India / Pakistan division

Soldato
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None of which in any way, shape or form explains your total lack of unity, industry, government or gives any indication as to how or why you'd suddenly have become something without being ruled by a country who were something.
What miraculous event would have suddenly united India and created the network of railways and infrastructure, government and industry?


The indication that it gives is that if it was possible once, for India to be completely united under a single ruler, it would be possible again. Plenty of times that large parts of India had been united. Even under a ruler named Aurungzeb, who was the last half decent ruler of the Mughals, India was pretty united. The East India company tired what they did earlier against him, and were promptly thrown out. Just later on his descendent's weren't as powerful and country became disunited once again.
Point being, it's happened may times before that the entire country was united and prospered greatly, which is one of the reasons it was so profitable for the British anyway. It can easily enough happen again.
 
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How can you sit at your PC and claim India were incapable of such? I mean even China was ruled by separate provinces and they turned out fine...Thats what 'Evolution' is, you might wanna look up its definition ;)

Many academics would happily butcher you for trying to apply the biological concept of evolution to a social concept such as culture and/or nation-states, but I do agree with the point you're trying to put across. :)
 
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We did not "attack" :rolleyes:
We fought there, we fought against other Eurpoeans there and we fought against some indians on behalf of other indians. You really don't seem to know much about it.

Even though I am disagreeing with him on another point, I do agree here :p (well, history is history, hehe)

Britain did not directly attack India. The East India company basically did what he's said, and eventually the British government decided to take over it's operations (at that point, the company was already in effect ruling the country)

(they did however, at many points of time go to war, of their own accord, against other Indian princes with the sole aim of making sure there was no opposition left. If you consider that attacking, then yes, they did. They just didn't attack in the sense of direct military invasion)
 
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We did not "attack" :rolleyes:
We fought there, we fought against other Eurpoeans there and we fought against some indians on behalf of other indians. You really don't seem to know much about it.


No you read up on it. They were not "stolen". They were given under Royal Decree.

I wonder what you are going to try and tell me next? Do we really owe Tower Bridge to the Americans because when they bought London Bridge they were under the mistaken impression that Tower Bridge was London Bridge?
I knwo it is trendy these days to teach kids in school about how Evil Britain enslaved the world, to ignore William Wilberforce or who actually sold who to the traders, to pretend that Islam never took anywhere by conquest and that only the UK was involved in any overseas colonisation but you really, really need to learn a lot more before you spout this rubbish.

Property and land has passed hands by way of conquest for hundreds of years, many "treasures" in many museums around the world come from origins outside the lands in which they now reside. The world isn't a very nice place. Deal with it.

Please dont patronise me, my Mother practically spent half of her life there, and I very well know what went on in the real world :)

Royal Decree? That old chestnut :D, Yes a very clever way just to legalise something so they can 'steal' it and not give it back to where it belongs as they then claim they have legal ownership, the cheek!

No the world isn't a very nice place, especially for the ones on the receiving end of such Crusades :)

I'm just offering an alternative view of why many people around the world resent the English because of old times (not talking about Muslims). If you read news and articles carefully enough you will see it everyday. For example in football, UEFA's stance against Liverpool in the AC Milan game. People shouldn't be surprised where a lot of the resentment stems from. You seem smart enough to notice it yourself.

I do think Britain are making great amends, perhaps taking it too far now. I do feel they are paying for their old mistakes now though, and probably rightly so relatively speaking.
 
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I do think Britain are making great amends, perhaps taking it too far now. I do feel they are paying for their old mistakes now though, and probably rightly so relatively speaking.

Can't say too much about the Greece thing since i'm fairly clueless about it. As for the kohinoor, it was essentially stolen :p it was basically a case of "give us the diamond as a 'present' or we kill you"


I do disagree though that Britain needs to pay for its mistakes as such. What they did (at least with regards to India) was not a mistake. It was what was best for their country. (I am of course arguing (as seen above :p )that it was not good for India). But regardless of how it was for India, it was a good move from Britain's point of view and they did what they had to to ensure they could keep reaping the benefits India had to provide, which were indeed immense. No reason they shouldn't do that if they could. Not that, at least in my opinion, needs any more justification, but most other countries in the world at that time were colonizing as well as much as they could.


(I'm really filling up this thread aren't I? lol :p)
 
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Can't say too much about the Greece thing since i'm fairly clueless about it. As for the kohinoor, it was essentially stolen :p it was basically a case of "give us the diamond as a 'present' or we kill you"

Exactly, The word should not be taken so literally. It was just cunningly called a Treaty by the Crown Colony while holding them at gunpoint and saying "sign here please".
 
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How can you sit at your PC and claim India were incapable of such? I mean even China was ruled by separate provinces and they turned out fine...Thats what 'Evolution' is, you might wanna look up its definition ;)

You do realise that China is a communist state?
That is what unified China.

So what would have unified India? Where would their technology and industry come from? (Pretending of course that neither the Dutch, Spanish or French would have taken India had it not been for the British of course).

How can you sit at your computer and be ignorant to Africa? What makes you think that India would not have been just like Africa?
 
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Point being, it's happened may times before that the entire country was united and prospered greatly, which is one of the reasons it was so profitable for the British anyway. It can easily enough happen again.

Yes they united under a conqueror and united under British rule......

India was prosperous for the UK because the UK knew how to turn all those assests and that potential into wealth. Something the Indians clearly did not know how to do, possibly because they were too busy infighting.
 
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Please dont patronise me, my Mother practically spent half of her life there, and I very well know what went on in the real world :)
So we should rewrite history because your mother "practically" spent half her life there? Is that even English? Comments like that are just begging for some patronising response.
Royal Decree? That old chestnut :D, Yes a very clever way just to legalise something so they can 'steal' it and not give it back to where it belongs as they then claim they have legal ownership, the cheek!
Oh dear, the "Royal Decree" was given by the Ottomans not by the British Monarchy....... So who was being cheeky....
No the world isn't a very nice place, especially for the ones on the receiving end of such Crusades :)
MMmm like the syrians, egyptians, aghans, spanish, north africans etc who all suffered islamic invasions....that's life I'm afraid, powerful nations take advantage of less powerful ones. Dog eat dog.
I'm just offering an alternative view of why many people around the world resent the English because of old times (not talking about Muslims). If you read news and articles carefully enough you will see it everyday.
Time they got over it then :) Or should we resent the present day gauls, vikings, romans, saxons, celts and so on?
For example in football, UEFA's stance against Liverpool in the AC Milan game. People shouldn't be surprised where a lot of the resentment stems from. You seem smart enough to notice it yourself.
I have zero interest in football and no idea what you are talking about.

I do think Britain are making great amends, perhaps taking it too far now. I do feel they are paying for their old mistakes now though, and probably rightly so relatively speaking.[/QUOTE]
 
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Exactly, The word should not be taken so literally. It was just cunningly called a Treaty by the Crown Colony while holding them at gunpoint and saying "sign here please".

Why would the British need to cunningly do anything? The most powerful nation in the world at the time were not exactly afraid of upsetting people or sweetening deals. If you need any further proof of that look at what we did to China when they stopped buying our opium......
 
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Why would the British need to cunningly do anything? The most powerful nation in the world at the time were not exactly afraid of upsetting people or sweetening deals. If you need any further proof of that look at what we did to China when they stopped buying our opium......

*crying while posting this* I agree with VIRII.
 
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Yes they united under a conqueror and united under British rule......

India was prosperous for the UK because the UK knew how to turn all those assests and that potential into wealth. Something the Indians clearly did not know how to do, possibly because they were too busy infighting.

Yes, but that conqueror worked for the benefit of India. Not for the benefit of another nation entirely. That is the key difference. And that conqueror was Indian. he was just the leader of one of the regions and then eventually became the leader of all of them. There is a fairly big difference if the person whose in charge is your own rather than a foreigner.

We did know how to do it, and proof lies int he example that it had happened earlier. Just because taht was not it's state at that point of time, does not mean that it had not happened earlier and will not happen again.

Why would the British need to cunningly do anything? The most powerful nation in the world at the time were not exactly afraid of upsetting people or sweetening deals. If you need any further proof of that look at what we did to China when they stopped buying our opium......

According to wikipedia,
The gem called the Koh-i-Noor which was taken from Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk by Maharajah Ranjit Singh shall be surrendered by the Maharajah of Lahore to the Queen of England.

The word surrender doesn't exactly scream out present now does it? And it's not cunning as much as brute force. "give it to us. or die"

Right or wrong, India would not be in the place it is now if not for British infrastructure.

Very true. But you cannot assume that it would automatically in a worse position than it is now. It could well be in a far better position. Yes, possibility exists that it could be worse off, but you gotta look at both sides :p
 
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Soldato
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Very true. But you cannot assume that it would automatically in a worse position than it is now. It could well be in a far better position. Yes, possibility exists that it could be worse off, but you gotta look at both sides :p

Indeed.

I dont condone the Brittish rule of India. Their actions where discusting, its a dark chapter in English history.

When one group of people think their better than the rest the result is always the same.
 
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Yes, but that conqueror worked for the benefit of India. Not for the benefit of another nation entirely. That is the key difference. And that conqueror was Indian. he was just the leader of one of the regions and then eventually became the leader of all of them.
India have benefitted plenty from UK rule. The UK benefitted tremendously from Roman and Norman conquest. Neither of whom conquered the UK for the benefit of the UK.
There is a fairly big difference if the person whose in charge is your own rather than a foreigner.
Sounds a tad xenophobic and racist..... ;)
We did know how to do it, and proof lies int he example that it had happened earlier. Just because taht was not it's state at that point of time, does not mean that it had not happened earlier and will not happen again.
It was a brief and clearly not welcome union is that what you mean? India were never a world power were they. India never had industry or Government or infrastructure or anything remotely close. I think you're letting a little pride in your origins cloud reality.
According to wikipedia,
The gem called the Koh-i-Noor which was taken from Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk by Maharajah Ranjit Singh shall be surrendered by the Maharajah of Lahore to the Queen of England.

The word surrender doesn't exactly scream out present now does it? And it's not cunning as much as brute force. "give it to us. or die"
The words "which was taken" doesn't scream out that Ranjit Singh was the rightful owner either does it..... :) Who do you think it belongs to precisely?

Very true. But you cannot assume that it would automatically in a worse position than it is now. It could well be in a far better position. Yes, possibility exists that it could be worse off, but you gotta look at both sides :p
I have looked at both sides and there is nothing to indicate that India would be better off in any way.
 
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Heres another question, if Britain or other European nations had not conquered much of the world, would have the problems we have today, and would we have the benefits we have today, obviously we can never know, but it would be interesting to see what the world be like.

From a personal POV I would not be where i am for sure.
 
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Indeed.

I dont condone the Brittish rule of India. Their actions where discusting, its a dark chapter in English history.

When one group of people think their better than the rest the result is always the same.

The developed world colonised the rest of the world. Had it not then the rest of the world would still be living in mud huts.
If it had not been the British then it would most certainly have been the Dutch or French. We went there to trade, we got dragged into their petty infighting, we fought off other invaders. It is not as clear cut as you make out, we did not go there with any intention of taking the place over.
 
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Heres another question, if Britain or other European nations had not conquered much of the world, would have the problems we have today, and would we have the benefits we have today, obviously we can never know, but it would be interesting to see what the world be like.

From a personal POV I would not be where i am for sure.

I think Africa would have been better off but only if it had remained completely isolated from the rest of the world with no access to western weapons etc.

Then again if the west hadn't been out colonising and hadn't fought off the muslim invaders in europe I am sure we'd be much worse off.
 
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India have benefitted plenty from UK rule. The UK benefitted tremendously from Roman and Norman conquest. Neither of whom conquered the UK for the benefit of the UK.

I never said there were no benefits from the UK rule. I was merely pointing out that to say India would never have prospered without the rule is wrong.

Sounds a tad xenophobic and racist..... ;)
Perhaps :) But can you say you would have nothing against an indian/chinese etc king or queen? ;)

It was a brief and clearly not welcome union is that what you mean? India were never a world power were they. India never had industry or Government or infrastructure or anything remotely close. I think you're letting a little pride in your origins cloud reality.

You're right as to we did not have those things at that time. But you can't assume that we would not have developed them at a later date.

The words "which was taken" doesn't scream out that Ranjit Singh was the rightful owner either does it..... :) Who do you think it belongs to precisely?


Haha, i have no idea who it precisely belongs to. But as far as i know, it crossed hands etc. among Indians themselves. not to a foreign power. As far as that goes, and to generalize to that degree at least, you can say it belongs to India. Not saying Ranjit Singh was the rightful ruler, just that nor were the British and they took it as a spoil of war.

I have looked at both sides and there is nothing to indicate that India would be better off in any way.


Course, but tehre is also nothing to indicate they wouldn't be. Counter-factual history always presents this problem :)
 
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