Radio War Nerd #343 — The 1947 Indian Partition, pt. 1
Recorded: August 24, 2022
On the 75th anniversary of the British-designed bloodbath known as the Indian Partition, the War Nerd & Ames recover the British Empire's central role in one of the bloodiest and most tragic events of the 20th century.
First: We look at two recent assassinations: the car-bombing of Daria Dugina, daughter of Alexander Dugin...and the attempted knifing-assassination of author Salman Rushdie...
At 30:50 - we discuss the leadup to the 1947 Indian Partition...
Reading:
*"The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India's Partition" by Narendra Singh Sarila
*"Britain robbed India of $45 trillion & Thence 1.8 billion Indians died from deprivation", MROnline, 2018
Total time: 1:43:20
Comments (29)
Did we ever do a part 2 on Indian partition? Just revisited this episode in light of current events and it's very helpful
they probably killed his daughter because they enjoy the idea of him spending his twilight years going "oh shit my progeny is dead", if I had a guess.
This is a recent interview with Dugin. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/millerman-talks/id1449387519?i=1000523321902
You guys really make me feel like I should burn my British passport. I really hated myself after this episode.
What's the name of the punk band Mark says is the best ever
Just ordered "Shadows of the Great Game"
@a clash - The power of british finance and Americans' Anglo solidarity?
I think people are just dumb and too easily misled into fighting each other instead of their real enemy.
I've often wondered why the entire world can't come together and unite against England. It's the one issue that every group of people I can think of can agree on, from Ireland to Germany to Russia to China to Kenya to the United States to Argentina. We could get rid of the world's nuclear stockpiles by launching all of them at London.
I blame the Beatles
I’m surprised at how impartial John and Mark were in this episode. They typically don’t miss the chance to kiss the Indian asses and to talk down on Pakistanis. Yeah we get it, gotta keep the Indians happy since it’s a bigger market
Wow, that's harsh. Does TheseLongWars know that RWN is supposedly biased against Pakistan and in favor of India, according to you? Or does having him on the show not count for some reason.
I'm starting to wonder if the British opposed Hitler because they wanted a monopoly on genocide. This stuff is just absolutely brutal, and the sheer indifference the British showed to the Indians is astounding. They didn't hate them; they just treated them like a space on a Risk or Diplomacy board.
For one thing, keep in mind that quite a few Indian aristocrats collaborated with the Raj, and those guys probably DID hate their fellow Indians in a visceral way because psychology. But that aside, it's just the logic of capitalism. Nobody involved is making any kind of moral choice, or even has the opportunity to. They must do everything they can to maximize profit, or else they'll be removed and replaced with someone who will. Everyone participating, from the bottom all the way to the top, is 'just doing their job.' They might or might not bother to rationalize what they're doing, but the (metaphorical) machine will continue to do as it's programmed regardless of what its human operators think or feel.
Rushdie is the only person who should be allowed to complain about “cancel culture”
Good stuff as usual, thanks
Re: The British looting India. Mark said it probably wasn't the case that the British were literally shipping back tons of gold and valuables back home, but that did in fact happen. That's where the term "loot" came from in fact, borrowed from the Hindustani equivalent https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/04/east-india-company-original-corporate-raiders
I said the $45 trillion looting wasn’t just loading gold bricks on boats, but wealth transfers in a whole gruesome range of ways, particularly rearranging the whole economy to serve England and killing off tens of millions in artificial famines. Didn’t mean to imply the Brits abstained from old fashioned gold bar plunder as well.
re: the aside on "the governess" I figure you guys already know this but one other example of the fucked up results of that kind of upper crust upbringing: the Koch brothers had a Nazi governess as kids.
Re Alexander Dugin, Max Blumenthal interviewed Mark Sleboda, a fellow academic, friend of the murdered daughter, and translator of one of Dugin's books. Listen from 1:45 to 18:00: https://youtu.be/JOYicMQzmy0
Also to focus on Sleboda's points. Characterizing Sleboda's ideology by referring to "blowhard" hot takes from his 20s and early 30s, as the USSR and Russia were falling apart, is a bit problematic. About as problematic as when my friends point out my unwoke podcast listening habits with links to Mark Ames's youthful claims and associations. Like Blumenthal's recent Covid reporting which leverages right-populist "don't tread on me" rhetoric with his leftish critique of government-media deceptions and business profiteering, Dugin conveys his hostility to liberalism with provocative aristocratic-civilizational takes soaked in metaphysical catastrophism. That's if you believe the Wikipedia page. Blumenthal and Dugin may both show us that it's not enough to be "anti-liberal" or "anti-capitalist" or anti-anything, and that you have to be for something as concretely possible and organizationally approachable as what you're opposing, e.g. (maybe?), for socialism/communism.
You know you’re an unrepentant war nerd when you see an episode about one of the most tragic events of the 20th century and you can’t help but crack a huge shit eating grin
Re: Darya Dugina's assassination, this reminded me very strongly of something that I never see anybody talk about: the assassinations of of separatists leaders in DPR and LPR since 2014. Alexander Zakharchenko, Alexander Bednov, Mikhail Tolstykh, and others. The two possibilities of course, are that they were killed by Ukraine or Russia. I'm more inclined to believe it was the latter- would the Russians really be incompetent enough to let the Ukrainians kill their client state's leaders and get away with it? Either option is a possibility though, and I've never seen anybody talk about these killings.
Good point. In at least some of those cases it's plausible it was an inside job, there is precedent for RU security forces offing separatist commanders they'd initially backed when they became a problem (early Trandnistr war). It is definitely plausible that the SBU could penetrate and kill them as well.
I didn't catch the "greatest punk band ever" what was the name? Would love to listen to them
Grazhdanskaya Oborona
Such a good and informative look at the partician. As a "child commonwealth" there is this assumed "sensible" empire attitude. You mention Malaya at the end, it would be great to hear an in-depth look at the empire there too!
Isn't it obvious that the bomb was meant for the father? I read that Dugana took the father's car. Another great episode. I am glad you explained the partition of Bengal. Never heard of this. I reccomend a book by Alex von Tuzelman titled "Indian Summer" which covers the partition and is highly entertaining.
I would hesitate to say that anything in war is "obvious" until a decade or two in hindsight. Do we need to make a call one way or the other?