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U.S Policy Toward India, 1940-50: an Indian Viewpoint

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U.S Policy Toward India, 1940-50: an Indian Viewpoint Click here for Full Issue of EIR Volume 22, Number 20, May 12, 1995 u.s policy toward India, 1940-50: an Indian viewpoint by Ramtanu Maitra ! The story of India's relations with the United States in this ers spearheading the independenC¢ movement, under the century is a complex one,full of promise,betrayed promises, banner of the Indian National Congress,were already known tragicallymissed opportunities,and endless manipulation by at the highest echelon of America's[establishment.Mahatma the British. This article analyzes the crucial period of the Gandhi's civil disobedience moveptent against the British Indian struggle for independence,from the angry interchange Raj in 1930 had drawn the attention! of Americans in general, i between Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill over In­ and the defiance of Gandhiji (as heI is known in India) of the dia policy in 1941,through the maneuvers and duplicity of British salt tax was compared by sOIpe in the American media the Anglophile faction in American diplomacy later on, to the Boston Tea Party.But the Indian leaders were farfrom which earnedthe wrath of Indian indendence leader Mahatma being happy about America's polifies. Jawaharalal Nehru, Gandhi,giving rise to Gandhi's "Quit India " movement of who, in 1927, had described the United States as not only total civil disobedience against the British. racist but imperialist as well,criticized U.S.foreign policy Although the framers of the Constitution of the Republic toward Latin America at the Brussels InternationalCongress of India, draftedby the nationalist leaders and proclaimed in against Colonial Oppression and Imperialism the same year. 1950, twenty-nine months after India obtained indepen­ A year later, Nehru wrote: "It is the United States which dence, had drawn their inspiration from America, and al­ offers us the best field for the study of economic imperi­ though the outlines of India's Constitution are based on the alism." American Declaration of Independence of 1776, the first notable intervention by any American President vis-a.-viscol­ A changed environment onized India came about in 1942,after almost 185 years of However,the arrival of President Roosevelt on the scene British colonial rule over the country. changed the attitude of Nehruand qther Indian National Con­ For the sake of historical accuracy,one must note that in gress leaders significantly. President Roosevelt's New Deal 1792,the first American President,George Washington,had domestic reforms were widely acclaimed by the Indian Na­ sent Benjamin Joy to Calcutta, then the capital of British tional Congress. At the same time, the work done by J.J. India, as consul. However, there is no available evidence Singh,an emigre-turned-businessman in America,played a suggesting that any other American President from 1792 to key role in presenting the Indian �realities to the American 1942 was involved in any serious manner to question the elite. Singh's India League of America, established in the continuity of the British colonial rule over India. Despite a 1930s,produced the monthly Inditl Today and roped in such surfeit of missionaries from America,the building of hospi­ individuals as Albert Einstein, Hoory Luce,Philip Murray, tals,an inflow of visiting educators, and the publication in Richard Walsh, and Louis Fischer to serve on its board of 1927 of Katherine Mayo's book Mother India, which pic­ advisers.Jawaharlal Nehru,who Was then favorably impres­ tured Indian society as depraved, squalid, and without any sed with FDR,wrote an article iQ Foreign Affairs in 1938, redeeming virtue,little was heard about India from the seat and another in the Atlantic Monthly in 1940,articulating the of power in Washington. Indian viewpoint in demanding home rule for the security of During the period of little more than two decades that Asia in the wake of the growing Japanese imperialist threat. separated the two world wars,India's struggle for indepen­ Gandhiji's civil disobedience movement, centered dence began to draw the interest of a cross-section of Ameri­ around the salt tax,had already sh�en up the British Empire. cans who were mostly represented by the Civil Liberties By the mid-1930s,the British rulers had begun to talk about Union, Socialist Party members,missionaries from the Uni­ impending reforms necessary for India.The British establish­ tarian Church,and such organizations as the League of Op­ ment was holding extensive negotiations with Gandhiji,Neh­ pressed Peoples under Dudley Field Malone. ru,and other top-rung Indian leaders.Despite the bitter oppo­ By the time President Franklin Delano Roosevelt entered sition of a Tory backbencher, Winston Churchill, the the White House in the winter of 1932,India's political lead- Government of India Act of 1935 was passed and the stage EIR May 12, 1995 Special Report 53 © 1995 EIR News Service Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission strictly prohibited. Independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, known as "Gandhiji," with Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last British viceroy in India. l ; was set for the first provinciaielections in 1937. e,ndid,,, foc the U.S. Presid y in 1940, reported to e The Second World War broke out in 1939. The British American public that from CaJo eastward, the question of viceroy in India, Lord Linlithgow, without even holding a Indian independence confronte� him at every tum. Wilkie formal discussion with the Indian National Congress leaders, wrote: "The wisest man in C ina said to me: "When the promptly declared war against Germany on behalf of India. aspiration of India for freedom ras put aside to some future Although the Congress leaders were against the fascist re­ date, it was not Great Britain that suffered in public esteem gime in Germany, this ad hoc act by Linlithgow was rejected in the Far East. It was the Unitetl States." out of hand, and the Congress Party members in the provin­ In a memorandum prepared on May 5, 1941, U.S. Assis­ cial government resigne� en masse, protesting Linlithgow's tant Secretary of State Adolf A. Berle observed that India of insensitive conduct. necessity exerted a vast inftue ce upon the affairs of the As the Nazis swept through Europe in mid-1940, Win­ Middle East, and that it was imberative to secure her active ston Churchill replaced Neville Chamberlain as prime minis­ cooperation in the prosecution bf the war, by bringing her ter of Britain. The viciousness of the newly formed troika of into "the partnership of nations on terms equal to the other Churchill, Secretary of State Leo Amery, and Linlithgow members of the British Commonwealth."I It was at this time sowed the seed for the fateful partition of India and a never­ that British and Australian troops were being routed in North ending bloodshed between the Hindus and Muslims. It is Africa, the Nazis had gotten co�trol of Greece and Yugosla­ well known that both Linlithgow and Amery, mediocre indi­ via and were planning the invasion of Crete, and Churchill viduals with a strong colonial streak, despised both Gandhiji was pleading for American help!. and Nehru. With Churchill's ascension to power, the anti­ According to the U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull, I India hate campaign was pushed a notch upward, with the he and President Roosevelt "we e convinced that the Indians fatal ending in mind. Churchill refused to listen to the Indian would cooperate better with the British if they were assured National Congress leaders, warned against "the slippery of independence, at least after the war." At the same time, slope of concession, " and welcomed Hindu-Muslim differ­ however, Hull said that he and �esident Roosevelt accepted ences as a "bulwark against the British rule in India." that it was "a delicate question " as to how far the United States could push for Indian indbpendence, in view of Lon­ Growing demand for independence don's sensitivities on this issue. It is in this context, and with the growing threat of Japa­ nese Imperial Army marching right through Asia, that the Churchill vs. Roosevelt question of Indian independence was presented to the Ameri­ U.S. interest in India showed up in the most concrete can President in 1941. A year or so earlier, following a form in August 1941, at the m'd-Atlantic summit between whirlwind tour of the globe, Wendell Wilkie, the Republican FDR and Churchill. Prior to the meeting, John Winant, the 54 Special Report EIR May 12, 1995 American ambassador to London,suggested urging the Brit­ so strongly and at such length that he never raised it [India] ish to set a date for granting Indian "dominion " status. This verbally again." FDR's closest confidant,the liberal Anglo­ proposal was welcomed by Assistant Secretary Berle, but phile Harry Hopkins,whom Churchfll dubbed "Lord Root of was scuttled by Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles,who the Matter," said no American suggestions during the war conveyed to Winant that if the President wants to bring up the were "so wrathfully received as those relating to the solution issue,he would wish to discuss it privately and confidentially of the Indian problem." Robert SherWood,in his book Roose­ with Churchill. Incidentally,Berle, generally described as a velt and Hopkins, wrote: "It was ind�ed one subject on which New Deal liberal,had always favored exerting pressure on the normally broadminded,good-hu/nored, give-and-take at­ London "to explore the possibility of making India the equal titude which prevailed between fue two statesmen was of other members of the British Commonwealth."
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