Nirodbaran
Talks with Sri Aurobindo
Volume 1
10 December 1938 – 14 January 1941
5 May 1940
Purani: I don’t think England has withdrawn from Trondheim because of the Italian threat.
Satyendra: The debate comes on Tuesday. The Labour Party is going to heckle Chamberlain. Simon says, “Be cheerful and we will win in the end.” (Laughter)
Sri Aurobindo: He means, “Be cheerful and we will muddle through.” Hore-Belisha will now say, “I told you so.”
Nirodbaran: Almost all the papers have supported the Government except the Mail, the Herald and the News.
Satyendra: The papers say the Ministers have all agreed on their policy.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, Hore-Belisha also, I suppose! Chamberlain said, “We are perfectly agreed on policy.” At the end it was seen that they had disagreed all along.
Nirodbaran: Labour also is supporting Chamberlain.
Sri Aurobindo: During war they stick together.
Nirodbaran: In the last war there was a change of ministry.
Sri Aurobindo: That was because of general discontent. The Conservatives have to become dissatisfied with Chamberlain before they change him. The question is: whom will they put in his place? Among Labour and the Liberals there is no one except Lloyd George, but he is too old. Among the Conservatives, all except Churchill and Hore-Belisha are imbecile.
Satyendra: Chamberlain won’t easily give up.
Sri Aurobindo: No, he will stick on with his hands, feet and teeth unless forcibly dislodged. It is because there is not a single real statesman in Europe that Hitler and Mussolini are getting their own way.
Satyendra: The Neutrals will lose their fear under the British strength and protection.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, but Sweden is very bitter.
Satyendra: It is their neutrality that the British are critical of.
Sri Aurobindo: That is true. If Sweden had joined them, it would have been a great help.
Purani: The Allies could have attacked Germany from the rear.
Sri Aurobindo: These countries think that their neutrality will save them.
Nirodbaran: Now Sweden is at Germany’s mercy and the British can’t help them as effectively.
Sri Aurobindo: Quite so. If they want to help, they will have to do it in another way. They will have to land 300,000 troops in Narvik.
Nirodbaran: One American paper says, “Licking rouses the British to a great impetus.”
Sri Aurobindo: That is true. They have a great tenacity.
Nirodbaran: A few reverses for the British will be good for India.
Satyendra: I don’t think so. They won’t let us go so easily.
Sri Aurobindo: No, unless they are beaten.
Purani: N.N. Sircar is asking the Congress to accept the Ministry.
Sri Aurobindo: They say that because they are officials themselves.
Nirodbaran: Gandhi has now agreed to a smaller body, provided it is elected.
Sri Aurobindo: Elected by whom?
Nirodbaran: I mean not nominated by the Government.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, but elected by whom?
Nirodbaran: By the people.
Sri Aurobindo: Then it comes to the same thing as the Constituent Assembly. It has to be elected by the Assembly.
Nirodbaran: But will the Muslims agree? They will be in a minority.
Sri Aurobindo: They can have their own elected representatives. Either the Assembly has to elect the member or each party has to give its own schemes and have them thrashed out by discussion. Only one or the other of these two prospects seems possible. The idea of the Constituent Assembly is not likely to be practicable. It will be a large body and won’t be able to reach any agreement.
Nirodbaran: But the Muslims will still put forward their Pakistan scheme which can’t be accepted.
Sri Aurobindo: There each party, as I said, will give its own scheme. If the Punjab Muslims, Sikhs, N.W.F., Baluchistan and other Muslims, such as the Arhars and Momins, stand against Pakistan, then the League will have to drop it. Now the League leaders say that they are the sole representatives of the Muslims and the Government strongly supports them. The Congress is also half-hearted against Pakistan. But once it is shown that the League leaders are not the sole representatives, the Government will have to accept the fact. At the same time the League will be a consultative body discussing all problems and putting them before the Constituent Assembly and the Government to be approved or accepted as the case may be.
Nirodbaran: But the Congress is making a demand that the Government must accept whatever agreement they come to.
Sri Aurobindo: That is absurd. They can’t bind themselves in advance to whatever agreement is reached. They have their own interests. You can’t say that they can’t have any voice in the matter. That is not practical. If you say that, you are declaring independence and asking them to go away bag and baggage; they can’t agree to it. They will do so only if they are forced to, or if they are beaten badly in the war.
Purani: You can’t say that you will accept the Pakistan scheme, for instance, and ask them to accept it.
Sri Aurobindo: That is, as Zetland said, all tall talk and phrase-making. It is not practical. The Congress is wrong in laying down such conditions. The Government is not going to submit to it. What they really intend to give is some form of Dominion Status as in Ireland, where India will be linked to Great Britain and not go over to any foreign power against her, as she can if she is independent. The British want to keep India with them and slowly and gradually release power from their hands, expecting that in time we shall become accustomed to having a connection with them. The Congress and others are shouting old slogans in changed conditions. At one time the Independence cry was all right, but now Dominion Status is almost equivalent to that and in time you will be virtually independent. Besides, it is the best option under the present conditions in contrast to Charkha and non-violence. Hitler won’t give it, neither will Mussolini nor Japan. Stalin may give autonomy but controlled from Moscow. Moreover, the first thing he will do will be to cut off the industrialists and middle class and establish a peasant proletariat.
Nirodbaran: The British have no interest in the Indian problem, as was shown by the poor attendance on the India debate.
Sri Aurobindo: That doesn’t mean they won’t stick to India.
Purani: If Hitler invades India, Gandhi will declare we are all non-violent.
Sri Aurobindo: Hitler will be delighted at it.
Purani: Yes, he will sweep off everybody with machine guns. Gandhi believes he can be converted.
Sri Aurobindo: It is a beautiful idea but not credible. Does anybody really believe in his non-violence?
Purani: I don’t think so, except perhaps a few of his lieutenants. Others take it as a policy. Patel does not believe in it.
Sri Aurobindo: Will he face an army with his Charkha?
Satyendra: Gandhi is so shrewd in so many respects; I wonder why he doesn’t see this absurd side of his programme. He seems reactionary in many ways. He is against armaments because they are so ruinous.
Sri Aurobindo: I dare say they are, but how can you avoid them?
Satyendra: He is against all machinery and the use of mechanical things such as fountain-pens, though he is forced to use them. It would be ludicrous to carry ink pot and pen wherever he went. Besides, it would be so inconvenient as he writes whenever he gets time – and he writes with both hands.
Evening
The radio said that Lloyd George had severely condemned Chamberlain.
Sri Aurobindo (opening the talk): So L.G. has hit Chamberlain on the head? He says he is both inefficient and ineffective.
Satyendra: There will be a lively debate. We shall be able to learn more about it.
Purani: Chamberlain may have to go.
Sri Aurobindo: If he makes another blunder he will have to. The Conservatives also are dissatisfied.
Nirodbaran: An American paper proposes Sinclair’s name. He does not seem a prominent figure.
Sri Aurobindo: Nobody knows anything about him. But in his speeches he seems to be always to the point and his criticisms are sound, but I don’t know how he would be as a Cabinet Minister.
Purani: It is really a wonder how they thought of fighting the German army with such insufficient troops.
Sri Aurobindo: Not only insufficient but ill-equipped. They have no heavy guns, no aircraft, no mechanised units.
Nirodbaran: They have not given out the number of men sent.
Purani: The odds against them are three to one, says an American paper. How can they fight such a superior force with that meagre number?
Nirodbaran: They relied on their wonderful navy perhaps.
Sri Aurobindo: The navy is all right. It has done good work. Even then, why didn’t they destroy the German fleet at Oslo?
Nirodbaran: Churchill also will have some grievance against Chamberlain.
Satyendra: Chamberlain is not responsible for everything.
Sri Aurobindo: But he is in command of both air and navy. Perhaps he will say he acted according to military advice, but the latter may have merely chimed in with his own ideas. Britain’s mine-laying also was not very successful. Otherwise how could the Germans get reinforcements? The British navy could not prevent that?
Purani: The navy could not go into the Baltic because of the German air force which would have attacked it.
Satyendra: What about the air force?
Sri Aurobindo: The British had no air base in Norway.
Nirodbaran: They could not establish an air base in Dombas?
Sri Aurobindo: No, that is too far inside the country. Air bases are very difficult to establish. In Norway there is only one good air base, Stavanger, and that was in German hands.
Purani: The Hindu says that Skagerrak and Kattegat were too narrow and shallow for the fleet to pass through.
Sri Aurobindo: That is an excuse. The German battleships were passing in and out. In fact that route is the only way. Russians passed their big battleships through it during the Japanese war. The papers are saying that the British sent the Territorials to Norway who had been trained only a few months earlier for the war. In France they have such a big army, they could easily have spared about 200,000 men. Even England could have spared some regular forces.
Satyendra: They have sent Canadian forces, they say.
Sri Aurobindo: The Canadian forces have never fought before. They are about as good as the British forces who have only read of war in books.
Purani: It is the French who know how to fight.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, because they have conscription. Everybody is compelled to undergo training, and afterwards they are called up from time to time so that they won’t forget.
Purani: Even the French Fathers had contempt for the English soldiers. During the last war they used to say, “Oh, the English!”
Sri Aurobindo: You know the jingo poem of the English?
We do not want to fight;
But, by Jingo! if we do,
We’ve got the men, we’ve got the ships,
We’ve got the money too!
The Continentals say that they have others to fight for them. The Germans said during the last war, “The English will fight to the last Frenchman.” But the English will say, “We need not be sentimental over that. We have defeated the French, Russians and Germans.”