Claude Arpi, one of the finest observers of strategy, defence and policy affairs shows how deadly the business-pleasure mixture is. Reproduced from the Pioneer in full.
Read and weep. How a man whom a lot of liberals consider the “architect of modern India” allowed the wrong part of his anatomy to interfere in strategic decision-making.
Compromising India
Claude Arpi
This month India will celebrate the 60th anniversary of its independence. A large number of new books, their authors pretending to rewrite the event, are being published - some have already hit bookstores. Though they have not created the hysteria unleashed over Harry Potter’s last adventure, they have generated a lot of ink in the media.
Tags: Commentary, History, Indian Politics, International Politics, Terrorism & PakistanOne of these books brings out the glamorous side of the most tragic event of the 20th century: The division of the sub-continent. In her memoirs entitled India Remembered: A Personal Account of the Mountbattens During the Transfer of Power, Pamela Mountbatten, the daughter of India’s last Viceroy, writes about her mother Edwina’s “deep emotional love” for India’s first Prime Minister. It could be dismissed as another schmaltzy tale written to reap some money, but the book contains serious assertions. She admits that Lord Mountbatten did use Edwina to influence Jawaharlal Nehru on Jammu & Kashmir.
The day I was reading this story (which seems to shock nobody in India), I came across an article in Outlook in which Maj Gen VK Singh, author of India’s External Intelligence: Secrets of Research and Analysis Wing had argued against the Kargil tapes being made public. The officer wanted to prove the relation between the tapes and the Official Secrets Act by taking the case of Brig Ujjal Dasgupta, Director, Computers, RAW who was arrested in July 2006. This officer was accused of having passed sensitive information to Rosanna Minchew, a CIA agent in the US Embassy. VK Singh argued, “Charges against Dasgupta have been framed under Official Secrets Act. As per the Act, if an Indian has any sort of communication with a foreign national, he’s presumed to have passed on information useful to an enemy.”
Though Maj Gen Singh’s comparing the release of Kargil tapes and Brig Dasgupta’s case is flimsy, one could ask: Can the special relations between Nehru and Edwina be seen from this angle? Nobody can deny today that the reference of Jammu & Kashmir to the UN has resulted in three wars for India and a lot of hardship for the people of that State.
Let us look into what happened. At the stroke of the midnight hour on August 14, India woke to freedom. Unfortunately, Maharaja Hari Singh could remember the events of the previous year when Nehru had tried to interfere in the State’s affairs. While most Princes signed the Instrument of Accession of their states to the Dominion of India, Maharaja Hari Singh prevaricated. What would happen to him and his state under Nehru’s rule?
Things came to a head by the end of October 1947 when raiders from North-West Frontier Province entered Jammu & Kashmir, killing, looting, and raping as they surged forward. By October 26, they had reached the outskirts of Srinagar. Maharaja Hari Singh had no choice but to sign the Instrument of Accession.
Nehru had probably not yet realised that a serious blunder had been made in asking Mountbatten to become the first Governor-General of independent India (Mohammed Ali Jinnah had intelligently kept the post for himself in Pakistan). Having a foreigner as the Head of the Dominion, avoided having to choose among Congress leaders!
Mountbatten manipulated the same leaders to become Chairman of a newly-created Defence Council. This was to have grave repercussions on India’s Kashmir policy. Mountbatten, a British officer, was now at the helm of the Indian defence machinery. British Generals still serving in India reported to him.
Early November 1947 saw a strange situation: The formal head of the Indian state (a Britisher) decided to go to Karachi to “negotiate” with Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan a solution to the Jammu & Kashmir issue. He was at the same time a player, an employee and the referee; his employer (London) was clearly batting for Pakistan for ’strategic reasons’. Fortunately nothing came out of those negotiations. However, London’s game was clear by then: India had to be restrained from chasing the raiders out of Jammu & Kashmir.
Events took a turn for the worse at the end of December 1947 when Mountbatten convinced Nehru that India must refer the Jammu & Kashmir issue to the UN. Though a great admirer of the Mountbattens, Nehru was deeply disturbed. He recorded in a note: “Are we to allow Pakistan to continue to train new armies for invasion and to allow its territory to be used as a base for these attacks? The obvious course of action is to strike at these concentrations and lines of communications in Pakistan territory. From a military point of view this would be the most effective step. We have refrained from taking it because of political considerations. We shall have to reconsider this position because a continuation of the present situation is intolerable … We wish to avoid war, but it is merely deluding ourselves to imagine that we are avoiding war so long as the present operations are continuing on either side.”
When he got to know of the note, Mountbatten cunningly decided to act fast. From the start, he had thought that the best way to derail an Indian offensive, which would have finished Pakistan, was to refer the case to the UN where the issue would be quickly buried. Mountbatten was not only a fine soldier, he was also a great manipulator. He knew that within Clement Attlee’s Cabinet, there were enough people like Noel Baker, the Commonwealth Secretary, who would immediately take Pakistan’s side against India.
He then used his ‘influence’ on Nehru to convince him that taking the issue to the UN was the ‘only solution’: The world would immediately condemn Pakistan for supporting and assisting the raiders. On December 20, Nehru reluctantly accepted the idea of a reference to the UN. He thought that while appealing, India could at the same time prepare a contingency plan for attacking the raiders’ sanctuaries in Pakistan.
But the Indian leadership was deeply divided on the reference to the UN. On December 22, Sardar Patel sent his resignation to Nehru (he was later convinced by Gandhi to withdraw it). Under pressure, Nehru sent an ultimatum to Pakistan Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan: The raiders should be stopped immediately, failing which India would consider a counter-attack.
By then Mountbatten was riding high. He spent Christmas day writing a long missive to Nehru, highlighting the danger of a military escalation and plied Attlee with confidential information. It is during those days probably that Edwina managed to make it “appealing to his heart more than his mind”. The events that followed are too well known. India’s case was buried in the bureaucratic corridors of the UN; the raiders were allowed to remain on Indian soil.
What about the Official Secrets Act?
On 08.05.07 Aram says:
Thanks for a very good article.
Till I read it, I had always believed that only mixup of moneys, mixup of relationships were bad.
I see that mixing up of business with pleasure leads to even more dangerous consequences.
If only we had Patel in place of Nehru……
On 08.05.07 sandeep says:
sorry for the Off the topis itema just check out latest issue of TIME mag on india’s 60th year of independnce there in one small section link is here i hope it works http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1649060_1649046_1649032-4,00.html
one gent says this he really says this Still, many South Asian Muslims insist Islam is the one and only force that can bring the subcontinent together and return it to preeminence as a single whole. “We [Muslims] were the legal rulers of India, and in 1857 the British took that away from us,” says Tarik Jan, a gentle-mannered scholar at Islamabad’s Institute of Policy Studies. “In 1947 they should have given that back to the Muslims.” Jan is no militant, but he pines for the golden era of the Mughal period in the 1700s, and has a fervent desire to see India, Pakistan and Bangladesh reunited under Islamic rule.
hahahaha i thougth we are SECULAR INDIAN REPUBLICE it gives two moments of comic relief !!!
On 08.06.07 nkota says:
Sandeep,
Can you please write an article about retards opposing sanjay dutts sentence, Global laming is quickly taking over peoples mind in India
On 08.07.07 Atlantean says:
Yes I read the TIME article Sandeep.
“In 1947 they should have given that back to the Muslims.” Jan is no militant, but he pines for the golden era of the Mughal period in the 1700s, and has a fervent desire to see India, Pakistan and Bangladesh reunited under Islamic rule.
I almost fell out of my chair when I read the words “the golden era of the Mughal period in the 1700s”!
Golden era my ass! Aurangzeb was busy destroying temples and the Sikhs and Marathas were screwing the Mughals at every available opportunity. The 1700s were also an era of patricide and absolute moral degradation in the Mughal dynasty, not exactly a “golden era.”
On 08.08.07 Anonymous says:
while the *chacha* was screwing us internationally his daughter was screwing us nationally.
Check this, old but interesting article
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article567013.ece
On 08.08.07 Shailendra Mathur says:
And there was also the small bit about Soviet Union having offered us a permanent seat in UNSC way back in 1956, and our dear old chacha refusing it, saying that China is a more worthy entrant to UNSC. 50 years hence, we are still pining for that elusive seat in UNSC
On 08.09.07 iznogoud says:
If ladylust at the highest level can cause so much havoc, no wonder we get screwed at every level.
On 08.10.07 Renie says:
Hi, please add your blog to our new directory of Indian Blogs, thanks!
http://www.indiblogger.in
On 08.10.07 socal says:
Yet another one from Hitchens:
http://www.slate.com/id/2171745/
Brutality by the Bay
Why did the Oakland police do so little about Your Black Muslim Bakery’s thuggery?
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This official apathy—amounting to collusion—is undergirded by a culture that cringingly insists on “respect” for any organization, however depraved, that can masquerade as “faith-based.” If I had stood outside that hideous bakery with a sign saying “Black Muslims Are Racists and Fanatics,” I think the cops would have turned up in a flat second and taken me into custody. I might well have been charged with a hate crime. As I have written before and am sure I will write again: This has to stop, and it has to stop right now, before sharia baking comes to a place near you.
On 08.16.07 shadows says:
>> The day I was reading this story (which seems to shock nobody in India),
Of course, we would not be shocked !! Everybody knows Nehru was corrupt and an idiot. Most people abuse him anyway, except the St. Stephens alumni types.
From that link posted by anonymous at 5 ,
As well as keeping her under continuous surveillance, the Centre (KGB headquarters) also surrounded her with handsome, attentive male admirers.
Indira Gandhi inspired by her father, eh ?? I wonder who is wooing Sonia Gandhi now?
On 08.16.07 Palahalli says:
Here is a lucrative and challenging task for the ““Bureau of Opinion Mongering & Judgment Dispensing”.
PEEP AND GATHER FACTS OF THE GOINGS ON IN SONIA’S BEDROOM
Obviously…we have reached “conservative” intellectual heights. Or..have we really? Was it really Priyanka’s baby??? slurrp…”Shadows”…lemme know soon ok??!
On 08.22.07 shadows says:
dear troll comrade palahalli,
Its not me who is saying that.. I quoted the lines from Mitrokhin archives
Go fight with him LOLzz
On 08.22.07 Shailendra Mathur says:
How will peeping into Sonia’s bedroom determine the parenthood of Priyanka’s child? If Priyanka gave birth to the child, she must be the mother. To the best of my knowledge it is the fatherhood that is mostly at doubt in such cases :D.
On 08.22.07 Palahalli says:
Mathurji…those were TWO cases for “Shadows” to investigate.
Sonia’s “philandering” and Priyanka’s adultery.
I sure hope “Shadows” makes good money in his venture.
I really don’t know if he has been contracted by the BJP’s dirty tricks dept…Remember Sanjay Joshi? As a one time insider…I know that there are many Sanjay Joshis residing in the Sangh’s bosom.
There is truly a lot of filth for one who is so inclined
Right “Shadows”?
On 08.23.07 Shailendra Mathur says:
Hehehe. Believe it or not, the Nehru gandhi family is indeed a sleazy one. Just to ponder on one point, what is the source of their income? Since Motilal Nehru, no member of this family has ever worked; and yet they seem to lead lavish lifestyles.
Rajiv Gandhi and Sanjay both went to the UK and flunked their exams. Indira herself studied in Switzerland, Germany and UK at various points of time. Rahul kept alive the family tradition of “academic excellence” by failing in US universities :D. And even now, when no member of their family works for a living they seem to lead incomprehensibly lavish lifestyles. Wonder where all the money comes from?
On 08.23.07 Palahalli says:
Like always…there is the ubiquitous “party purse”
It appears that our “leaders” have enough “followers” who will simply not tolerate any dive towards poverty!
And yes….this is true across all parties and most leaders.
On 08.23.07 Shailendra Mathur says:
And where do you think the party gets its money from? I am sure the Congress dont voluntarily donate thousands of crores for the upkeep of these white elephants :D.
To think of APJ Abdul Kalam, who came into Rashtrapati Bhavan with two suitcases and left after 5 years with two suitcases! He would have made a much better Prime Minister than the spineless worm who currently occupies the chair
On 08.23.07 shadows says:
comrade palahalli,
you ask the questions , you raise stupid doubts about priyanka gandhi’s motherhood
, and you ask me to investigate !!
Do you even know what you post, in your zeal to contradict me, nevermind the original post itself ??
sighhss… i wish i had as much time as you to waste on masturbation.. both intellectual and real
On 08.24.07 Palahalli says:
Mathurji: “And where do you think the party gets its money from? I am sure the Congress dont voluntarily donate thousands of crores for the upkeep of these white elephants.”
- Let us avoid naivete. A “white elephant” is that creature which is a mirage. There…but not really there. The Nehru family is not a “white elephant” for the Congress. This family assures the party it’s power. So, it would be indeed an idiot congressman who does not “donate” to this family.
Now, if we are going to make a discussion of “party purses”…then let us make an intelligent discussion. All parties are afflicted with this disease.I hope we havn’t forgotten Pramod Mahajan…
And “Shadows”..you need sleep. Your tantrums are quite funny though
On 08.24.07 Shailendra Mathur says:
“Let us avoid naivete. A “white elephant” is that creature which is a mirage.”
A white elephant is a decorative creature, which requires enormous amount of money for its upkeep, and has no commensurate benefits. So if you object to calling the Nehru Gandhis white elephants, we might also collectively call them an albatross around the neck of the Congress and the country.
As long as one member of this family is around, a) no one else can reach the top of the hierarchy in the party, and b) much more intelligent people have to give in the whims and fancies of these idiots.
And these two factors are stopping brilliant and ambitious people from joining the Congress.
On 08.24.07 Palahalli says:
I agree with the albatross analogy. This sounds accurate.