Arth Of War

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http://esamskriti.com/html/new_essay_page....&cid=165&sid=84

[Guest]

Has this been posted before ?

http://muse.jhu.edu/demo/journal_of_milita...7.1boesche.html

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>The wisdom of Mahabharata </b>
Hiranmay Karlekar
Most Indian intellectuals are familiar with Lord Acton's famous observation, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." How many of them know of Bheeshma's observation on power in the Mahabharata? According to the Great Epic, Yudhishtira approaches the Kuru patriarch as lies on his bed of arrows, waiting for the Sun to begin its northward journey, to die, and requests to be told about the dharma of a king. His intense pain removed, and clarity of thought restored, by Krishna's blessing, Bheeshma begins to answer Yudhishtira's many questions, and says in response to one that power "changes men. A man who was scrupulously honest, can be corrupted by power and become dishonest" (Ramesh Menon, The Mahabharata: A Modern Rendering, Vol II, Rupa, 2004, pp 595-96).

While historians have debated as to when The Mahabharata was written, it was beyond doubt centuries before Lord Acton's (1842-1902) perceptive observation in a letter to a friend. Yet, this writer cannot think of a single Indian intellectual who has quoted Bheeshma on power while he can recall several of them quoting Lord Acton. Few other instances, perhaps, illustrate more poignantly the alienation of a large section of Indian intellectuals from their own intellectual and cultural well springs and identification with those of the West.

All this is not to belittle Lord Acton's astute observation or the intellectual and cultural traditions of the West, which, revived and enriched by the knowledge revolution since the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, has given modernity to the world. What merits criticism is an obsessive admiration for the West that leads to the neglect of India's own intellectual and cultural heritage, its great epics and monumental works of religion and philosophy. For one thing, it would mean the non-utilisation of the wisdom, insights, customs and practices that have evolved in the matrix of the country's history. Familiar to most people, these could be useful for promoting the kind of enlightened values a society needs for its progress, and framing policies as well as strategies for implementation. For another, pride in a country's achievements, which can only come through awareness of these, gives a nation a sense of destiny that enables it to find its rightful place in the world.

It must, however, be a pride tempered by wisdom and morality so that it does not become arrogant and exploitative chauvinism but a source of self-confidence making for triumph over even the most challenging odds. Also, it must be accompanied by knowledge, which enables a country to recognise its national interest, shortcomings, the greatness of the culture and intellectual traditions of other nations, and what it can profitably learn from these.

In India's case, the need to draw from its own repositories of wisdom is all the greater given the profound treasures they contain. <b>The Mahabharata is a striking example. While The Bhagavat Gita overwhelms with its breathtaking encapsulation of the metaphysics of The Upanishads and the grandeur of its metaphors, Bheeshma's answers to Yudhishtira's questions reflect a deep understanding both of the compulsions of realpolitik that would impress Chanakya as well as the high-minded morality that kings must practice.</b>

Bheeshma's answers to Yudhishtira cover a wide range of subjects including a king's virtues and his attitude toward his subjects, the appointment of his advisors, and the qualities to be sought in them and other important functionaries of the State. They also cover the character of his administration and matters like the deployment of spies. Some of his have a remarkable contemporary applicability. Those appointing judges should remember that honest and fully trustworthy men should be appointed to administer justice, and that the nation would become weak if the judges were corrupt. Leaders of political parties choosing candidates for elections to legislatures should bear in mind that legislators should not only be honest and sincere but "have the courage of the truth with them all the time" (Menon, Vol II, p 596). And, of course, Finance Minister P Chidambaram should remember that a "good king levies taxes as a bee gathers pollen from flowers, gently, without injuring the people" (Menon, Vol II, p 597).

Apart from Bheeshma's answers to Yudhishtira, there are pronouncements by Krishna (besides those in The Bhagavat Gita), Vidura and Sanjaya that are highly relevant to the management of the affairs of the State in today's world. What explains this is perhaps the fact that these feature not in a vacuum but in the midst of the unfolding of a profound epic that is a mirror to its contemporary society and has at its heart a gigantic conflict between the forces of Dharma and Adharma. Hence it not only tells what should be but what actually is in a highly imperfect world. Thus, in the Bheeshma Parva, it relates how, on the eve of the battle of Kurukshetra, the commanders of the Pandava and Kaurava armies meet and lay down the norms of honourable combat. One, however, encounters violations galore as the narrative unfolds the manner of Bheeshma, Abhimanyu, Drona and Karna's killing, and the nocturnal murder by Dhrishtadumnya and others by Ashwatthama, Kripa and Kritavarman being the most notable.

Also, The Mahabharata has stunning insights into the future. Thus Rishi Markandeya says that the kings of the Kali Yuga, which descended on the earth on the tenth day of the battle of Kurukshetra and prevails even today, "will be short-lived, greedy and rapacious", and that "wealth alone will confer nobility, regardless of a man's birth or his character; power will define virtue". Also, "Arrogance and sin will pass for wisdom and righteousness, brashness and a loud voice for scholarship. Only the poor will have any honesty of virtue left, and the powerful will make life so miserable for them that they, too, will become corrupt." More, "Terrible wars and demonic diseases will decimate the human race, and savage cold and scathing heat, scorching droughts and sweeping floods will terrorise the people...." (Menon, Vol I, pp 665-69).

Did Rishi Markandeya foresee global warming, AIDS and Katrina, which savaged New Orleans in the US? One does not know. It is unwise to read too much into past events and observations in the light of later developments, particularly since in an epic like The Mahabharata one does know where facts end and fiction takes over. One thing, however, is certain. It is a great treasure chest of wisdom and insights and the country will be the loser if it continues to ignore it.
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[ramana]

Link: ARTHASHASTRA AND SUNZI BINGFA

From the e-Book Across The Himlayan Gap.

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->ARTHASHASTRA AND SUNZI BINGFA

V. R. Raghvan

<b>An attempt to understand the strategic outlook of two great nations like India and China would require an examination of many strands of history.</b> One most important strand would be the written account of the way the nations were protected from external and internal threats to their existence. India and China produced a unique pair of treatises, which allow us to examine strategic thoughts that guided their policies. <b>The classical treatises of Arthashastra and Sunzi Bingfa are specially suited to this examination, by the range, scope and emphasis of their outlook. </b>

Arthashastra and Sunzi Bingfa offer fascinating insights into the approaches to statecraft by two wholly different civilisations. It is nevertheless better to study them on their own terms instead of looking for commonalities. Arthashastra was conceived and named as the Science of Wealth. It focussed on creation of wealth as the means to ensure the well being of the state. Sunzi Bingfa is what might be called the Science of Decisive Results. The first covers a wide gamut of state-making activities. The second, while specifically directed towards winning a war, is indicative of the philosophy that should govern the activity of the state. <b>The two classics were products of their limes. In China, It was the period of Warring States, when various kings were contesting for supremacy within the pale of Chinese civilisation with nomadic horsemen threatening the frontiers. The Great Wall had yet to come up in its integrated shape and victory in war was seen as the best way to ensure the safety of the state. In India it was the time of post-Buddha warring kings. Alexander had visited, conquered a part of India and left behind strong satraps to rule the seized lands. These not very dissimilar circumstances nevertheless produced two contrasting doctrinal approaches to managing the state’s security.</b>

<b>In the western world, by the end of the 4th Century BC, the mighty armies of Persians (Darius) and Greeks (Alexander) had come and gone. The new model armies of the Romans had already created an empire. Hannibal’s campaign over the Alps with elephants had been conducted in 216 SC. Warfare had become an organised enterprise in all its aspects, viz., financing, organising, recruiting, tactics, generalship, logistics and training.</b> In China and India, prior to the 5th Century SC, warfare had remained ritualistic, either based on unorganised masses crashing into each other, or of feudal knights battling individually according to the rules of personal combat, e.g., the probity of Prakasha yudha. Chivalry and the warrior’s code took precedence over results. King Porus’ regal answer to Alexander on how a defeated king be treated is indicative of the altitudes that guided warfare. In China the King (Duke) of Song in 638 BC declined to attack till the enemy army was fully arranged and such a civility made him lose the battle. Mao Zedong was fond of saying, “We are not the Duke of Song.” Around the 5th Century SC, warfare had started getting organised into a method. By the 4th Century, warfare in both countries had become a “directed” affair.

In China, the King of Zhao had introduced the first major military reforms by 307 BC, by replacing the chariots with cavalry. By 299 BC the Shangjun Shu (sometimes also called Book of Shangjun) had been compiled. It formalised the views of the Legalists as opposed to the Confucian traditionalists. It saw war as inevitable and which must be won. It went on to say, “A wise ruler understands that he can attain surpremacy in the under-heaven only by victory and therefore obliges his people to serve in the army.” The theory of proportional dependence of a state’s power on its military success became the classic contribution of the Shangjun Shu The period of Warring States ended by 221 BC, Sunzi Eingfa gave a sharper edge to the Shangjun Shu and made war the first priority of the state: “War is a matter of vital importance to the state; the province of life and death: the road to survival or ruin. It is mandatory that it be thoroughly studied.”

A comparable emphasis on the military aspect of state policy did not emerge in India. The Arthshastra focussed on preservation of the state through alliances, and the elaborate and almost esoteric “Mandalas” by which to determine inter-state relations. It thus emphasised balance of power - a much maligned outlook today in India. Kautilya’s India looked at war as a feature of the state’s life, something to be lived with, almost as if one puts up with a chronic illness with the help of palliatives. The army was just one of seven elements that constituted the slate (king, ministers, land and people, towns and cities, treasury, forces, allies). War was treated as any other state enterprise and not considered vital as in Sunzi Singfa. Bulk of the army was made up with the help of guilds (shrenis). The mandala approach was applied even to the regular army. The army chiefs and other generals were given the full treatment of spies, surveillance and mutual suspicions. The location of the army was decided by the need to keep it divided and not on operational needs. Compared to Sunzi Bingfa, war in Arthashastra was more an ongoing effort instead of a climactic, decisive act to shatter the present and shape the future. The perils of indecisive and therefore protracted wars from which no country ever benefits, as advised in Sunzi Bingfa, were never quite understood in Indian strategic thought. It was to cost India dear throughout its history, and even in the modern post-Independence period. Even in recent times Mao Zedong emphasised protracted war as the people’s means to defeat the stronger tortes of a state. Arthashastra does not mention protracted war at all. Perhaps living in a protracted state of conflict had made the rulers and peoples inured to it.

Historical and state factors played a not insignificant part in the evolution of the contrasting strategic emphasis on matters of the nation’s safety. <b>Even in the age when the king was synoymous with the stale, India and China as kingdoms looked at threats to the state differently.</b> Chinese convictions about it being the civilised centre, or middle, against the barbarian periphery, led to the military emphasis of Sunzi Bingfa. India had by then absorbed numerous military and civilisational invasions. A culturally accommodative state had emerged which is reflected in the Arhashastras emphasis on alliances and spheres of influence.

Sunzi Bingfa emphatically related power to military strength. This special emphasis on the military as the indicator of national payer, continues to weigh heavily in Chinese thought in modern times. Mao’s immortal quote on political power growing out of the barrel of the gun, reiterates lhat emphasis even more tellingly man Sunzi Bingfa. Kautilya’s Arthashastra viewed good counsel and correct judgement as the constituents of power and as more useful than military might. One also wonders in the light of the history of the time, if Kautilya was not more concerned with the intellectual and moral qualities of Indian leadership of his time than their personal valour! Along with power the relative importance given to decisive action is another area of divergent outlook. Sunzi Bingfa places a high premium on decisive, even deterrent action. There is a clear preference for action directed towards decisive results. The story of the author of the Chinese classic, actually beheading a few concubines of the King of Wu while teaching them drill, to show how obedience is to be obtained may be apocryphal, but is indicative of the ruthless emphasis on decisive results. The Arthasbastra is almost managerial in its outlook on managing the affairs of the state.

The present may seem remarkably as a continuation of the past, if Indian and Chinese policies for the management of internal and external threats are any indication. <b>Arthashastra and Sunzi Bingfa really cannot and should not be compared but used as insights into the two great civilisations’ inspirations of state policies. They provide very useful clues to each other’s outlook on the role of the state. More than that, they offer pointers to the future management of relations with each other.</b> At the turn of the second millennium, when the need is more of interdependence than confrontation, Arthashastra and Sunzi Bingfa offer as good an understanding of what was done in the past, as of what can be achieved in the future. India and China will do well to learn from both the classics.
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After building up the pitch he cops out. Looks like the Indian elite rediscovered the Arthshastra in 1909 and after learing from it to giude in their freedom struggle and building up the nation state have not figured out how to deal with an alternate doctrinare state. The urgent lesson to learn is how to deal with China guided by -Shangjun Shu ->Sunzi Bingfa -> Mao's Red book while Indian has only the Arthshastra.
I am sure the key is in the book and requires a re-interpretation.

[Bharatvarsh]

From Sri Krishna Deva Raya's political treatise:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Burn the kingdom of your enemy and seize his forts. If
his wives happen to fall into your hands, treat them as you
would treat your sisters and daughters. In the presence of his
envoys, do not litter harsh words about him, for you may be
obliged to conclude peace with him,

Pg 180.

http://dli.iiit.ac.in/cgi-bin/Browse/scrip...e=2020050057298<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

Does Arthashastra say anythig about how should king fight against the enemy resorting to gurilla warfare like the terrorists are doing in present days?

[Sunder]

<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Sep 11 2006, 08:56 AM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Sep 11 2006, 08:56 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Does Arthashastra say anythig about how should king fight against the enemy resorting to gurilla warfare like the terrorists are doing in present days?
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Yes. The Arthashastra talks about different types of warfare "Prakasha Yuddha" (Overt Warfare, "Koota Yuddha" (Covert war), Mantra Yuddha (Diplomacy and Propaganda warfare), "Guda Yuddha??" (Guerrilla warfare, Assassinations etc.)

I also remember reading that a Vijigishu (conquerer) should also encourage the tribals to start skirmishes in border areas. It has been a while since I had read the Arthashastra.

[Guest]

Krishna's War Ethics

[Guest]

Kautilya for the 21st century
Relevance of Kautilya for Today: Dr K.S. Narayanacharya;
preface by S. Gurumurthy;
Kautilya Institute of National Studies, Mysore, pp 146, Rs 150.00

[ramana]

<!--QuoteBegin-ramana+May 22 2007, 08:21 PM-->QUOTE(ramana @ May 22 2007, 08:21 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->A collection of Kautilya's Maxims

and
Kautilya's Arthasastra on War and Diplomacy in Ancient India


Amazon Book link The First Great Political Realist: Kautilya and His Arthashastra

<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The First Great Political Realist is a succinct and penetrating analysis of one of the ancient world's foremost political realists, Kautilya. <b>Kautilya's treatise Arthashastra stands as one of the great political books of the ancient world, its ideas on the science of politics strikingly similar to those of Thucydides, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Clausewitz, and even Sun Tsu. Roger Boesche's excellent commentary on Kautilya's voluminous text draws out the essential realist arguments for modern political analysis and demonstrates the continued relevance of Kautilya's work to modern Indian strategic thinking and our understanding of the relationship between politics and economics</b>.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

and

Online version of Arthasasthra @ U Penn
[right][snapback]69214[/snapback][/right]
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[Guest]

The serial 'Chanakya' is being aired on 9X channel on Sundays at around 9:00-10:00 in the morning.

If anybody has a TV tuner card then please record it.

Thanks.

[ramana]

Capt. Interesting article but how is it related to the the thread topic which is about Chanakya's Arthashastra? Please exercise some thread control. Thanks, ramana

And Geet one can get the DVD in any Indian store and youtube has relevant videos.

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-ramana+-->QUOTE(ramana)<!--QuoteEBegin-->And Geet one can get the DVD in any Indian store and youtube has relevant videos.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

OK, then those who dont have access to broadband internet or those DVD's they can watch it on TV.

[Guest]

Is this book available online? When I search on google, I get stuff written about AS, but I am looking for the text itself, translations and all. I'd be grateful if someone can post a link, if any.

[ramana]

You seem to be new member. We have a thread on Arthsashtra. See page 3

http://www.india-forum.com/forums/index.ph...wtopic=745&st=0

Next time please ask any question in the Misc thread and not open a thread.


Also there are many compilations of Arthasashtra on the net. Look up U Penn.

[Guest]

The Bhagavadgītā and War According to Madhva

The Bhadavadgītā at War