Glimpses of World History

by Jawaharlal Nehru

  The Manchus had abdicated, but Yuan still stood in the way of the Republic, and no one seemed to know what he would do. He controlled the North, the Republic the South. For the sake of peace, and to avoid civil war, Dr Sun effaced himself, retired from the presidentship and had Yuan Shih-Kai elected as president. But Yuan was no republican. He was out to gain power to exalt himself. He borrowed money from foreign Powers to crush the very Republic which had honoured him by electing him President. He dismissed Parliament and dissolved the Kuo-Min-Tang. This led to a split, and a rival government, with Dr Sun as its head, was set up in the South. The split which Dr Sun had sought to avoid by all the means in his power had come, and there were two governments in China when the World War broke out. Yuan tried to become emperor, but he failed and died soon after.

  119

  Farther India and the East Indies

  December 31, 1932

  We have done with the Far East for a while. We have seen something of India also during the nineteenth century, and it is time that we moved westward to Europe and America and Africa. But before we take this long journey, I should like you to have a glimpse of the southeast corner of Asia and bring our knowledge of it up to date. It is long since we considered these countries. I have referred to them in some previous letters rather vaguely and variously and perhaps not very correctly, as Malaysia and Indonesia and the East Indies and Farther India. I doubt if any of these names covers the whole area, but so long as we understand each other, what’s in a name?

  Look at a map if you have one handy. To the south-east of Asia you will see a peninsula consisting of Burma and Siam, and what is now called French Indo-China. And from between Burma and Siam a thin tongue of land shoots out—the Malay Peninsula—fattening out towards the end, with the city of Singapore at the tip. From Malay to Australia there lie many islands, big ones and small, curiously shaped, giving the impression of the ruins of a giant bridge connecting Asia and Australia. These islands are the East Indies, and to the north of these lie the Philippines. A modern map will tell you that Burma and Malay are under the British; Indo-China is French, and, in between, Siam is an independent country. The East Indies—Sumatra and Java and a great part of Borneo and the Celebes and Moluccas, the famous spice-islands which drew the mariners of Europe across many thousands miles of perilous seas—are Dutch. The Philippine Islands are under American domination.

  That is the present position of these countries of the eastern seas. But you will remember my telling you of India’s children who went and colonized these countries nearly 2000 years ago; of the great empires that flourished there for long ages; of beautiful cities with wonderful buildings; of trade and commerce and a mingling of Indian and Chinese culture and civilization.

  In my last letter dealing with these countries (it is number 79) I told you of the fall of the Portuguese Empire of the East and the rise of the British and Dutch East India Companies. In the Philippines the Spaniards still ruled.

  The British and the Dutch had combined to defeat and drive out the Portuguese. They succeeded, but there was little love between the victors, and they quarrelled with each other frequently. On one occasion, in 1623, the Dutch Governor of Amboyna in the Moluccas had the entire English staff of the East India Company arrested and executed on a charge of conspiring against the Dutch Government. This wholesale execution is known as the Massacre of Amboyna.

  One fact I would have you remember; I have told you of it in earlier letters. At this period—that is, during the seventeenth century and after— Europe was not an industrial country. It did not manufacture goods on any large scale for export. The days of the big machine and the Industrial Revolution were far distant still. Asia was more of a manufacturing and exporting country than Europe. When the goods of Asia went to Europe, they were paid for partly by European goods and partly out of the treasure that came from Spanish America. This trade between Asia and Europe was a profitable one. The Portuguese had controlled it for a long time and had grown rich by it; the British and Dutch East India Companies were formed to share in it. But the Portuguese looked upon this trade as their peculiar preserve, and would not allow anyone to share in it. They had had no difficulty with the Spaniards in the Philippines, as the Spaniards were more interested in religion than in trade. There was little of religion about the British and Dutch adventurers who came on behalf of the two new trading companies. Soon there was conflict.

  Farther India and the East Indies

  The Portuguese had been ruling for over a century and a quarter in the East. They were far from popular with the people they ruled and there was discontent. The two trading companies of England and Holland took advantage of this discontent and helped these people to get rid of the Portuguese, but immediately after, they themselves stepped into the place vacated by the Portuguese. As rulers of India and the East Indies they took tribute from the people in the shape of heavy taxes and in other ways, and this helped them greatly in carrying on the foreign trade without any great burden on Europe. The great difficulty which Europe had previously experienced in paying for the goods from eastern countries was thus lessened. Even so, as we have seen, England tried to stop the inflow of Indian goods by prohibition and heavy duties. Matters stood thus till the coming of the Industrial Revolution.

  The conflict of the Dutch and the British in the East Indies did not last long, because the British withdrew from it. They were beginning to get busy in India, and had their hands full. So these East Indian islands were left entirely to the Dutch East India Company, with the exception of the Philippines, which remained under the Spanish. As the Spanish cared very little for trade and were not trying to conquer any further territory, the Dutch had no rivals now in this area.

  The Dutch East India Company, like its namesake the British Company in India, settled down to make as much money as possible. For 150 years this trading company ruled these islands. They did not pay the slightest attention to the welfare of the people. They oppressed them and extorted as much tribute out of them as was possible. When it was easy to make money by taking tribute, trade became a secondary consideration and languished. The Company was thoroughly inefficient, and the Dutchmen who went out to serve it belonged to the same type of unscrupulous adventurers as the factors or agents of the British Company in India. Money-making, by fair means or foul, was their chief concern. In India the resources of the country were far greater, and even a great deal of mismanagement could be covered up; in India also a number of able British governors made the administration efficient at the top, even though it crushed the people at the bottom. But you will remember that the great Revolt of 1857 put an end to the British East India Company.

  The Dutch East India Company went from bad to worse, and ultimately in 1798 the Netherlands Government took direct charge of the Eastern Islands. Soon after, owing to the Napoleonic Wars in Europe and Holland becoming a part of Napoleon’s Empire, the English Government took possession of these islands. For five years they were treated as a province of British India, and during this period considerable reforms were introduced. With the fall of Napoleon, the East Indies were returned to Holland. During the five years that Java was connected with the British Indian Government, an able Englishman, Thomas Stamford Raffles, acted as Lieutenant-Governor of Java. Raffles reported that the history of the Dutch colonial administration “is one of the most extraordinary relations of treachery, bribery, massacre, and meanness”. Among other practices, the Dutch officials used to have a regular system of kidnapping people in the Celebes in order to secure slaves for use in Java. This kidnapping was accompanied by devastation and killing.

  The direct rule of the Netherlands Government was no better than that of the Company. In some ways it was even more oppressive for the people. You will remember perhaps what I told you of the Indigo Plantation system in Bengal, which caused so much misery to the cultivators. Something similar to this system, only much worse, was introduced in Java and elsewhere. In the days of the Company the people were made
to supply goods. Now, under the “culture system” as it was called, they were forced to work for a certain period every year, which was supposed to be about a third or a quarter of the cultivator’s time. In practice, often enough, almost all the cultivator’s time was taken up. The Dutch Government worked through contractors, who were given advances of money, free of any interest, by the government. These contractors then exploited the land with the help of forced labour. The produce of the land was supposed to be shared, in certain fixed proportions, between the government, the contractor and the cultivator. Probably the poor cultivator’s share was the smallest of all; I do not know exactly what it was. The government also laid it down that certain products that were required in Europe must be grown over part of the land. Among these were tea, coffee, sugar, indigo, etc. As in the case of the indigo plantations in Bengal, these had to be grown even though the profit was less than it otherwise might be.

  The Dutch Government made enormous profits; the contractors flourished; the cultivators starved and lived in misery. In the middle of the nineteenth century there was a terrible famine, and vast numbers of people died, Only then was it thought necessary to do something for the unhappy cultivator. Slowly his conditions were bettered, but even as late as 1916 there was still forced labour.

  In the latter half of the nineteenth century a number of educational and other reforms were introduced by the Dutch. A new middle class has grown up and a nationalist movement has demanded freedom. As in India, some very halting advance has been made, and feeble assemblies, with little real power, have been established. About five years ago there was a revolution in the Dutch East Indies; it was crushed with great cruelty. But no amount of cruelty or oppression can kill the spirit of freedom which has arisen in Java and the other islands.

  The Dutch East Indies are now known as Netherlands India. Every fortnight an air service goes all the way from Holland, across Europe and Asia, to the city of Batavia in Java.

  I have finished my outline story of the East Indian islands, and now I want to cross over to the mainland of Asia. Of Burma there is little more to be said. Often the country was divided between North and South, and the two struggled with each other. Sometimes a powerful king united the two and even ventured to conquer neighbouring Siam. And then, in the nineteenth century, came the conflicts with the British. The Burmese King, over-confident of his strength, invaded and annexed Assam. The first Burmese War with the British in India followed in 1824, and Assam went to the British. The British now discovered that the Burmese Government and army were weak, and the desire to annex the whole country came to them. Silly pretexts were found for a second and a third war, and by 1885 the whole kingdom was annexed and made part of the British Indian Empire. Since then Burma’s fate has been linked with India’s.

  South of Burma, the British had also spread in the Malay Peninsula. They took possession of the island of Singapore early in the nineteenth century, and owing to its happy situation it soon became a rising commercial city and a port of call for all ships going to the Far East. The old port of Malacca, farther up in the peninsula, declined. From Singapore the British began to spread north. There were many small States in the Malay Peninsula, most of them vassal to Siam. By the end of the century all these States were British protectorates, and they were joined together in a kind of federation named the “Federated Malay States”. Siam had to give up all the rights she possessed in some of these States to England.

  Siam was thus being surrounded by European Powers. To the west and south, in Burma and Malay, England was supreme; to the east France was aggressive and was absorbing Annam. Annam acknowledged China’s suzerainty, but that was of little help when China herself was in difficulties. You will remember my telling you in a recent letter on China about fighting between France and China over the French invasion of Annam. France was checked a little, but only for a while. In the second half of the nineteenth century France built up a great colony, called French Indo-China, including Annam and Cambodia. Cambodia, where in the old days the Empire of Angkor the Magnificent had flourished, was a subject-State of Siam. France established its sway over it by threat of war with Siam. It is worth noticing that all the early intrigues of the French in these countries were carried on through French missionaries. One of these missionaries was sentenced to death for some reason or other, and it was to secure reparation for this that the first French expedition was sent in 1857. This expedition seized the port of Saigon in the south, and from there French control spread north.

  I am afraid there is a great deal of repetition in these sordid tales of imperialist advance in the countries of Asia. The methods were more or less the same everywhere, and almost everywhere they succeeded. I have dealt with country after country, and finished the story, for the time being at least, by putting it under some European Power. Only one country in south-east Asia escaped this fate, and this was Siam.

  Siam was lucky to escape, wedged in as she was between England in Burma and France in Indo-China. Perhaps it was because of the presence of these European rivals to the right and left of her that she escaped. She owed her good fortune also to the fact that she was having a spell of fairly good government and there were no internal troubles, as there had been in many other countries. But good government was, of course, no guarantee against foreign invasion. As it happened, England had her hands full in India and Burma, and France in Indo-China. By the time both of them had reached the frontiers of Siam, late in the nineteenth century, the day for annexations was already passing. The spirit of resistance was rising in the East, and nationalist movements were beginning in the colonies and dependencies. There was danger of war between Siam and France over Cambodia, but Siam gave in and avoided friction with the French. To the west a strong mountain barrier protected Siam from the British in Burma.

  I have told you that twice at least in the past the Burmese kings have invaded Siam, and even annexed it. The last invasion was in 1767, when the Siamese capital named Ayuthia or Ayudhia (note how Indian names occur) was destroyed. Soon, however, the Burmese were driven out by a popular rising and a new dynasty began with King Rama I in 1782. Even today, just a 150 years later, this dynasty still reigns in Siam, and all the kings seem to be called “Rama”. Under this new dynasty Siam had good but rather paternal government and, very wisely, an effort was made to cultivate good relations with foreign Powers. The ports were opened for foreign trade, commercial treaties were made with certain foreign Powers, and some reforms were introduced in the administration. The new capital was Bangkok. All this was not enough to keep the imperialist wolves away. England spread in Malay and took Siamese territory there; France got Cambodia and other Siamese territory to the east. France and England nearly came to blows over Siam in 1896. But then, in the recognized imperialist fashion, they agreed to guarantee the integrity of the remaining portions of Siamese territory and, at the same time, divided this up into three “spheres of influence”. The eastern part was the French sphere, the western was the British, and in between there was a neutral area where both could have their pickings. Having thus solemnly guaranteed the integrity of Siam, a few years later France took some more territory to the east, and England of course then had to take some compensation in the south.

  Still, in spite of all this, a part of Siam has escaped European domination, and that is the only country to do so in this part of Asia. The tide of European aggression has been checked now, and there is little chance of Europe getting more territory in Asia. The time is soon coming when the European Powers in Asia will have to pack up and go home.

  Siam was till recently an autocratic monarchy and, in spite of some reforms, there was a good deal of feudalism. A few months ago there was a revolution there—a peaceful one—and the upper middle classes, it seems, came to the front. Some kind of parliament has been established there. The king, of the dynasty of Rama I, wisely agreed to the change, and so the dynasty has remained. Siam has thus now a constitutional monarchy.

  One other cou
ntry of south-east Asia remains for us to consider— the Philippine Islands. I wanted to write about them also in this letter, but it is late and I am tired, and the letter is long enough. This is the last letter I shall write to you this year—1932—for the old year has run its course and is at its last gasp. In another three hours it will be no more and will become a memory of the past.

  120

  Another New Year’s Day

  New Year’s Day, 1933

  It is New Year’s Day today. The earth has completed another cycle round the sun. It recognizes no special days or holidays, as it rushes ceaselessly through space, caring not at all what happens on its surface to the innumerable midgets that crawl on it, and quarrel with each other, and imagine themselves—men and women—in their foolish vanity, the salt of the earth and the hub of the universe. The earth ignores her children, but we can hardly ignore ourselves, and on New Year’s Day many of us are apt to rest awhile in our life’s journey and look back and grow reminiscent, and then look forward and try to gather hope. So I am reminiscent today. It is my third consecutive New Year’s Day in prison, though in between I was out in the wider world for many months. Going farther back, I remember that during the last eleven years I have spent five New Years’ Days in prison. And I begin to wonder how many more such days and other days I shall see in prison!

  But I am an “habitual” now, in the language of the prison, and that many times over, and I am used to gaol life. It is a strange contrast to my life outside, of work and activity and large gatherings and public speaking and a rushing about from place to place. Here all is different; everything is quiet, and there is little movement, and I sit for long intervals, and for long hours I am silent. The days and the weeks and the months pass by, one after the other, merging into each other, and there is little to distinguish one from the other. And the past looks like a blurred picture with nothing standing out. Yesterday takes one back to the day of one’s arrest, for in between is almost a blank with little to impress the mind. It is the life of a vegetable rooted to one place, growing there without comment or argument, silent, motionless. And sometimes the activities of the outside world appear strange and a little bewildering to one in prison; they seem distant and unreal—a phantom show. So we develop two natures, the active and the passive, two ways of living, two personalities, like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Have you read this story of Robert Louis Stevenson’s?