Hacker News Reader

Comment by macewindu | Hacker News Reader

[flagged]

Citation needed. The British certainly viewed Indians as expendable, and many decisions during (say) the Bengal Famine made squarely favored military wartime supply at the expense of the local population, but I don't think anybody has seriously proposed that the British intentionally created the famine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943#Historio...

First, I would say that the British should not receive the benefit of the doubt as to their behavior during the Bengal famine, given their intransigence to release grain during the Irish potato famine (and that so many Irish were forced to rely on potatoes leaving them vulnerable was another effect of British rule.)

Here's some scientific evidence that the Bengal famine of 1943 was not linked to soil moisture levels, like the previous five: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/04/churchill-policies-bl...

Again, the long history of callousness of the British empire towards its colonies should lead one to be skeptical of the official intent at the time.

Genocide by convenient happenstance, as a side-effect of deliberate action, is still genocide.

The first modern genocide (if you don't count the Congolese, which most don't but should) was a death march. The Turks didn't try to eliminate the Armenians by shooting or poisoning or slashing them; they simply made them walk, en masse and in horrible conditions, until they died.

If you've supplanted an ethnic group's government and redirected resources such that people start dying in horrifically large numbers, that is also a case in which you're committing genocide. Even if you're the Brits.

I'm no expert on Indian history, but that seems implausible. Famines would only serve to increase unrest and undermine the stability of British rule. The famines seem to be more a result of neglect and mismanagement than active efforts.

Furthermore, India in the 1800s-1900s was not exactly like the Americas, Australia or South Africa. The population was much larger, and social, economic or cultural structures were much more robust, long-standing and harder to dismantle.

starving people is more likely to make them stop fighting than make them start

The history of revolutions and riots in France, Russia, Ireland, and others [1] show the opposite: Often, people will tolerate inequality and injustice if they're fed and comfortable, but when people get hungry they get angry.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_food_riots

Dead men can’t fight

Famines were mainly a result of British mismanagement of resources. This mismanagement peaked when World War 2 was the top priority (read: Bengal famine). The British were indeed sloppy when it came to the welfare of Indians and did enact some evil policies. They were imperialists after all. But there's no evidence that the British wanted to "wipe out" the native population.

> there's no evidence that the British wanted to "wipe out" the native population.

No one accused all "the British". If you read my sentence, I used the word, some Brits such as Churchill. There's ample evidence of Churchill's desire to genocide, and even actions taken to genocide non-white people and subsequent whitewashing of the matters. I am sorry if some readers are upset to discover this about their hero, as I do realize a lot of Anglo-Saxon people worship Churchill, but these are unfortunately the facts of the matter.

"I cannot understand this squeamishness about the use of gas," he wrote in a memo during his role as minister for war and air in 1919.

"I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes," he continued.

"In 1937, he told the Palestine Royal Commission: "I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place.""

You can also google Hanslope Park papers to see that a lot of other evidence of intentional planning for genocides and other serious crimes against humanity level of wrong doings were erased or blocked from being released. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/18/foreign-off...

There were parts of the world earmarked for white settlement, like the Kenyan highlands, and of course Australia & the Canadian prairie. But I've never heard of India making this list, everyone thought it was too hot.

To the extent that there was any plan for most of India, it seems to have been along the lines of taxing the peasants (hence salt) and using them as soldiers. Which of course was the traditional aim of empires, this was precisely the Mughal aim, but was quite a few generations past its prime in the 1940s. But if this is your game plan, then killing off the people is not in your interest. (I say "most" because obviously the plan for Bombay etc. was much like that for Hong Kong & Singapore, offshore trading posts, certainly a post-Mughal way to make a living.)

Of course if you had quoted the full context of your supposedly damning gas quote:

"It is sheer affectation to lacerate a man with the poisonous fragment of a bursting shell and to boggle at making his eyes water by means of lachrymatory gas. I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes. The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum. It is not necessary to use only the most deadly gasses: gasses can be used which cause great inconvenience and would spread a lively terror and yet would leave no serious permanent effects on most of those affected."

lachrymatory gas: That's tear gas. To cause a great inconvenience yet leave no serious permanent effects. To reduce loss of life to a minimum. That's clearly not a memo calling for genocide.

I'd strongly object to saying these views are "unfortunately the facts of the matter" and that Churchill 'desired' genocide.

The Hanslope Park papers were about papers sent back to England related to the entire era of colonialism, not about "Churchill planning genocides" as you suggest.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com