How Churchill 'starved' India

[perseus]

Some Liberal historian's often compare some of Churchill's exploits in WWII to the leaders of the Axis countries. For example, did he treat Indians any better than Hitler treated the Russians?

A lesser known fact of WWll is that three million Indians died in a famine during 1943, partly because of the policy of prioritising food for the war effort. Rice was exported from India and shiploads of Australian wheat would pass by India to be stored for future consumption in Europe. He also formulated a scorched Earth policy were boats and rice were removed in case of a Japanese landing.

Was this necessary? Would he have done this if they were Scandanavians for example?

For more detail see How Churchill 'starved' India

 

[LeEnfield]

I know that millions died in India at this time, but do you honestly think that Churchill would see millions of Indians die of starvation for his other aims. Churchill had hoped to keep India tied to Britain after the war so would he have deliberately starved all those people then hoped that they would stay loyal. Churchill was many things but stupid he wasn't

 

[MontyB]

I think one of the great misconceptions of WW2 from an allied point of view was that we were somehow more squeaky clean than the Germans but the reality is that we were fighting the Axis to determine who the big man on the block was going to be and not because of the righteousness of the cause.

When you look at the actions of both Churchill and Stalin against there own allies it is very hard to separate them from Hitler.

Saw a very good documentary on the Soviet Union last night in fact and how similar it was to the Nazi regime yet the allies turned a blind eye while using the same atrocities committed by the Germans as the justification for war.

 

[perseus]

Unethical it might have been, but I'm still not prepared to put Churchill in the same park as Stalin and Hitler. They both systematically killed millions for purely political ends, not just military convenience. Churchill also stood up against Stalin who wanted to mass execute civilians as an example, he said "let me be the first one".

That said, I'm afraid this didn't help Churchill's cause after the war, and must have encouraged India to believe they could govern themselves better. They were in for a nasty surprise though.

 

[LeEnfield]

Who was responsible for the management of India at this time, Well you had an Indian Congress plus the Viceroy of India, now why isn't the Viceroy of India held to blame rather than Churchill. Do think that Churchill was going to spend his days watching over India or worrying about how the war was going on all the different fronts and having countless meetings with all sorts of people as he tried to get things done on these fronts. If you feel that the top man should carry there can then that would be the Emperor of India King George.

 

[Yin717]

If you feel that the top man should carry there can then that would be the Emperor of India King George.

Very good, lol.

To be totally frank I think Churchill didn't do it entirely in hate of India. I mean, he maybe overdid the export of rice but of course we were trying to fight a war and imagining what might have happened to India if we had lost the Battle of Britain? (Especially if it was because the pilots were to ill to fly.) As to the ships in case of a Japanese attack, well Britain had already seen what Japan had done in China and if I'm honest if Japan had attacked India they probably would have starved India as well, probably far worse. I think it was probably best that the Allies got hold of the rice so that they could at least attempt to take India back.

 

[LeEnfield]

India had voted to support Great Britain during WW2, and they raised the largest volunteer army that has been recorded in the world to fight for Britain. Churchill had spent time in India and never once have I ever seen pass any remark that could be classed derogatory about India, so why should he want to cause suffering there.

 

[MontyB]

Unethical it might have been, but I'm still not prepared to put Churchill in the same park as Stalin and Hitler. They both systematically killed millions for purely political ends, not just military convenience. Churchill also stood up against Stalin who wanted to mass execute civilians as an example, he said "let me be the first one".

That said, I'm afraid this didn't help Churchill's cause after the war, and must have encouraged India to believe they could govern themselves better. They were in for a nasty surprise though.

So it is more acceptable that multiple thousands (some claim up to 1 million) of Indians die in order for Britain to have a surplus of food?

I hate to be the one that says this but if there is any one man in history that single handedly destroyed the "Empire" it was Churchill, his lunacy throughout WW1 cost it the Dominions and what he didn't sell the American's in WW2 left because of his colonial policies.

If you look at several of Churchill's quotes I think it more likely that given a free reign he could easily have matched Hitler but probably not caught Stalin...

"I do not understand the squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favour of using poisonous gas against uncivilised tribes." -- Writing as president of the Air Council, 1919

"The unnatural and increasingly rapid growth of the feeble-minded and insane classes, coupled as it is with a steady restriction among all the thrifty, energetic and superior stocks, constitutes a national and race danger which it is impossible to exaggerate... I feel that the source from which the stream of madness is fed should be cut off and sealed up before another year has passed." -- Churchill to Asquith, 1910

"You are callous people who want to wreck Europe - you do not care about the future of Europe, you have only your own miserable interests in mind." -- Addressing the London Polish government at a British Embassy meeting, October 1944

"One may dislike Hitler's system and yet admire his patriotic achievement. If our country were defeated, I hope we should find a champion as admirable to restore our courage and lead us back to our place among the nations." -- From his Great Contemporaries, 1937

"It is alarming and nauseating to see Mr Gandhi, a seditious Middle Temple lawyer, now posing as a fakir of a type well known in the east, striding half naked up the steps of the viceregal palace, while he is still organising and conducting a campaign of civil disobedience, to parlay on equal terms with the representative of the Emperor-King." -- Commenting on Gandhi's meeting with the Viceroy of India, 1931

 

[perseus]

Monty

You are largely preaching to the converted. But its all relative. For tyrants, Stalin and Hitler are difficult to beat.

At worst it was gross negligence at best perhaps stockpiling in view of the Uboats. Remember, supplies were still under threat during the first half of 43. Later though it was difficult to justify, perhaps he had an obsession with the Balkans.

Of course if Churchill had been born in Stalin's environment with the autonomy this would have given him, who knows?

Le Enfield did you read the link?

Leopold Amery, secretary of state for India, and Field Marshal Sir Archibald Wavell, soon to be appointed the new viceroy of India, are deliberating how to ship more food to the colony. But the irascible Prime Minister Winston Churchill is coming in their way.

"Apparently it is more important to save the Greeks and liberated countries than the Indians and there is reluctance either to provide shipping or to reduce stocks in this country," writes Sir Wavell in his account of the meetings. Mr Amery is more direct. "Winston may be right in saying that the starvation of anyhow under-fed Bengalis is less serious than sturdy Greeks, but he makes no sufficient allowance for the sense of Empire responsibility in this country," he writes.

 

[Yin717]

I hate to be the one that says this but if there is any one man in history that single handedly destroyed the "Empire" it was Churchill, his lunacy throughout WW1 cost it the Dominions and what he didn't sell the American's in WW2 left because of his colonial policies.

Actually I would disagree. Even after WW2 we still had a relatively large Empire. I personally believe...well actually it's more of a fact that Thatcher really ruined the Empire. Unlike Churchill, she actually gave no regard to the commonwealth whatsoever and all the countries actually wanted to leave. If you thought Churchill was tough, Thatcher was something far worse.

 

[Del Boy]

I hate to be the one that says this but if there is any one man in history that single handedly destroyed the "Empire" it was Churchill, his lunacy throughout WW1 cost it the Dominions and what he didn't sell the American's in WW2 left because of his colonial policies.

Now, I hate to be the one to say this, but this is total nonsense IMHO.
The British Empire, the greatest ever known, and the most civilising influence the world has experienced, simply ran its course. This was very much my time, and it was becoming clear that time was called - 'The wind of change was blowing................'

As they say in the tropics - 'you gotta know when to hold 'em - you gotta know when to throw 'em - you gotta know when to walk away - you gotta know when to run'.

I find it quite touching that the Commonwealth has survived until now, and that our relationships with the like of India are so good. So very much there has been adapted from our traditions.

As for trying to match Winston with the two major tyrants of our time - you must be having a laugh - Adolf and Uncle Joe were, as has been said already - simply monsters. The former a psychopath, simply a pumped-up demogogue working to script and spin with a deliberate public policy of pure theatre which mesmerised the masses only because it was new to them and left them with a flattened country and a deflated dead Wizard of Oz on the carpet. Uncle Joe was a psychopath, simply a greasy -pole -climbing bureaucrat who knew how to control and hold his position .

Those were certainly unbalanced monsters, nothing normal there for sure.

Winston on the other hand, was a democrat, and a bloody good one; the man who who warned the world, fought hard for peace, but then made sure to win, saving Europe and the world from Hitler's forces of darkness, and then saving western Europe from Uncle Joe.

The greatest leader, for sure. Watching the criticism of this giant political warrior is like looking down upon the Lilliputians. Just thank God for Winston.

Over and out.

 

[MontyB]

Oh don't get me wrong Hitler and Stalin were all you say but I am of the opinion that had Churchill been given the same powers he would have been a match for them.

I notice you didn't comment on the quotes either.

 

[Del Boy]

Oh don't get me wrong Hitler and Stalin were all you say but I am of the opinion that had Churchill been given the same powers he would have been a match for them.

I notice you didn't comment on the quotes either.

The point is, IMHO, that much of Churchill's power was as a war leader, and hard decisions taken at war cannot be measured in the same way as deliberate peace time policies directed at your own people, those in your trust - these are where the millions of victims pile up in the case of Hitler and Stalin. Bear in mind that Jews in Germany were actually Germans, offering no threat to the state.

Far from holding any likely pretension to dictatorship, Churchill quite rightly succumbed to the result of the election at the end of WW11, even at that moment of the very height of his glory, and continued to serve his constituency in Woodford thereafter.

Remember also that his talents reached elsewhere; he was a considerable artist and writer and imbiber, always a great attribute for a democrat.

I had hoped to keep this discussion short and general and so at this stage I did not direct my efforts to the detail of quotes; it is by his actions that a man should be judged, is it not, and I have been accused in the past of never shutting up about Winston, have I not?

Of course, that was in the days when I drew my inspiration from your own forum signature.

I am sure that do not want me quoting Winston at you again, especially as I have now learned, with your help, how to copy and paste and link.

 

[Panzercracker]

The point is, IMHO, that much of Churchill's power was as a war leader, and hard decisions taken at war cannot be measured in the same way as deliberate peace time policies directed at your own people,

Starving Indians to feed the British was not a hard decision, it was a racially motivated genocide.

Bear in mind that Jews in Germany were actually Germans, offering no threat to the state.

Interbellum Jews were very often an insular group that refused to integrate, Jews were Jews, not Germans, they were german citizens and no threat to the state but definitely not 'Germans'.

Churchill wasa bigot and a murderer, not anywhere near the likes of Hitler or Stalin but he still deserved a bullet for his "hard decisions" however history is written by the victors so today Brits get to ********** about their Concentration Camp Chief Churchill while Germans have to be ashamed of their own murderer.

 

[LeEnfield]

At the end off WW2 when the German people were starving, Britain went on even shorter rations to help feed them. Still Churchill had one aim while he was in power and that was to defeat the Axis powers and in this he had to be ruthless as had we been defeated then the results could have been truly dreadful. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and yes more might have been done to help the Indians but did we have the ships and the manpower to it. Also many of these totals of deaths can only be guessed at as many of the Indians were never recorded at birth, marriage or death.

 

[Panzercracker]

At the end off WW2 when the German people were starving, Britain went on even shorter rations to help feed them.

Which shows that Britain was willing to starve milions of innocent Indians to death but would help a nation that spawned the single most evil regime in the world and attempted to murder over 200 milion people, good job.

Still Churchill had one aim while he was in power and that was to defeat the Axis powers and in this he had to be ruthless

And he was ruthless towards other peoples, he was willing to murder millions of women and children to do it and he did.

But then again seeing as Britain by then had a long history of genocide to preserve its power, including the invention of concentration camps and multiple genocidal campaings in India there's little wonder that Churchill so readily killed even more colonial "subhumans".

Its even less wonder that you as a Brit defend his genocide.

as had we been defeated then the results could have been truly dreadful.

More dreadfull than starving milions of innocent Indians but choosing to feed a nation that spawned the Holocaust?

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and yes more might have been done to help the Indians but did we have the ships and the manpower to it.

Of course you could have just accepted the fact that you were a bunch of thieves, murderers and looters who're occupying someone else' country and get the f*ck out instead of stripping it from food and killing anyone who resisted your colonial racist policies.

Yep, if Indians refused to be stolen from by the Brits they got a bullet since it was war, it didnt matter that you were an occupier no better than the nazis (since UK was racist in its policies).

Also many of these totals of deaths can only be guessed at as many of the Indians were never recorded at birth, marriage or death.

It doesnt change the point, when looked at it from the point of view of India Britain was no better than the Germans and it ceirtanly enacted a Nazi kind of genocide by deliberately stealing from India and starving its people.

 

[senojekips]

Churchill, especially in his latter years in power, was a typical selfish, whiskey sodden, product of the English public school system as it was at that time. The "little people" were but more than cannon fodder, that could be used to earn glory and honours for the upper classes, all in the name of Great Britain.

I do not deny that he did a far better job than Chamberlain was doing, however he had a complete disregard for the suffering of the lower classes. This was not uncommon among his type at that time, but I feel that to imply that he deliberately set out to starve the Indian people is totally without foundation.

All of the nations of the Empire made huge sacrifices in both manpower and materiel. At that time India was not a large net exporter of most foodstuffs, and consequently they were living somewhat "hand to mouth", in all but the very best of circumstances, it never took very much in the way of a poor crop or harvest to tip them over the edge and this was in turn exacerbated by the lack of effective internal distribution systems. By the time aid was bought to drought or pest affected areas, many had died as almost no one had large reserves of food.

Churchill was somewhat of an "overstuffed turd" by today's standards, but nothing really unusual in his own time. He was of the same stamp as men like Haig who thoughtlessly just kept sending wave after wave of his own troops into certain death with almost no chance of achieving any significant gain. On the first day of the battle of the Somme, he was responsible for the slaughter of 17,000 men, and yet he learned nothing from this. This is just how the English upper classes were.

 

[Yin717]

Churchill was somewhat of an "overstuffed turd" by today's standards, but nothing really unusual in his own time. He was of the same stamp as men like Haig who thoughtlessly just kept sending wave after wave of his own troops into certain death with almost no chance of achieving any significant gain. On the first day of the battle of the Somme, he was responsible for the slaughter of 17,000 men, and yet he learned nothing from this. This is just how the English upper classes were.

And yet they helped create the world we know and love today.

 

[MontyB]

And yet they helped create the world we know and love today.

That would depend on your disposition wouldn't it?

A sizable proportion of the Commonwealth is made up of third world, impoverish and corrupt nations, I can't think of a nation in Africa I would hold up as a shining example of success, the same could be said of Britain's Middle Eastern possessions and outside of Singapore Asia is pretty sparse on glowing examples.

Basically if not for Australia, Canada and New Zealand the commonwealth has been a royal failure, just a bunch of impoverish nations clinging to a failed empire.

As far as Churchill goes I think Senojekips is being rather polite.

 

[Panzercracker]

And yet they helped create the world we know and love today.

Excuse me? My visit to UK left me with an impression that white Brits are a bunch of racist twats, my personal opinion about Brits as a nation is that they're a bunch of bigoted racist morons (its a huge generalisation) and opinions of people like LeeEnfield justify my point of view.

Twats like that never even think that there might be other people with other point of view like say, Indians who didnt give a f*ck about the Commonwealth in all its racist glory and definitely didnt want to starve for it.

Say what you like i dont give a flying crap about the anglosaxon world, it never did anything for me, my nation and given its long history of racism, immoral pragmatism in politics et cetera it can go burn in hell.

Not to turn it into a flamewar just to point out that UK had a racist policy and Churchill was nothing short of a racist murderer or we could roll with Senojekips and say he was an inconsiderate murderer.

As for the Commonwealth, its hated in India, good relations are a myth, UK has a long history of f*cking its associates within the empire tho, Gallipoli is one example, starving of India another.