World

The way we think and the way we play War!

“The Chinese soldiers dressed like monks. So, for a layman, they will look like monks. But the swords they had, were not Tibetan, they were Chinese.”: Dalai Lama. This statement came up in yesterday’s HT with the daily report about Tibetan struggle.

This made me recall some of the many stories I read about China. Let me clarify it in the beginning that I haven’t read whole of Chinese history, so at places may be I would be exaggerating. But a bit of exaggeration makes life beautiful: let there be butterflies when there are just butter and flies J

~*~

The Chinese have a phrase, “Masquerading as a swine to kill the tiger.” This refers to an ancient hunting technique in which the hunter clothes himself in the hide and snout of a pig, and mimics its grunting. The mighty tiger things a pig is coming his way, and lets it get close, savouring his prospect of an easy meal. But it is the hunter who has the last laugh.

Message: The newest one: "Masquerading as a monk to kill the revolution"...  

Connection: I tend to start again by India’s perception about goody-goody China in the honeymoon years of our independence. In those days, roses were so beautiful, on Sherwanies; Gandhi Topi looked beautiful, on Nehru’s head; we dreamt of solving issues in the UN, so what if we mistook a hunter for a pig? Not a big deal, right? Let us get into better ones…

~*~

In 473 BC, in ancient China, King Goujian of Yue suffered a horrible defeat from the ruler of Wu in the battle of Fujiao. Goujian wanted to flee, but he had an adviser who told him to surrender and to place himself in the service of the ruler of Wu, from which position he could study the man and plot his revenge. Deciding to follow this advice, Goujian gave the ruler all of his riches, and went to work in his conqueror’s stables as the lowest servant. For three years he humbled himself before the ruler, who then, finally satisfied of his loyalty, allowed him to return home. Inwardly, however, Goujian had spent those three years gathering information and plotting revenge. When a terrible drought struck Wu, and the kingdom was weakened by inner turmoil, he raised an army, invaded, and won with ease.

Message: Chinese will pretend! So be aware!

Connection: India had her own Chanakya, a ‘one man’ who erased a mighty empire. But he did take a vow beforehand, in front of all: that he would bring the kingdom down! And he never pretended! How different India was!

~*~

In 1934, the communist leader Mao Tse-tung and some 75,000 poorly equipped soldiers fled into the desolate mountains of western China to escape Chiang Kai-shek’s much larger army, in what has since been called the Long March.

Chiang was determined to eliminate every last communist, and by a few years later Mao had less than 10,000 soldiers left. By 1937, in fact, when China was invaded by Japan, Chiang calculated that the communists were no longer a threat. He chose to give up the chase and concentrate on the Japanese. Ten years later the communists had recovered enough to rout Chiang’s army. Chiang was pursued until he and his entire army fled to the island of Taiwan. Nothing remains of his regime in mainland China to this day.

Message: Chinese communists will never leave even a single opponent! Looking at China’s sour relations with Japan even today, we realise that China never forgets. And never forgives...  

Connection: India had one great warrior Prithvi Raj Chowhan, who defeated Muhammad Gauri so many times, and every time left him alive, all in the name of pride. Until he was captivated, mercilessly blinded and eventually murdered. How different Indians were!

~*~

When the Mongols invaded China in the 12^th century, they threatened to obliterate a culture that had thrived over two thousand years. Their leader, Genghis Khan, saw nothing in China but country that lacked pasturing for his horses, and he decided to destroy the place, levelling all its cities, for “it would be better to exterminate the Chinese and let the grass grow”.

It was not a soldier, a general, or a king who saved the Chinese from devastation, but a man named Yelu Ch’s-Ts’ai. A foreigner himself, Ch’u-Ts’ai had come to appreciate the superiority of Chinese culture. He managed to make himself a trusted adviser to Genghis Khan, and persuaded him that he would reap riches out of the place if instead of destroying it, he simply taxed everyone who lived there. Khan saw the wisdom in this and did as Ch’u-Ts’ai advised.

When Khan took the city of Kaifeng, after a long siege, and decided to massacre its inhabitants,  Ch’u-Ts’ai told him that the finest craftsmen and engineers in China had fled to Kaifeng and it would be better to put them to use. Kaifeng was spared. Never before had Genghis Khan shown such mercy, but then it really was not mercy that saved Kaifeng. Ch’u-Ts’ai knew Khan well. He was a barbaric peasant who cared nothing for culture, or indeed for anything other than warfare and practical results. Ch’u-Ts’ai chose to appeal to the only emotion that would work on such a man: greed.

Message: Chinese know what to show whom! The US says, “Show me the money!” And Chinese show then exactly that! Tibet doesn’t. And so it suffers…

Connection: Alas, India didn’t have a Ch’u-Ts’ai, and hence, our Nalanda was burnt for months, Somnath destroyed for times, and Delhi was looted at barbarian’s dil. Many years later, when the East India Company came, Indians still didn’t know their real motive. They thought greed = want for money, but greed has no limits. Ye dil mange more! No wonder, Chinese want more! Tibet!

Free Tibet!