Perhaps that is what you are saying though I guess I am trying to make the distinction between Gandhi being lucky in that his non violent nature led him to non-violent resistance and that just happened to be the most effective strategy and Gandhi after looking at the situation saw that non violence was the most effective strategy and if it hadn’t been he would have adopted a violent approach.

The reason why I don’t see him as a “man of peace” but instead a genius in assessing a situation and then providing the most effective strategy was his participation in the First World War.

During the First World War, he eagerly helped Great Britain with men, money and munitions. He had hoped that by doing that England would start treating Indians as equal members of the British Empire with the same rights as other British subjects.

It was only after he saw that this didn’t work that he became the “Half Naked Fakir” as Winston Churchill called him. Gandhi adopted this persona specifically because he understood how to use the “cult of personality” to maximum effect.

Don’t get me wrong Gandhi was a genius. To be able to assess a situation so accurately and develop such a successful strategy and through the “cult of personality” be able to put the strategy into effect takes much intelligence and talent. He is truly deserving to be considered one of the greatest leaders of all time.

But he wasn’t a man of peace. And there is one quote that time and time again I see taken out of context. That quote is “an eye for an eye makes the world blind”. He didn’t mean it in an absolute sense. He was referring to the situation India found itself in with England. As long as Indians responded with violence the world would just see “violence begetting violence” and not understand how England was the one responsible for the violence. The world would be blind to that.

But if the Indians reacted non-violently then it would be quite clear who was responsible for the violence. It also made England’s greatest advantage over Indian a liability. England’s greatest advantage of course was its military strength. But if they used their military and Indians responded non-violently then it actually hurt England’s position in the world’s (and their own domestic populace’s) eyes. So they couldn’t use the military as much, which reduced the advantage they had.

Gandhi was brilliant, no doubt one of the most brilliant leaders ever. But if non-violence would have not been effective against the British as it would have not been against the Nazis or the Soviet Union, Gandhi would have without a doubt understood that and been a strong proponent of violence.

And he would have probably wore more clothes, like a military uniform or something like that and would have adopted a different persona.

Thanks for your great comments. Appreciate you taking time for this good discussion.

I agree with you 100% that non violence would not have worked against Hitler. But that’s my whole point. If you read my concluding sentence, non violence was a smart solution for that situation.

By the law of survival of the fittest (strategist), Gandhi would not have survived the Nazis, but in that case Gandhi’s followers would not face the moral dilemma they faced against British people either. So both sides would resort to outright violence as strategy.

That’s exactly what happened when British people tried to crush Quit India at it’s root in 1942. Violence begot violence.

About West disparaging. The point is not to disparage West in general. I am specifically targeting colonialism.

The fact is that people don’t like being denied the choice of their own destiny. Period.

We don’t even have to go advantages and disadvantages of colonialism. People like to be themselves far more than they like to be modern or developed.

I won’t argue that individual Indians should resort to terrorism, neither would I argue that as a nation, India’s policy towards Britain should be based on the shadows of the past. But To expect people to not to feel bitter is simply not fair. It’s going to take more time to clear hearts and minds fully.

I do respect Gandhi but I don’t think his ideas could have worked if he hadn’t been going up against the British or a similar country. It was the same shock of the American people at Martin Luther King. Had either one gone up against some truly tyrannical government and people they would have have been slaughtered outright no matter how peaceful they had been.

I say this only to say that non violence can only work in certain situations, sometimes and sadly violence is a necessary evil, and I would say last resort. It was good that it didn’t have to get very far in this case.

To answer your question I think it was smart strategy but I think he really did believe what he said. A true test would have been to send him into The Soviet Union or Hitler’s Germany or one of the other backward despotisms of the last century, and see what he would have advocated. That however would be impossible because he wouldn’t have lived longer then ten minutes, nor would I wish that on anyone.

The trick now is to not disparage or overlook the good things learned or gained from the west because of the bad things and use what you can to take your rightful place among the nations of the world.