Nirodbaran
Talks with Sri Aurobindo
Volume 1
10 December 1938 – 14 January 1941
17 June 1940
Reynaud has resigned, Pétain has become the Premier and other members of the Cabinet have been picked from the military.
Nirodbaran: Was there any difference in policy among the members of the Cabinet?
Sri Aurobindo: Probably. Reynaud is unpopular. Now it is practically a military dictatorship.
Purani: Even after the war it may remain. Most of them seem to be Catholics and from the right wing.
Nirodbaran: Weygand hasn’t shown any remarkable qualities till now.
Satyendra: Pétain has no time, and besides the supplies and equipment are too poor. What can he do? At present what is most necessary is men; equipment doesn’t matter so much.
Sri Aurobindo: Oh, it does matter. They say that because their ammunition was exhausted they couldn’t use the 75mm gun. On the first day they were able to destroy four hundred tanks. Afterwards we didn’t hear any more about this. This was due to lack of ammunition.
Nirodbaran: The Germans have now reached the south end of the Maginot Line.
Sri Aurobindo: That means all industrial areas have fallen into their hands. The British have opened disused coal mines in Wales to supply coal to France.
Satyendra: The situation is very grave now.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, one of the tactics Germany applied was to capture the generals by means of tanks so that the troops might get disorganised.
Nirodbaran: And at this late hour England is calling up the twenty-nine-year-old age-group. People who are twenty-nine years old are quite strong and able-bodied; they could have been called up long ago.
Sri Aurobindo: Quite so. I suppose they wanted to keep men for commerce, agriculture, industry, etc., so that export would go on leisurely as in 1914.
Purani: And they could rely on the blockade.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, but except for war materials the blockade can’t be so effective if Hitler becomes master of Europe.
Evening
News arrived at about 6.20 p.m. that Pétain has decided to stop fighting and negotiate with Hitler for honourable peace terms. The Mother gave the news to Sri Aurobindo and went away.
Sri Aurobindo (after reading the news): France has stopped the fight. This is Pétain’s doing. He is too old!
Naturally it came as a great surprise and we were all thrown into a gloom.
Purani (later in the evening): No terms have been given yet?
Sri Aurobindo: No.
Nirodbaran: It seems to me France has acted more dishonourably than the Belgian king.
Sri Aurobindo: Oh, yes. Besides, Hitler now becomes the master of Europe.
Nirodbaran: But why has France done this? She still has a huge army and navy intact. She could have withdrawn somewhere else, as Reynaud said, instead of surrendering like that.
Purani: France has become decadent now.
Nirodbaran: Hope England won’t give up.
Satyendra: I don’t think she will.
Sri Aurobindo: The English don’t give up. But it has to be seen if England also has become decadent or not. After all Poland fought much better than France. It was only the Polish generals who were incompetent, the people went on fighting. Finland also fought very well.
Satyendra: In Belgium it was the king, not the Government who surrendered; but here it was the Government that has surrendered. The navy could perhaps disobey and revolt?
Sri Aurobindo: Not possible. Pétain has put Admiral Darlan in the Ministry. The Navy is not likely to disobey him.
Purani: Now the Mediterranean situation will be critical. If Hitler gets the French fleet, then with Italy on his side he will be very powerful.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, and Turkey’s position will be dangerous. Now only Hitler’s death can save the situation.
Nirodbaran: Everybody is astounded, for Russia is already preparing for future attacks.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, the Russian Army has marched into Lithuania and Latvia, hasn’t it?
Nirodbaran: Japan is threatening Indo-China and may capture it, any time now. She won’t allow Germany there.
Purani: Yes, it must have shaken the whole political structure of the world and I think everybody realises the danger if Hitler occupies France.
Sri Aurobindo: Does India realise it? Everybody seems to be busy with his own interest and none considers anything in the light of the world situation. The Congress Committee is now in session. Will it realise the danger?
Nirodbaran: I think it will.
Sri Aurobindo: Let us hope so. Nehru seems to shut his eyes and calls all these fears of foreign invasion a bogey. I am wondering what our Ashram’s fate will now be. Like the others we are also considering our own self-interest! (Laughter) Shall we be under Stalin or under Hitler? Stalin will be the more serious risk.
Nirodbaran: Why Stalin? He will first have to conquer India.
Sri Aurobindo: That won’t take him a long time and he won’t allow our existence at all.
Nirodbaran: The British will grab Pondicherry if France capitulates.
Sri Aurobindo: If England gives in to Germany, Japan may come and drop some bombs on India.
Purani: Could it be the result of Karma that France is being defeated and overrun?
Sri Aurobindo: Of course there is past Karma, but it is not fixed. It can be counter-balanced by the right Karma at present or it can exhaust itself through suffering. Even if France is conquered now, she can rise again through the exhaustion of her Karma by suffering. New forces can come into play.
Nirodbaran: In that case England also has a heavy Karma to pay for.
Sri Aurobindo: Oh yes. It has to be seen what she does.
Nirodbaran: If England had given India freedom, wouldn’t that have counted morally?
Sri Aurobindo: Certainly, it would have had a great moral value for her.
Purani: Apart from that it would have been a great benefit from the practical point of view.
Nirodbaran: That, of course, but I am talking of moral and spiritual values.
Purani: It seems Suryakumari or somebody else brought some French coins to the Mother; on seeing them the Mother said, “What coins are these? I don’t know them. They seem to be the coins of a ruined country.” It was after the Munich pact.
Sri Aurobindo: I didn’t know about it. But when France betrayed Czechoslovakia the Mother said that France was condemned.
Nirodbaran: Do you foresee all possibilities?
Sri Aurobindo: The possibilities can be foreseen but we don’t accept them as fixed or inevitable. They can be changed.
Purani: Reynaud should not have resigned.
Sri Aurobindo: What could he do? He is unpopular in France. And he is not a military man. He could have made a coup d’etat and arrested all these people, but he must have felt that the nation would not be behind him.
Now two things can save the world: one is Hitler’s death and the other is if Hitler exhausts himself so much that he has to wait before farther adventures. In that case time will be gained.
Nirodbaran: If America and Russia joined with England, the three of them would make a formidable combination.
Sri Aurobindo: That is common sense. But nobody listens to common sense. Even if Hitler dies, there is Stalin. And if Stalin invades India, Subhas Bose and Nehru will oppose him, perhaps.
Nirodbaran: I wonder what Hitler’s next move will be.
Sri Aurobindo: Yes, it will be interesting to see what he does next.
Nirodbaran: Not likely that he will go to the Balkans, as it will involve him with Russia. He will now avoid friction with Russia and America.
Purani: America, of course, and America won’t come in unless a variety of odd incidents happen: for instance, the sinking of an American ship.
Sri Aurobindo: Hitler will never do that. The Asura who guides him knows very well what would happen then.