MAHATMA GANDHI On Terrorism And War Peter Rühe Jacket - front - inside: Introduction by Michael N. Nagler www.gandhimedia.org Jacket – front – inside: Mahatma Gandhi - the Father of the Indian Nation, and the Apostle of Nonviolence. He worked for India's independence from the British rule. And gave us the awesome power of nonviolence. A social reformer, he taught the world the eternal values of love and truth. His fight for human rights, protection of environment and religious tolerance was mankind's finest hour. This book introduces the reader to the thoughts and writings of Mahatma Gandhi on nonviolence, terrorism and war. It also presents a report about Gandhi’s two visits to the nonviolent army of Abdul Ghaffar Khan at the Afghanistan border. This army, called the Red Shirts, experimented with nonviolence to pacify this violence-stricken area in the 1940’s. The texts are supported by rare images of Gandhi from the archives of his family and associates. Jacket - back - inside: Peter Rühe specialized in the collection and conservation of visual material related to Gandhi. He presented multimedia events on Gandhi in many countries and has contributed to several TV productions. Rühe is the founder of the GandhiServe Foundation, Berlin and webmaster of the largest resource on Gandhi on the internet, GandhiServe’s Mahatma Gandhi Research and Media Service – www.gandhiserve.org Peter Rühe is the author of the book Gandhi – A Photo Biography, Phaidon Press, 2001. www.gandhimedia.org The writings by Mahatma Gandhi are published by permission of the Navajivan Trust, Ahmedabad - 380 014 (India). www.gandhimedia.org Dedicated to the Conscience of Humanity www.gandhimedia.org C o n t e n t s Contents Preface Introduction by Michael N. Nagler My Writings Gandhi on: Violence and Nonviolence War Terrorism Gandhi’s visits to the Afghanistan border First visit: May 1, 1938 – May 8, 1938 Second visit: October 5, 1938 – November 9, 1938 Glossary Literature Index Photograph Index www.gandhimedia.org Preface The world confronts an ever-widening increase of violence and the terrible loss of life in innumerable smaller and larger armed conflicts around the world. No region of the globe is exempt from the sourge of violence. The fear of different races, religions, nationalities, and ethnic identities continues to fan the flames of hatred and violence allover. Mahatma Gandhi, known as the father of independent India and the apostle of nonviolence, offers the twenty-first century a way out. He worked for India’s independence from the British rule. And gave us the awesome power of nonviolence. A social reformer, he taught the world the eternal values of love and truth. His fight for human rights, protection of environment and religious tolerance was mankind’s finest hour. This book introduces the reader to the toughts and writings of Mahatma Gandhi on nonviolence, terrorism and war. The selection of quotes have been carefully made from original sources. The book also documents Gandhi’s two visits to the nonviolent army of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan in the then North-West Frontier Provinces of India near the Afghanistan border. This army of 100.000 Pathans (Pashtuns), called the Red Shirts, experimented with nonviolence in order to pacify this most violent area of the Khyber Pass. This is a success story of heroism that comes when born fighters take to nonviolence. The Red Shirts exploded three myths: that non-violence can be followed only by those who are gentle; that it cannot work against ruthless repression; and that it has no place in Islam. The rare photographs of this visit of Gandhi hail from the archives of Gandhi’s family and associates and – except a few – are published here for the first time. May this book help to spread the message of nonviolence and create a better understanding of the personality of Gandhi about whom late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said: “If humanity is to progress, Gandhi is inescapable. He lived, thought, and acted, inspired by the vision of humanity evolving toward a world of peace and harmony. We may ignore him at our own risk.” Peter Rühe Berlin, September 2006 www.gandhimedia.org Introduction On April 8, 1929, a young man named Bhagat Singh entered the visitor's gallery of the Lahore assembly where many British and Indian officials were conferring, threw a bomb and began firing an automatic pistol. Singh, who had assassinated the British assistant superintendent of police at Lahore the previous December, was captured on this occasion and hanged in March of 1931. Gandhi, who had utterly condemned both these "dastardly" acts of violence, warned after the perpetrator was finally done to death: Bhagat Singh and his companions have been executed and have become martyrs. Their death seems to have been a personal loss to many. I join in the tributes paid to the memory of these young men. And yet I must warn the Youth of the country against following their example. We should not utilize our energy, our spirit of sacrifice, our labours and our indomitable courage in the way they have utilized theirs. This country must not be liberated through bloodshed. (Footnote: Find in Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi under New Delhi, March 23, 1931) No one loathed terrorism more than Gandhi. He stood to lose everything he had worked for with a single bomb, for he knew full well how rulers seize on the chance to condemn non-violent movements for the slightest infraction (as today's media will ignore a highly disciplined non-violent demonstration for hours, to seize on the odd outbreak of sabotage). But Gandhi's aversion to terrorism went much deeper. Terrorism is in many ways the worst form of violence. Indeed, it is often tinged with a kind of cowardice, which is even worse than violence, if anything can be. As one who dedicated his whole life to showing weary humanity the way out of violence he could not possibly condone one of its worst forms. Yet, as an American writer said recently, "terrorism cannot be condoned, but it can be understood." And therein lies both the subtlety and the contemporaneity of Gandhi's position. www.gandhimedia.org The major difference between Gandhi's views and the prevailing U.S.-led reaction to terrorism is that no matter how much terrorism sickened him (I am not being hyperbolic; there are eye-witness accounts of Gandhi being physically revolted by open violence), he did not hate terrorists. For him, precisely because he was nonviolent, the doer was never identified with his deed. Thus we find him pleading in vain with the Viceroy for commutation of the sentence of death for Bhagat Singh and his accomplices in 1930, and not just because it might make the misguided patriot a martyr: in the Mahatma's eyes, violence is violence whether handed down by a legally constituted court or hurled by a lone assassin. All life is sacred; all violence to life is desecration. It was by the same reasoningthat while he hated "from the bottom of my heart the system of government that the British have set up in India" and the way they kept it set up, he "refuse[d] to hate the domineering Englishman," just as he refused to hate the domineering Hindu. This refusal to dehumanize made it possible for Gandhi to, as we say, not condone but understand. He pleaded with the colonial government to listen to the voice, however hoarse and inarticulate, that was issuing from the deeds of their attackers: "Will you not see the writing that these terrorists are writing with their blood? Will you not see that we do not want bread made of wheat, but we want bread of liberty; and without that liberty there are thousands today who are sworn not to give themselves peace or to give the country peace." He did not ask that the terrorism be condoned (though he may have asked that the terrorist be spared); he asked most urgently that it be understood. Gandhi probably knew that his pleas would not bring concrete results, but acted in the faith that on some level they must tell on his audience and anyone listening. Any form of Satyagraha, as he said elsewhere, will eventually “force reason to be free” whether or not we see that freedom in our own lifetime. At the same time – this is also highly characteristic of nonviolence – no matter how strenuously he opposed the British overreaction he tried equally hard to hold back the overreaction of isolated Indians as youth, pariticularly in Bengal, ignored his advise and followed Bhagat Singh down the road of despair. All this could not be more pertinent to our own situation. Condemn terrorism, by all means, he urges, but condemn it even-handedly. Terror is terror, he would say today, www.gandhimedia.org whether it comes strapped to the body of a suicide bomber or launched from thousands of miles out of range onto targets that may just turn out to be civilians. If we are not to use violence to protect ourselves against such attacks, though, what on earth are we to use? The answer is on one level very easy: nonviolence is the only possible alternative. Otherwise we only add violence to violence, thus making the cycle of destruction endless, as many have begun to suspect. But most of us still have only a vague idea what exactly nonviolence is; in the hundred years since Gandhi launched it in South Africa we have barely begun to exploit the vast power for positive change that it holds. The situation is oddly similar to the great breakthroughs in physics that occurred at very much the same time: a handful of theoretical and applied physicists work with the reality of quantum science while the general public remains unshaken in its literally superstitious belief that all reality is material and outside the observer.