The Illogic of Empire

On March 6, 1947, not long after Britain had set a timetable for withdrawing both its troops and administration from India, Winston Churchill rose to speak in the House of Commons.

"The government by their fourteen-month time limit have put an end to all prospect of Indian unity," he said, denouncing this cut-and-run philosophy as "Operation Scuttle." "How can one suppose that the thousand-year gulf which yawns between Muslim and Hindu will be bridged in fourteen months?... How can we walk out of India in fourteen months and leave behind us a war between 90 million Muslims and 200 million caste Hindus? ... Let us not add--by shameful flight, by a premature, hurried scuttle--to the pangs of sorrow many of us feel, the taint and smear of shame."

Sound familiar? Sixty years and some flowery rhetoric may separate Churchill's speech from George W. Bush's recent address, but arguments for maintaining colonial rule in India are almost identical to the justifications offered for the continuing presence of US troops in Iraq and escalation of the war.

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