track record of survival. It has absorbed many invasions and has survived each of them. Its interlude with Communism should be seen in that light as another invasion – an invasion of ideas.

China’s evolution today represents the vision of two individuals- Mao Ze Dung and Deng Xiao Peng. The Mao’s contributions are many, but key among them is his role as nation builder. In particular, he unified China under communist rule, obtained nuclear weapons, and consolidated China’s place in the world. It took the Soviet Union seventy years to realize the folly of its economic policies. China, on the other hand, realized this in about thirty years and Deng launched the four modernizations to transform it. Significant among them is the absence of any devolution of political power. In fact soon after the modernization program was launched, the regime suffered a jolt in the form of political dissent form of the Democracy Movement and led to the Tienannmen Square massacres. This event shook the very core of the regime and hardened its attitudes towards political dissent. The West hopes that by constructive engagement it can bring about gradual changes to the Chinese polity. The hope is that the government will transition from totalitarianism to authoritarianism to eventually democracy. The adoption of pragmatic policies by Deng Xiao Peng, and end of Cold War show that it is making the transition to authoritarian state. In all possibility this could be the most that will happen. Engagement with the West is bringing about tremendous pressure for political change from the newly rich. However, the regime in Beijing wants to keep all political freedoms in control while it leapfrogs from ox-carts to a modern economy without giving up anything on the political side. It fears democratization could derail the process of modernization and undermine the authority of the Communist Party. Consequently, economic liberalization has not been accompanied by political liberalization.


The challenge of Taiwan to the Chinese political system

Taiwan’s democratic transformation throws up a major ideological challenge to the mainland’s political system. Many mainlanders would question the authoritarian nature of their state if the Taiwan experiment succeeds. The mainland is tackling the challenge in two ways- by treating Taiwan as a renegade province it questions the legitimacy of that political system which could undermine it- this is accompanied by keeping up the military pressure and numerous threats. The second way is that of proposing ‘one country two systems’ type of government. Both these paths appear to be aimed at buying time while it grows stronger. As can be seen the fight is internal and will get resolved with the march of time. However it is in the interest of the world community that Taiwan exists as an example of contrast to the people of China.

China and the World

China is a member of many of the power bodies of the world. Its pretense at being a responsible international player is not matched by its actions on the ground. Despite being a member of the UN Security Council its participation in peacekeeping missions are few and that too in non-combatant roles. Despite being a member of many international treaties it has proliferated weapons of mass destruction in its own strategic interest and has thus spread suffering.

In order to understand its policy of proliferation, one must understand that this constituted practicing war by other means. Realizing that direct war can be costly, China has found the asymmetric weapon of proliferation to tie down its challengers- declared and potential. Its nurturing the North Korean regime to tie down South Korea and principally Japan has backfired. The latter is drawn more closely into security arrangements with the US than during the Cold War. And possibly that could be a goal of the Chinese- a Japan tied up in a relationship with the US is better than an autonomous Japan. And North Korean belligerent moves have prompted the neighbors into participating in US theater missile defenses, which in turn degrade China’s posture. Its proliferation to Pakistan has prompted India to unveil its nuclear capability and it is a matter of time for the Indian posture to build up sufficiently to dissuade China. It is contributing to the instability in the Middle East by proliferation and hopes to weaken the US based alliances in the region. One has to see how this turns out in the future.

Taking a long view of China’s history, the nearby regions have suffered whenever China had a weak center. From the time of the Mongol invasions to the colonial era, there has been negative fallout in the region whenever China had weak regimes. However strong centers have also resulted in a spillover of hegemonic tendencies prompting a former Thai minister to say, "The best thing China can do is stay together and stay at home!" What is desirable is a benign son of heaven in Beijing for peace and prosperity in Asia and now in a globalized world. However till that happens, one has to be on guard.

Threat to India and responses

The post Cold War was hoped to give rise to multiple poles. China sees for itself a bipolar role globally and a unipolar role regionally. It is in this aspect that its moves to check India’s rise to power should be seen. Most Indian observers state that the loss of Tibet as a buffer has brought about problems in the Indo- Sino relationship. However it is not understood that the occupation of Tibet was an essential element of the Chinese worldview for gaining domination in Asia. It is the desire to dominate and play a zero sum game that drives the dissonance in the relationship and than mere border disputes. Here again it has taken advantage of the confusion among the Indian elite in recognizing the challenge it presents to them. Here is an instance of Sun Tzu’s precepts in practice to confuse the challenger in order to achieve strategic surprise.

Ever since Sumdrong Chu, China seems to have decided that direct confrontation is not a feasible option and has propped up Pakistan as a surrogate. The proliferation of delivery systems started in late 1988 along with the declarations of peace. It is notable that these transfers took place after the Cold War was waning and appears to be part of a long-term strategy to tie up India locally. The hoped for response did not materialize as India took steps to protect its strategic autonomy.

The potential areas where China could cause direct problems for India are mainly two – proliferation of WMD to Pakistan and support for insurgencies in the North- East region. It can cause indirect problems through dragging its feet on the unsettled border and veto India’s membership in world councils. Proliferation of weapons and delivery systems to Pakistan increases instability and causes resources diverted to defense related systems. The umbilical can only be cut by forceful posture with Agni-III deployment and a visible the C3I system put in place. The nuclear tests in the late nineties and the deployment of the deterrent will contribute in mitigating the effects of the proliferation. Active dialog and steps have to be taken to raise the costs to the proliferators to dissuade them. Pursuing peace efforts in Kashmir with the local militants will go a long way to diffuse the situation and remove the rationale for Pakistan to offer ‘moral ‘ support to the militancy.

The trouble in North East and an unsettled border lead to increase or sustained military/paramilitary expenditure, which reduces economic growth. These could be accompanied by encouraging intransigence in neighbors- Myanmar etc. Here again a mixture of economic and political measures should tackle the internal troubles. Integrating the North East into the mainstream of the Indian economy is an urgent and required step and should be pursued regardless. As regards the neighbors, expansion of BMIST, and a new regional economic integration are needed to ensure ASEAN type of system. This should go a long way in discouraging the propensity to support such behavior in neighbors.

Conclusion

China's threat is mainly an indirect one through proliferation to Pakistan and support of insurgencies in the North East. It could also harass India by prolonging the border settlement and oppose entry into world bodies. The response has to be increased economic growth and regional integration to reduce propensity for conflict accompanied by a watchful eye on defense related systems. As China eventually resolves for itself the role that it wants to play in the world, India has to be on its guard. China’s attempts to constrain India are doomed to fail for India has historically never taken a back seat to China. The realization should be that it is not that China directly threatens India but rather it reduces and diminishes India’s power.

I watched languidly when suddenly something struck me. In the eventually 200 interviews that I did for my book, I had been struck by how obsessed the BJP and the RSS were with the Third Battle of Panipat. But that history lesson had made no impact on me until that day spent on YouTube. I had a eureka moment. I saw, in a flash, the connection between the physical exercise in the shakha and the intellectual beliefs of Hindu nationalism. I grasped why the BJP wins.

The Third Battle of Panipat was fought in 1761 between the Maratha confederacy and the Afghan warlord Ahmad Shah Abdali. With the Mughal Empire in decline, the Marathas were the ascendant national power. Had they won at Panipat—86 kilometres north of Delhi—the Marathas could have ended the British presence in India before it ballooned into Empire. The results of the Third Battle of Panipat would shape modern India like no other.

Though Ahmad Shah Abdali was from another country, he was able to garner the support of local Muslim rulers. On the other side, the Marathas failed to entice the Rajputs, Jats and Sikhs to fight with them. The other problem was that the Marathas lacked internal unity. Rather than ruled solely by the Peshwas, they were a confederacy of chieftains: the Holkars from Indore, Gaekwads of Baroda, Bhonsles of Satara and the Scindias from Gwalior. This meant that, while the royal guard of the Peshwas supplied 11,000 cavalrymen for the battle, the Scindias alone contributed 10,000 men on horses. The 100,000 Marathas at Panipat on the morning of January 14th, 1761 were not a single army; they were a mishmash of militias.

As I remembered the history lesson of Panipat when I saw those videos, what hit me was not its ‘truth’. Much of this narrative would not meet a historian’s standards, and it reduces a convoluted event to simple religious competition. But what hit me was how the RSS had internalised its own lessons from the disunity at Panipat. The physical part of the RSS training was not just exercise, it was exercise done together. What was being taught was teamwork—whether it was marching synchronously, standing on top of each other in a pyramid, or playing ‘games’ that are associated more with corporate outings. What both the history lesson and the physical exercise highlighted was the need for coordination among Hindus. It is this belief in teamwork, what I call ‘Hindu Fevicol’ in my book, that is central to Hindu nationalism.

Vajpayee’s fear of division was not just moored in history; it was anchored in the rifts that were tearing apart the Congress right then. He made a trip to England in the late 1980s to attend an academic conference in Oxfordshire. There he met the Princeton political scientist Atul Kohli who had written at length about the de-institutionalisation of the Congress. “I have read your books,” Vajpayee told him during their evening walks. “That is what we are worried about. That’s why organisation matters so much for us.”

But Vajpayee (UP Brahmin), Advani (Amil Sindhi), Narendra Modi (Gujarati Ghanchi) and Amit Shah (Gujarati Baniya) come from diverse castes and parts of India. And the social base of their party has evolved from only upper castes to Tribals, OBCs and even Dalits. In the 2019 General Election, for example, Modi won more Tribal, Dalit and middle-caste votes than his opponents.

The person responsible for the defeat of Prithiviraj, the Hindu King at Delhi, by Mohammed Ghori was his own caste relation Jaichand. The person who hounded Rana Pratap from forest to forest was none other than his own caste-man Raja Mansingh. Shivaji too was opposed by men of his own caste. Even in the last-ditch battle between the Hindus and the British at Poona in 1818, it was a fellow caste-man of the Peshwas, Natu by name, who lowered the Hindu flag and hoisted the British flag.’

Kanika was one of the Counsellors in King Dhritarashtra’s court. He was a part of Dhritarashtra’s inner circle. Kanika was said to be well versed in the science of politics and an expert in counsels.

Dhritarashtra asked Kanika to advice about how to deal with Pandavas whose valour and fame was on a rise with every passing day. Here are some nuggets of wisdom from that episode which came to be known as Kanika Neeti from then on:



A King should ceaselessly watch over the faults of their foes and take advantage of them. If the king is always ready to strike, everybody fears him
He should so conduct himself such that, his foe may not detect any weak side in him
He should always conceal, like the tortoise concealing its body, his means and ends, and he should always keep back his own weakness from, the sight of others.
Having begun a particular act, a king should ever accomplish the task thoroughly.
If the foe is one of great prowess, the king should always watch for the hour of his disaster and then kill him without any scruples
Kings should sometimes feign blindness and deafness
A king should not show his foe, any mercy, even if he seeks his protection
A king must destroy his foes’ roots and branches. Then he should destroy their allies and partisans
A king should bear his foe upon his shoulders till the time comes when he can throw him down, breaking him into pieces like an earthen pot thrown down with violence upon a stony surface
The foe must never be let off even though he addresses you most piteously
By the arts of conciliation, by the expenditure of money, by creating disunion amongst his allies, or by the employment of force should the foe be slain!
If your son, friend, brother, father, or even the spiritual preceptor, anyone becomes your foe, you should, if desirous of prosperity, slay him without scruples
If two parties are equal and success is uncertain, then he that acts with diligence grow in prosperity
Even If you are angry, show yourself as if you are not so, speaking even then with a smile on your lips. Never reprove anyone with indications of anger. Speak soft words before you smite and even while you are smiting
You should never permit beggars and thieves to dwell in your kingdom as they transmit critical information
An army should always be at your command, well trained and equipped, only sharp teeth can give a fatal bite
If those in whom you confide prove to be your foes, you are certain to be annihilated. Choose your confidants wisely.
After testing their faithfulness you should employ spies in your own kingdom and in the kingdoms of others. Your spies in foreign kingdoms should be apt deceivers and persons in the garb of ascetics
Your spies should be placed in gardens, places of amusement, temples and other holy places, drinking halls and streets
Your spies should also be placed with the minister, the chief priest, the heir-presumptive, the commander-in-chief, the gate-keepers of the court, persons in the inner apartments, the jailor, the chief surveyor, the head of the treasury, the general executant of orders, the chief of the town police, the chief architect, the chief justice, the president of the council, the chief of the punitive department, the commander of the fort, the chief of the arsenal and the chief of the frontier guards.
You should pursue virtue, wealth and pleasure in limits
One who is desirous of prosperity should with diligence seek allies and means, and carefully conduct his wars
A prudent king should ever act in such a way that friends and foes may never know his motive before the commencement of his acts
A person desirous of prosperity should always exert with prudence, adopting his measures to time and place
If the foe is insignificant, he should not yet be despised, for he may soon grow like a Palmyra tree extending its roots or like a spark of fire in the deep woods that may soon burst into an extensive conflagration

The precondition of peace is bravery, the precondition of bravery is strength, and the precondition of strength is pre-preparation, and everything else comes after that, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said yesterday (22 February).

He followed it up with a line from a poem by Ramdhari Singh Dinkar, which loosely translates as, “The world respects patience, forgiveness and mercy only when it is backed by visible power”.

Modi was addressing a webinar on the effective implementation of provision in the 2021-22 Budget in defence sector, and the messaging was clear — India can’t be a great power unless it overcomes its import dependence in the defence sector.

From Thirukkural, Jaishankar goes on to Mahabharatha which holds lessons to deal with the complexities of the uncertain world.

The dilemmas of statecraft permeate the story, among them taking risks, placing trust, and making sacrifices.

It gives the most vivid distillation of Indian thoughts on statecraft with a graphic account of real-life situations and their inherent choices.

The courage required to implement policy is, perhaps, its most famous section — the Bhagavad Gita in which Krishna provides strategic guidance, diplomatic energy and tactical wisdom in navigating challenges.

Focussing on the importance of the sense of duty and the sanctity of obligations, it is also a description of human frailties.

Jaishankar emphasises that brand differentiation is especially important for a rising and aspirational power.

He calls for introduction of our own diplomatic terms into the discourse as it is intrinsic to the process of India’s international emergence.

He sums up the foreign policy strategy in one sentence, “India should engage the US, manage China, cultivate Europe, reassure Russia, bring back Japan into play, draw neighbours in, extend the neighbourhood and expand traditional constituencies of support”.

The India Way includes among other things:

Pursuit of multiple approaches and multiple alliances and partnership with global interests

Keep the many balls up in the air and reconcile commitments to multiple partners with skill. There will be convergence with many but congruence with none. In this world of all against all, India’s goal should be to move closer towards the strategic sweet spot. India must reach out in as many directions as possible and maximise its gains in the new world matrix of many sides, many players and many games.

Respond with engagement than by distancing; deal with contesting parties at the same time with optimal results; engage a broader set of partners more creatively; forge convergences and manage divergences taking advantage of the opening of a world of multiple choices at different levels; assess the disruptions underway and the trends that accelerate, mitigate or counter new directions.

Make many friends, few foes, great goodwill and more influence with a stronger competitive spirit and a sharper strategic sense.

Constant advancement of goals and interests, using all pathways that the world has to offer. And since that often means plunging into the unknown, it requires both judgement and courage.

Take on global responsibilities and act as a constructive player

Move over from the Delhi Dogmas of passivity and pessimism stuck in the past history and dilemmas of defensive and argumentative mindset.

With his experience as Ambassador to China, he says that India should learn from the rise of China which should sharpen India’s competitive instincts. China has risen as a formidable global power drawing on its own cultural attributes. The China Way has elevated dissimulation to the highest level of statecraft. This is exemplified by popular aphorisms such as, ‘Deceiving the heavens to cross the ocean’ or ‘making a sound in the East to then strike West’ or ‘decking trees with false blossoms’. Unlike in India, there is neither guilt nor doubt in dissembling in the Chinese mind. In fact, it is glorified as an art.

Some of his prescriptions for specific foreign policy issues:

China: In dealing with China’s might, India should use “Nimzo-Indian Defence”, moving from the past strategic posture similar to the “Indian Defence” in chess. The border and the future of ties cannot be separated. India should not give free pass to China to make use of the open Indian market while keeping its own market protected. One of the ways to deal with China is try to create multipolar Asia with a stable balance.

The US: The playbook of dealing with US needs rewriting in view of the new priorities and problems of US. India has to maintain a narrative of its value in the US and customise it for the President of the day.

Pakistan: There is no one-time fix. A mix of fortitude, creativity and perseverance with prompt Uri and Balakot responses to counter mischiefs.

Neighbours: Generosity and firmness.

Non-alignment: it suited India in the days when the country was weaker and was caught in the cold war between the two potent super powers. There was comfort in group mentality and non-involvement. But multi-alignment is the new India Way. It is more energetic and participative.

Jaishankar ends the book with a chapter on the Chinese-origin coronavirus which has made the world even more uncertain than the disruption caused by China’s rise in the world. This opens up opportunities for India whose value to the world will probably increase even further after the virus. He concludes the book with an optimistic and diplomatic message, “Let us take it as a sign of the times that the world has discovered the virtue of Namaste, the India Way of greeting with folded hands”.

The India Way is a timely message to the new India which is becoming stronger and is seeking its due place in the world. The book is not a mere academic analysis or erudite exercise. It is the call of a serving External Affairs Minister with experience of four decades of distinguished career as a diplomat. He has a unique opportunity to practice what he has preached in his book. He is lucky as a policy maker to have the confidence of a politician as prime minister who shares his vision for India’s future in the world.

Jaishankar argues that as India rises in the world order, it should not only visualise its interests with greater clarity but also communicate them effectively. His bold, dispassionate, candid and clear articulation fits the description of diplomacy by Thiruvalluvar in his poem: “Diplomacy is articulation according to the need of the time with profound knowledge and without fear”.

The reviewer is a retired diplomat

ramana wrote:In my humble opinion India Way is a distillation of this very thread for it builds on many of the gems gleaned from antiquity.

After 1996, a great admirer of Kao in the Indian Foreign Service persuaded him to leave for future generations his first person account of some aspects of his association with the world of intelligence. In the months before his death, he spent a few hours every day transferring his memory into a tape-recorder. The tapes were transcribed and he personally corrected the transcripts. The tapes and the transcripts have been left by him in the custody of a prestigious non-governmental organisation of New Delhi to which he was close with the wish that they should be made public only some years after his death. It is hoped these are preserved carefully. It ought to be a precious part of the history of independent India.
-- The Kaoboys of R&AW: Down Memory Lane by B Raman

How India balanced all sides in the Russia-West conflict
Refusing to condemn Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, India has been managing a multi-aligned foreign policy, to its benefit

India’s struggle to find a pathway that avoids criticizing Russia despite its blatant aggression in Ukraine highlights a larger underlying reality: the unyielding importance accorded by New Delhi to protecting India’s interests in its international decisionmaking. India’s enduring goal remains ascending to the international stage as a great power but without committing to any entangling alliances along the way. This ascent is best assured under conditions of peace in the presence of multiple, competing power centers that can be leveraged by India to derive benefits for itself amid their mutual rivalries. Given this aim, neither unipolarity nor any bipolarity that involves a strong Indian antagonism toward one of the poles serves India’s interests: the former creates few incentives for the dominant power to assist India’s rise, and while the latter may induce one great power, such as the United States, to support India in its competition with a close rival such as China (which is also opposed to India), New Delhi fears that Washington’s asking price may be too high and may involve forms of entrapment that India seeks to avoid to the extent possible. To be sure, India will partner with the United States in balancing China because Beijing currently represents the most significant threat to Indian interests, but New Delhi neither seeks an alliance with Washington toward that end nor is comfortable with the idea of the United States being its sole partner in realizing that objective.

Consequently, India prefers a multipolar international order that would allow it to maneuver between several and diverse poles, exploiting their differences depending on the issue areas, to secure gains for itself while avoiding permanent alignments with any. To the degree that the current Ukraine crisis fosters a deeper Sino-Russian partnership, it eliminates Russia as an independent pole and increases China’s influence at just the time when Sino-Indian relations are terribly uneasy. The importance of preventing Russia from treating China as its only reliable partner has thus driven New Delhi to implicitly support Moscow in the hope that this gambit will eventually pay off in ways that benefit India. Not even the benefits of the evolving U.S.-Indian partnership suffice to induce India to abandon Russia given its judgments about Moscow’s significance for New Delhi’s interests, especially at a time when many Indian strategic elites disturbingly believe that the Russian invasion of Ukraine, however distasteful, is an understandable response to the West’s “predatory geopolitics.”

None of this implies that India does not value the liberal international order. It does—but largely instrumentally, given its substantive ambivalence about many components of that regime. Even if the fact that the liberal order is fundamentally a Western creation is overlooked because of India’s own historical experience of colonialism, many aspects of liberal internationalism still provoke disquiet in India. The cardinal principle of liberalism that the individual enjoys inalienable rights sits uneasily with India’s postcolonial obsession with the sacrosanct character of state sovereignty, and while India values democracy for itself, it has invariably been skittish about democracy promotion and, more recently, has tended to exalt representative democracy over its liberal incarnation. Similarly, the idea that a peaceful international order is advanced by free and open trade is often at odds with New Delhi’s desire to protect its economy from the diverse forms of physical and virtual penetration that could both limit its state power and undermine the prosperity of some segments of its population. And even on the necessity of preserving access in the maritime commons—a critical strategic problem in the Indo-Pacific—the formal Indian position on the freedom of navigation is uncomfortably similar to that of China’s, with the only exception being that Beijing’s assertiveness has pushed New Delhi into functional solidarity with Washington because of the threat that China currently poses to India.

Not surprisingly, then, one distinguished U.S. scholar of India, Sumit Ganguly, has concluded that India’s support for some aspects of the liberal international order remains “limited and tentative.” There is no doubt that the liberal international order provides the best framework for India’s ascendency to great power status, but only if that order is populated by a multiplicity of capable power centers that India can partner with depending on the circumstances and issues. Accordingly, India does not have an innate commitment to the liberal international order as such, since that order is dominated by more powerful states that have at times constrained its ambitions in different ways. Consequently, if the larger goal of preserving the order comes into conflict with particular Indian interests—as exemplified by the need to placate Russia despite its egregious violations of one of the order’s core rules, namely, prohibiting the use of force for territorial conquest—New Delhi will pursue its own equities because the private gains to India are judged to be more valuable than both the private losses stemming from such a choice and the larger toll exacted on the liberal order as a whole.

Given this reality, the inconsistency in India’s attitude vis-à-vis Russia in comparison to China does not bother New Delhi one whit: because Beijing is a direct adversary, India will confront China resolutely, in partnership with other countries when necessary, while invoking the importance of the rules-based international order to legitimize its choices. Yet the imperatives of protecting this very order will be disregarded if they collide with New Delhi’s more immediate concerns. In doing so, Indian policymakers do not concede—as U.S. leaders are wont to argue—that the struggle over the preservation of the liberal order, as it is manifested in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, pits democracies and autocracies on opposite sides. While the current standoff may reflect such differences on the broadest canvas, India’s own position specifically refutes this view. In fact, New Delhi views the division between democracies and autocracies over Ukraine as largely accidental: it judges the dividing lines to be drawn on the basis of national interests rather than on the character of the regimes in question. To that degree, India behaves—and has always behaved without embarrassment—as political realists imagine states to behave in competitive international politics.

Will the n-deal finally go ahead?
March 16, 2008
Help India!

By K. Subrahmanyam, IANS

The Indian government has completed the negotiation of the India-specific Safeguards Agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and it is now ready to be submitted to the Board of Governors for approval. External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee is to meet the Left parties Monday to apprise them about the draft safeguards pact.

Mukherjee is also due to travel to the US to participate in Indo-US Joint Commission meeting, which is co-chaired by him along with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He is expected to hand over a copy of the draft safeguards agreement to her.

The Left had earlier indicated that it would not agree to the government going ahead with the safeguards agreement.

The Left allowed the government to proceed with the negotiations on the safeguards agreement with the IAEA to save the government’s face on the eve of the Gujarat elections.

Their present pronouncements appear to indicate that they do not consider it necessary to come to the aid of the government. In fact allowing the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government to successfully negotiate the IAEA safeguards and then veto its submission to the Board of Governors will amount to subjecting the government to far greater humiliation than the domestic loss of face it would have suffered if it had not gone to the IAEA at all.

The safeguards agreement with the IAEA is essential if India were to restrict its civil nuclear cooperation with Russia and France and not import any civil reactor or obtain any civil nuclear technology from the US.

Therefore it is not logical to connect at this stage the conclusion of the IAEA safeguards agreement with either the Hyde Act or US imperialism or any other extraneous issue. Objection to the conclusion of the safeguards agreement would mean that the Left is opposed to India obtaining reactors from Russia and France. If that is so, then they could have said so and need not have brought in the Hyde Act and US imperialism as excuses.

The strategy of the Left is now becoming clearer. Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) general secretary Prakash Karat addressing the Jan Sangarsh Rally March 13 in Lucknow called for the formation of a third alternative and appealed to secular and democratic forces to assist the party towards the fulfilment of the objective.

Therefore, the CPI-M is interested in denigrating the Congress and ensuring that the UPA does not come to power again.

The best way of denigrating the Congress is to threaten to withdraw support from the government on a major international deal after having allowed the government to commit itself deeply in it.

If the government pulls out of the deal to continue in office for a few more months then it will be humiliated internationally and such humiliation and the veto of the Left for the deal will come in handy for electoral propaganda to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The Left’s calculation appeared to be that if both the UPA and the NDA fail to mobilise adequate strength to form the next government, that will open the gate for the Left to sail towards power as part of the Third Front. In the 1930s in Europe, Communist parties under Stalin’s directions trained all their guns on Social Democratic parties. That did not lead to the victory of the Left but in the victory of the rightist forces.

Let us look at the interests of the UPA. The ruling coalition has announced Rs.600 billion debt relief for the farmers, given tax reductions to the middle class and is expected to release the Pay Commission report which will raise the emoluments of employees first in the central government to be followed by similar raises in the pay packets of state and local bodies
employees.

If this largesse is not immediately cashed in terms of votes within the next few months, memory will fade and the ruling party will not be able to reap the benefit.

Secondly, it is clear that the industrial production of the first quarter of this year is nearly half of what it was last year. There is general expectation of US economy getting into a recession with consequences for all other economies of the world. The dollar is falling in value and the oil price is rising. Food prices are also rising all over the world. These developments indicate that the economic outlook in the next year is likely to be less favourable than it is now.

Therefore, the UPA government will have to assess whether it will be to its advantage to humiliate itself by allowing the Left to veto the further processing of the IAEA safeguards and that way get a few more months in office and then face the elections when the economic conditions are likely to be less favourable.

On the other hand, going ahead with the IAEA safeguards and the NSG waiver will demonstrate to the potential third front participants that the Left cannot call the shots and does not wield that kind of clout. Either the Left has to blink and go along with the UPA or withdraw its support and precipitate an election. All indications are that the Left is not likely to do well if the elections are to take place in the near future.

The Left has been against the deal, which will liberate India from the technology denial regime of the last three and half decades presumably because a high growth rate and an accelerated reduction in poverty are against the interests of the party.

Yet they allowed the government to go ahead with the separation plan of nuclear facilities, the enactment of Hyde legislation, the 123 agreement and the initiation of the IAEA safeguards agreement.

There is no reason why they should not allow the government to go ahead with the conclusion of IAEA safeguards agreement even while protesting all the time about US imperialism. Unfortunately most of our media and political class have not focused adequate attention on the strategy of the Left and the probability of its success.

Once the budget is passed, the moment of truth will arrive. In any case since the Left is not going to be part of any alliance and therefore will campaign on their own in the next election both against the NDA and the UPA.

Since they want a third front they will not be supporting the UPA till the Lok Sabha’s term expires. They will have to part ways a little earlier to campaign against the UPA. If that is assessed as six months, then even if UPA surrenders to the Left, their parting of ways is likely to be in October. Elections this year will be more advantageous to the UPA and in all
likelihood the UPA will go ahead with the nuclear deal.

Some people raise the question of the propriety of the 123 agreement being signed by a minority government. Out of 192 national governments in the world, how many are in a position to talk about a government being supported by majority. Not in two-thirds of the cases since they are not democracies – as happens to be the case with China.

In any case this parliament is about to finish four years and our MPs will need to check whether they still represent the majority public opinion or out of touch with it. If a future government finds any particular agreement entered into as unsatisfactory it will be its sovereign right to reopen it.

(K. Subrahmanyam is India’s pre-eminent analyst on strategic and international affairs. He can be contacted at ksubrahmanyam51@gmail.com)

I have already noted that secularisation is inimical and hostile to religion. What does it mean in our case? It means that the secularised Islam that colonised us was hostile to Islam as a religion.

Among other things, it means that it is hostile to Islamic doctrines as well. How? In very simple religious terms: secularised Islam is blasphemy (within the framework of Islam as a religion). What does this mean?

According to Islam, Allah is the Lord and the Ruler of the Universe. As the word ‘Islam’ indicates, it demands an attitude of absolute submission and total surrender to Allah and his will.

It requires a complete obedience to him; human beings must follow his rules and laws unconditionally. In its phase of conversion into a religion, Islam tried to inculcate this reverential attitude and habit towards Allah among the converted.

In its secularising moment, secularised Islam reversed this thought and attitude entirely and gave it a blasphemous form: among Indians, it inculcated and induced such a habit and attitude, not towards Allah, but towards human rulers. Secularised Islam put human Muslim rulers of India above Prophet Mohammed and placed the same rulers as Allah’s equals.

This is how secularised Islam expressed its antithetical attitude to Islam as a religion and expressed its hostility towards Islam.

I have claimed that colonialism transforms the experience of people and prevents the colonial subjects from accessing it in any form other than how the coloniser defines it.

This inability to access our experience is what I call ‘colonial consciousness’. This is what secularised Islam also did: it introduced slavishness and servitude into Indian psychology.

Centuries of this colonisation made a slavish submission to civil authorities the hallmark and an important trait of Indian cultural psychology. In very simple terms: Indians became slavish, submissive, and servile to civil (ie, human) authorities.

The British noticed this psychological trait of Indians and said that Indians were ‘effeminate’ and had ‘no backbone’.

Though this is what all the Bengalis were in their eyes (after all, Bengal was one of first important ports of call to the British), very soon, all Indians joined the group of a servile people.

That is why they went in search of ‘military’ castes in their attempts to recruit Indians to the British army.

They found such ‘castes’ among the Sikhs and the Marathas (both of whom fought the Muslim rulers over long periods) and the Gurkhas (who were least subject to secularised Islamic rule). They found it among some ‘sub-castes’ as well: the Coorgis in Karnataka belonged to the ‘martial type’. The rest of India was too effeminate to be of much use except to slavishly obey the British authorities and lick their boots.

How Indian child-rearing practices and the socialisation processes in India succumbed to cultivating servility in Indian children because of Islamic colonisation has not been understood yet. But that is not relevant to this story now.

When the British ‘gave’ India her independence, the Indian servility did not disappear. It continues to be produced and reproduced even today.

If we look at how Indians relate to civil authorities, we see this servitude everywhere. The bureaucracy, the police, the ministers receive obsequiousness without demanding it.

They punish those who dare ‘defy’ them. This is not merely how ordinary Indians relate to political and administrative authorities: this is institutionalised within these organisations too.

How a peon responds to the boss; how a junior secretary bows down to the deputy secretary; how the chief secretary deals with principal secretaries; how the chief minister treats the principal and chief secretaries, how the circle inspector treats the local constable and is treated in turn by the assistant commissioner of police.

This servitude, often called sycophancy, goes all the way to the very top. This is how Indians are seen abroad: whether by the Chinese or in the West. Obsequious, eager to please and servile.

This cultural psychology expresses our colonial consciousness as induced by Islamic colonisation.

https://swarajyamag.com/politics/prime- ... ised-islam

Episode 5: Kautilya: India’s Forerunner to Machiavelli?

with Professor Kaushik Roy

Beatrice Heuser: Thank you Paul and hello from Hamburg.

Kautilya who lived in India from 375 to 283 BCE, ranks with Sunzi as one of the great early sages who wrote about the relations between polities and thus also about the wars between them. His main oeuvre is the Arthaśhāstra. Somewhat confusingly, he is also referred to as Chanakaya Vishnugupta. But let us stick to Kautilya here. Kautilya was advisor to two successive emperors of the Maurya Empire in India. Indeed, if I understand it correctly, he helped the first of them ascend to the throne. He is thus, not only a theoretician, but also had political influence.

Kaushik Roy is Guru Nanak Chair Professor in the Department of History, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. He is also a Global Fellow at Peace Research Institute in Oslo (PRIO), Norway. He has been attached to this Institute in different capacities for about a decade. At present, he is engaged in PRIO’s ‘Warring with Machines’ project. Previously, he has taught at Visva Bharati University at Santiniketan, West Bengal India and also at Presidents College, Kolkata, India. He obtained his PhD from the Centre for Historical Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He has worked extensively on the wars of pre-modern, early modern and present eras.



He is a prolific author, and his publications include: A Global History of Modern Insurgencies and Counterinsurgencies [Routledge, 2022]: Battle for Malaya: The Indian Army in Defeat, 1941–1942 (Indiana University Press, 2019): Hinduism and the Ethics of Warfare in South Asia: From Antiquity to the Present (Cambridge University Press, 2012), and Brown Warriors of the Raj: on the Recruitment and Command in the Sepoy Army, 1859-1913 (Manohar, 2008).

Dr. Roy, Kautilya suggests that one should cultivate an “enemy’s rear-enemy”, in other words, make friends with your enemy’s enemy.(1)Kautilya is, therefore, often described as a “Realist”, i.e., somebody taking the most cynical view of international relations. What polities were there on the Indian Subcontinent, and were relations between them really that ruthlessly inimical?

Kaushik Roy: Okay. Now, Kautilya, his name comes from [the Sanskrit word] kutila, which means “the evil one.” So, there is an argument one can make that he is the father of “Realist” philosophy in international relations. I mean if his operating range could be taken as the 3rd Century BCE, then he predates Machiavelli by quite a long time.(2) Kautliya also speaks of the power game, which is well into what is called the power theory of international relations.

Now basically, there are two traditions as regards Kautilya: one argues that Kautilya is a saint who later became a minister and helped Chandaragupta Maurya to found the Maurya Empire. And when Megasthenes(3) visited India, he had retired from Pataliputra, the capital of the Maurya Empire. Kautilya’s theory had a lot of influence on the succeeding empires in the history of India, the Gupta empire and later on to modern times, the BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] government [which has been ruling since 2014] also, undertook extensive studies of Kautliya to see how they can be used in modern military affairs and present-day international relations.

On the other hand, there is the other argument that Kautilya is a mythical person, and actually there is a corpus of political thought which evolved gradually in ancient India and given the name of Kautilya. We also know that such a debate also exists about Sunzi, whether he was a historical person or not a historical person.(4)But, the internal evidence of the Arthaśhāstra, Kautilya’s magnum opus (which has 15 chapters of which six are very important) points to the fact that they [the six important chapters] are written at a certain period of time, when the Maurya Empire was founded, in the 3rd Century BCE, and they have the stamp of a single author.

So, we can say that the core of the Arthaśhāstra was prepared by one person, Chanakya or Vishnugupta, whom we call kutila or Kautilya.

In fact, the Panchatantra [exact date is unknown but between the 2nd Century BCE and 5th Century CE], was also influenced by Kautilya. The Panchatantra went from India to the Islamic caliphate through the channel of Muslim invasion, and also influenced Aesop’s Fables of Europe. So, Kautilya was ,as famous, if not more, like Sun Tzu, or Clausewitz(5). But very few in the Western world know about him, because Sanskrit is very difficult, and old Sanskrit is very difficult to decipher and read, and there are many different transcripts of Kautilya.

Beatrice Heuser: You did say you thought he had an influence not only on the Arab world but also on Europe. So, if it was not the manuscripts themselves that were legible, how/when did it reach Europe for the first time?

Kaushik Roy: It reached Europe in the 19th Century. What I am saying is that Kautilya’s work, the Arthaśhāstra, influenced the Panchatantra, which influenced Islamic West Asia. It also influenced what you call Aesop’s Fables. In that indirect way we can trace it, but the trajectory of the history of ideas is very murky. But basically, the Arthaśhāstra, deals with what Kautilya categorises as the modern terminology of the grand strategist. So, the Arthaśhāstra, deals with several layers. One is the grand strategy. Another is military strategy. And third he deals with tactics.

Now about grand strategy, Kautilya says that policy, niti or rashtraniti, (state policy), is an amalgamation of politics, finance, diplomacy, and military. In other words, the military represents force in Hinduism or in Sanskrit, danda, now that comes last. So, first politics, then you have foreign policy, then you have finance, and finally you have the military

At the grand strategic level, Kautilya says, somewhat similar to that of Sunzi, first resort to diplomacy, if necessary, armed diplomacy, deterrence, coercion. Only if all of this fails, then you use force. But Kautilya warns that use of force is anitya, uncertain, is dangerous. It is not certain what that strategic output will be. So, Kautilya advises the vijigishu (the would-be ruler or emperor) that the use of brute force always results in strategic bankruptcy.

Now, in Kautilya’s format, there are three types of war: Conventional war; Unconventional war, that is insurgency, and finally; Limited war. In conventional war, he says that the aim is to smash the enemy, and that is dangerous. Better to fight a limited war, grab some territories, make him subordinate to the hegemonic ruler, and then establish alliances, multiple alliances, with other states to create a hegemonic empire.

Now Kautilya also speaks of unconventional war, to assassinate kings, use poison, use spies. In fact, Kautilya can be called a spy master: single spies, double spies, triple spies, they all are in the arsenal of Kautilya’s Arthaśhāstra for how to conduct unconventional war.

Beatrice Heuser: I found it very interesting just how Kautilya is interested in ruses and espionage, but also in agents of influence. And there seem to be quite a lot of sections when he attributes to women all the roles of subversion and creating quarrels between different leaders by insinuating that one of them was making unchaste proposals to them, et cetera. So apparently he had armies of women spies and agents of influence.(6)

Kaushik Roy: I know Kautilya, like other Brahmans, did not suffer from so-called gender bias. He said men and women could be used in tandem for conducting unconventional warfare. Kautilya says, that there should be spies in the shape of mendicants, religious leaders. There should spies in the form of traders, there should female spies.

There are two types of female spies. One is those who are young and beautiful, who will try to get close to the foreign power’s leadership, and try to extract information from them or try to assassinate them, poison them or force them, encourage them to change alliances. And also killer spies, both male and female. There is another type of spies, who are not merely tactical, but Kautilya said they would deal with strategic and operational issues; they are bhikshus - female mendicants - stationed in particular areas of the foreign territories for quite a long time and try to interact with the people of foreign territories and gather information about the conditions of the foreign countries: their economic conditions; their political conditions; what the people are thinking. And, Kautilya also says that they should be used to spread misinformation and disinformation.

Beatrice Heuser: So really, all the hybrid warfare thinking goes back to Kautilya if not even earlier.

Paul O’Neill: It is interesting to see how we are getting the diplomatic, the information, the military and the economic levers of power in Kautilya's work, even in the 3rd Century BCE.

His tenure covers quite a lot of different kinds of state. He starts off, I think, where India is resisting the armies of Alexander [the Great]. So, there is a resistance element. He then seeks to overthrow the Nanda dynasty. Then build an empire, the Maurya Empire. And then of course there comes the point at which you have the Mauryan Empire and the Seleucid Empire that have to come to an accommodation. How does he change his approach, or his theories about the kind of warfare, the kind of state security apparatus needed to manage those different types of state?

Kaushik Roy: There are two books. One is the book on thoughts (diplomacy). And another book is on conventional warfare. Or you might say that these books are really chapters [of the Arthaśhāstra]. First, I will take the military aspect, and then I will deal with the broader political aspects and the diplomatic aspect.

About the military aspects, Kautilya says first take up the issue of the army. initially the Indians before 500 BCE used to fight only with infantry (paiks), and hastis (elephants). But the Macedonian invasion showed the importance of cavalry. Paurava (or Porus) was defeated at the Battle of Hydaspes by the Companion Cavalry [of Alexander III], and especially the role played by the Central Asian horse-archers who were employed by Alexander, whom he had hired after defeating the satraps of Bactria and Sogdiana. So, Kautilya says that the twofold army - infantry and elephants - should be changed to a fourfold army. And the other two branches would be: one, cavalry, and second, more important, chariots.

Now about cavalry, he emphasizes training. What is more important, Kautilya talks about combined training of even small units. That a composite unit should include some infantry soldiers, some chariots, some elephants and of course some cavalry. The other important element which Kautilya introduces is the strategic role played by forts. Kautilya says if the army is defeated and is withdrawn, then there should be strong forts, not in the interior of the country, but at the borders.

Beatrice Heuser: I think that is very interesting that you are talking about the interior and the exterior of a country. Because one of the things that emerges from Kautilya is how he links internal troubles with external powers. The internal trouble means that your insurgents etc. may have the support of external forces, which gives some support to my theory that you very rarely have insurgencies that are purely domestic: there tends to be this international element to them, very well elaborated by Kautilya.

Kaushik Roy: Exactly. And that brings us back to the issue of hybrid warfare. You know, before the 1980s, from Clausewitz onwards, my understanding is that Western theorists have made a clear-cut compartmentalised division between conventional war and unconventional war, what you call insurgencies and counterinsurgencies. Kautilya says that such a division is non-existent in practice, and that theory should accommodate practice. Kautilya speaks of a grey line, or a continuum, where at one end you have high intensity conventional war, at another end you have politically-motivated assassinations, small cells of assassins and spies operating on enemy territory. If I may use the term of Thomas X. Hammes’s [the concept of] fifth-generation warfare(7) or hybrid warfare. And then, finally, limited conventional war and unconventional war.

So, Kautilya has a model. Kautilya says that it would be wrong for the ministers to think there is a clear war and peace; there is no clear-cut division between high intensity war and low intensity war. There is a continuum, and states follow a dual policy. That means at one level, you have a peace treaty with the neighbouring country, at another level, simultaneously, you are encouraging disaffection and rebellion (bopa) in the enemy country. Thirdly, you are at the same time, giving money and ideological and moral aid to the enemies of your enemy.

Beatrice Heuser: This is why I think people say that he is so Machiavellian his approach. But what is really, really important there is that all you said illustrates the fact that the West has an unduly binary approach to war, or has this very strong binary approach, whereas many other cultures, and Kautilya is an excellent example, Sunzi is an excellent example, do not share that. And this shows in a way how difficult it is for the West to operate in other cultures where this binary approach does not exist.

Kaushik Roy: I think the binary approach is inapplicable in the case of India, or ancient India, and probably to some extent China, because the binary approach to strategic affairs, as you probably know better, came up in Europe because of the Peace of Westphalia,(8)and the small nation states operating within Europe. While in India you have various races, various tribes. You have tribes, you have settled agriculturists, you have pastoral nomads and semi pastoral nomads, you have migratory people. You have a varied ecology in a big country where a uniform administration is not possible, because people are speaking different dialects, also different religions. So, in this multi-ethnic, multi-cultural country, to build up an empire, according to Kautilya, you need a multi-dimensional strategy, which also includes various levels of war making and peace-making.

And because it is such a big country, it is also vulnerable to foreign influence, foreign pressure, both military and economic. So here, Kautilya speaks of his Six-fold Strategy: the Mandala theory.(9) You know the most important thing that he said? That in the international state system, no country can be isolated; you are a family member. And so, he operates what he calls the Mandala policy – a circle of states. He says India is at the core, just as the Chinese might say they are. Then the states which are bordering India, by their natural location, have to be enemies because there will be border conflicts. So, they would be enemies. But those countries which are at the border of the enemy countries, they are our allies. So, we have amitra (enemy) then mitra (ally). Then those enemy’s enemies, who are our friends, they have enemies; so, they might join hands with India’s enemies. So, these circles, from the hub of this wheel go outwards and outwards and outwards [in alternating rings].

Beatrice Heuser: You see this also in Southeast Asia where of course the influence of Sanskrit writing was very important. The Mandala idea is very much one that dominates Southeast Asian politics, practically through the 19th century CE, and it really is most easily imaginable as concentric circles with you at the centre, and then adversaries around you because you have border conflicts with them, and then your enemies’ enemies in another circle around them, are your natural allies. Very interesting.

Paul O’Neill: To what extent was that Mandala idea a [static] simplification? Because when [Kautilya] decides to overthrow the Nanda dynasty, he seeks help from the Himalayan king, and promises half the kingdom that they inherit. So, clearly my enemy's enemy is my friend in that context. But then there is some suggestion that having taken over the Nanda dynasty, then he has the man [the Himalayan king] assassinated. So, is it a gradual expansion, and therefore it changes the nature of the countries bordering yours or the regions or the states bordering yours? And so, as you grow, those who had been your enemies, now become your friends and those who had been your friends, now become your enemies; a much more fluid model than a rather static map-based assessment of where friends and enemies might reside?

Kaushik Roy: Actually there are two aspects or levels. At one level, Kautilya says that the Mandala theory must be used by a small state to gain hegemony within the subcontinent. Once that state establishes an ekarat, an empire, within the subcontinent, then the Mandala theory could be pushed further with the foreign states to create an amity of alliances and to prevent any hostile alliance emerging against India. And then, that stable big state should be used to balance the power equation.

But Kautilya warns the ruler, the vijigishu, that once you have conquered India and established a big empire, meaning from the Kabul/Kandahar line in Afghanistan in the west, to the borders of Yunnan/Burma in the east, from the Himalayas and Karakorum in the north to Cape Comorin in the south. Then, Kautilya says that you have reached the natural limits. Do not try to expand further because of geography. You have the deserts of Persia on one side, arid wastes of Central Asia, and you have oceans bordering in the South and West and East [of India], and further East, you have jungles of Burma. Then, Kautilya says that the stable big empire should make use of Mandala, but with a different perspective. That is to prevent the emergence of any hostile influence or alliance among the bordering, foreign countries.

Let me give one example. In the later days of the Maurya Empire, the Seleucid Empire(10) was breaking up. You have the Indo-Bactrian Empire of Bactria and Sogdiana. You have the Seleucid Empire, along Iran and Iraq. So, the Maurya Empire had enmity with the Indo-Bactrian Kingdom, which was attacking India (Punjab), but had a positive relationship with the Seleucid Empire. So, the Maurya Empire established a diplomatic alliance with the Seleucid empire, which had enmity with the Indo-Bactrian Kingdom as it is established on the two provinces Bactria and Sogdiana, which had become independent of the Seleucid Empire. Before that, when the Seleucids attacked India, then Chandragupta Maurya maintained good relations with [Ptolemic] Egypt, the enemy of the Seleucids. So, this is the Mandala theory implemented in practice.

Beatrice Heuser: Why was he [Kautilya] actually placed so well to pontificate on war? He was not an active soldier of any sorts, and yet he gives us, in very large parts of his work, very detailed, very practical prescriptions, about the conduct of war. This is the same accusation that is normally levelled against Machiavelli, of course, if they say he is not really a soldier, how can he talk about all these things?

And perhaps linked with that, something I will come to in a moment. Did he have, a priestly dimension?

Kaushik Roy: Kautilya was not a soldier. He was from the princely class, intellectual class. He never served in the army. He never commanded the army. But Kautilya speaks about war, and military theories and tactics to be followed. There is one tradition in India (the Upanishads) that speaks of peace. In reaction to that, Kautilya speaks of use of war in statecraft. So, Kautilya is reacting to the idealist philosophy of that time. Buddhist philosophy particularly of that time speaks of peace and disbanding the army. So, Kautilya is also speaking against that. So, within this matrix of ideas, Kautilya is one pole, and the other pole is the Upanishads/Buddhist tradition.

But the important thing is that Kautilya never gives primacy to the army and warfare in his whole gamut of ideas. Kautilya provides us with a list that is very important. The list shows the salaries and the positions of the various officers in the empire. At the top is the Minister for Finance and Foreign Affairs. And the Minister of War comes at the fourth or fifth position. And the General, senapati, his position, economically and culturally and socially, is much, much lower. This goes back to your early query about the role of Brahmanism in Kautilya’s theory of ideas. Idealistically, ancient society has four layers: first come the Brahmans, the intellectual class; then Kshatriyas, rulers or generals; third the Vaishyas (business) class and fourth come the Shudras who are the cultivators [working class]. Kautilya says that this division of society must be maintained. The Kshatriyas, the soldiers and generals, they should always be subordinated to the Brahmans, who were the intellectuals, who were the priestly class, and who provided most of the ministers and civil administrators. And they would be at the top, and the army should be subordinated. Kautilya also says – and here is a modern relevance - that the senapati should not be called to the Royal Council.

Interestingly in present-day India, even now, the chief of the services of army, navy and air force, and also the chairman of the chief of staff committee, they are not formal members of the cabinet committee for political affairs, the highest policy making body. They could only come if the Prime Minister agrees. In fact, they could also not meet the Prime Minister without the President's approval. So, that is quite a strong civil-military relationship: civilian above, the military below. And all these could be traced back to the Kautilyan tradition that the army should be subordinated to the policy-making body and politicians. And the Brahmans should make policy, not the senapatis. Their attention and focus should be on the tactical aspect.

Paul O’Neill: The point about the stratification of society you have just mentioned, Professor, is interesting because I understand that he was also quite an advocate of the idea of societal support. So, he introduced rights or support for pregnant women, for the elderly, for the disabled, for people who were less able to care for themselves.

Was that driven by a desire to see a stable society that might be then less prone to the kind of espionage, the interference, the hybrid warfare attacking his own dynasty? Or was that driven largely by his religious perspective as a Brahman and therefore this sense of some kind of fairness or equity?

Kaushik Roy: Kautilya was speaking of a welfare state, not because he was a liberal humanist, but for instrumental reasons. Kautilya warns the ruler, ‘Don’t over tax the peasants, then there will be a rebellion, bopa, and then the foreign powers would intervene’. And here Kautilya has the historical example of the Nandas. The Nanda Empire collapsed because the rulers overtaxed the peasantry: 50% taxation. Kautilya says that taxation of the gross produce of the land should never exceed 20%. An undertaxed peasantry who is content is better than discontented peasantry. So, Kautilya’s agrarian taxation policy had an influence throughout history, especially among the Hindu kingdoms.

Now, Kautilya also says that it is much more financially ruinous to police the countryside with costly coercive machinery, that results in the militarization of the society. Better, give some carrots to the people lower down. And here Kautilya makes a break with the Brahmanical tradition of Manu and all those other theories. Kautilya says that even the poor who belong to the lowest level, the Shudras, the state should look after them.

It had an influence on Ashoka(11) who built roads, inns, rest houses, places for watering the horses, free food for poor people, in some localities, in pursuit of the policy of keeping the people happy so that there would not be insurgencies within the realm, especially in the countryside.

Beatrice Heuser: You seem to portray him as so utilitarian. But let me just end perhaps with a quotation that could come straight out of a European medieval text on how to prepare yourself for a Just War, suggesting that one should “fast and practice penance before going into battle”, being “desirous of getting into heaven” if somebody lost their lives.(12)We also have another embryonic idea of Just War: Kautilya distinguished between a “just conqueror” - perhaps that's just the translation I saw - “a demon-like conqueror”, or a “greedy conqueror”; advising a weak king to seek the protection of a just conqueror,(13)or, one might say, advising a weak power to seek the protection of a benevolent hegemon. But this whole idea of justice, is that something that is also there in his thinking, and not just a purely utilitarian streak?

Kaushik Roy: Although Kautilya is a “Realist”, there are elements of ethics in it. For example, he divides the whole conduct of war into: dharmayuddha and kutayuddha. Dharma was not at that time used as a word for religion, that came much later, during the medieval times. Dharma means ‘way of life’, conducting a just way of life. In dhamrayuddha only the enemy’s combat army should be destroyed, and especially the women, the children, the fruit trees, the edible crops, they should not be destroyed. In fact, there is a passage in Megasthenes who says he is shocked to see that in India, when the soldiers march, they do not destroy the crops in the field, and they do not disturb the tillers of the land. So, that is the ethical tradition. But Kautilya warns that the strategic situation might change when the state is on the receiving side, and it is not winning the conventional war, the enemy is coming. Then, you have to harass the enemy’s countryside, then you have to destroy the livestock of the people, you have to follow a scorched earth policy.

But Kautilya warns that ends do not always justify the means. There should be a balance. You know, there are like 10 commandments of Mao: no rape; no molestation; no kidnapping; no entry into private houses, etc. They should be strictly followed. It is not for humanitarian, it is not public relations, policy. So, there is an ethical aspect in Kautilyan thinking.

Beatrice Heuser: Fascinating. I think you've given us all a lot more interest in reading the texts. Thank you very much for shedding light on this extraordinarily complex character with this extraordinarily complex thinking, which seemed to have anything from very ethical to mostly utilitarian.

Thank you very much for joining us today, Dr. Kaushik Roy.



1) Kautilya, Arthaśhāstra Book XII, Concerning a Powerful Enemy, Chap. 3.

2) Talking Strategy, Season 2, Episode 6, Arming the Citizens: Machiavelli’s Quest for Virtue, with Professor Maurizio Viroli.

3) Megasthenes (350-290 BCE) was a Greek historian, diplomat and Indian ethnographer, who described Mauryan India in his book Indica, which only now exists in fragments.

4) Talking Strategy, Season 2, Episode 1, Classical Chinese Strategic Thought: Sunzi, with Dr Peter Lorge.

5) Talking Strategy, Season 1, Episode 6, Carl von Clausewitz; the Father of Strategic Studies with Professor Beatrice Heuser.

6)Arthaśhāstra, Book XI, The Conduct of Corporations, Chap. 1.

7) Thomas X. Hammes, The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century, Zenith Press, 2006.

The Peace of Westphalia is the term used for two treaties signed in the Westphalian cities of Osnabrück and Munster in 1648 that brought to an end the Thirty Years War in Europe (1618-1648) between Catholic and Protestant powers and their allies.

9)Arthaśhāstra, Book VII, The End of the Six-fold Policy.

10) The Seleucid Empire was founded by Seleucus I Nicator (358-281BCE), a Macedonian general in Alexander the Great’s Army when the Macedonian Empire ended in the power struggles on Alexander’s death.

11) Also known as Ashoka the Great, who was a ruler of the Maurya Empire during c. 268to 232 BCE.

12)Arthaśhāstra, Book X, Relating to War, Chap. III: „"It is declared in the Vedas that the goal which is reached by sacrificers after performing the final ablutions in sacrifices in which the priests have been duly paid for is the very goal which brave men are destined to attain." About this there are the two verses
‘Beyond those places which Bráhmans, desirous of getting into heaven, attain together with their sacrificial instruments by performing a number of sacrifices, or by practising penance are the places which brave men, losing life in good battles, are destined to attain immediately.
Let not a new vessel filled with water, consecrated and covered over with darbha grass be the acquisition of that man who does not fight in return for the subsistence received by him from his master, and who is therefore destined to go to hell.’
Astrologers and other followers of the king should infuse spirit into his army by pointing out the impregnable nature of the array of his army, his power to associate with gods, and his omnisciency; and they should at the same time frighten the enemy. The day before the battle, the king should fast and lie down on his chariot with weapons. He should also make oblations into the fire pronouncing the mantras of the Atharvaveda, and cause prayers to be offered for the good of the victors as well as of those who attain to heaven by dying in the battle-field. He should also submit his person to Bráhmans.“

13)Arthaśhāstra, Book XII, Concerning a Powerful Enemy, Chap. 1.

The ancient Indian text of Kautilya’s Arthaśāstra comes forth as a valuable non-Western resource for understanding contemporary International Relations (IR). However, Kautilya’s Arthaśāstra largely suffers from the problem of ‘presentism’, whereby present-day assumptions of the dominant theoretical models of Classical Realism and Neorealism are read back into it, thereby disrupting open reflections on Kautilya’s Arthaśāstra which could retrieve its ‘alternative assumptions’ and ‘unconventional traits’. This book attempts to enable Kautilya’s Arthaśāstra to break free from the problem of presentism – it does so by juxtaposing the elements of continuity and change that showed up at different junctures of the life history of both ‘Kautilya’s Arthaśāstra’ and ‘Eurocentric IR’. The overall exploratory venture leads to a Kautilyan non-Western eclectic theory of IR – a theory that moderately assimilates miscellaneous research traditions of Eurocentric IR, and, in addition, delivers a few innovative features that could potentially uplift not only Indian IR, but also Global IR.

RoyG wrote: ↑19 Apr 2023 09:11 The kernel of kautilyan governance is autocracy, division of the ruling classes (true meaning of varna/varna Sankara), pervasive intelligence apparatus is at odds with the liberal democratic tradition. If India wants to grow it has to pick one growth model - autocracy or liberal democracy. Indian strategic thought is still very indecisive.

ramana wrote: ↑24 Aug 2023 20:42 vijayk, THe above post is not germane to this thread. It belongs to the many political threads.

R Charan wrote: ↑26 Sep 2023 07:52 India Working On Joint Military Doctrines To Enhance Synergy Among Forces

India is in the process of formulating joint military doctrines in sync with its efforts to enhance synergy among the three services and other key wings of the defence establishment to effectively deal with future security challenges, officials said on Monday.
https://www.defencenews.in/2023/09/indi ... ng-forces/

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bharathp wrote: ↑30 Nov 2023 06:49 @chetak ji, can you post the timestamps as an image until then? take a screeshot and attach here for ppl like me who want to hear the bits we are interested in?