The March Of Folly by Barbara Tuchman

 

Those of us who haven’t studied history in detail, will find this book fascinating and remarkably educative though a trifle hard to work through. Reading four hundred pages of serious prose in smallish print is never an easy task; it is however, well worth the effort in this case.

The author argues that the march of folly is characteristic of the actions of governments throughout history and that ‘holders of high office act contrary to the demands of reason and enlightened self- interest’ all too often. In essence, a dispiriting lesson of history appears to be that governments tend to commit acts of serious folly in their choice of policies and their implementation.

Plato has argued, in essence, that for good governance Kings should become Philosophers or else Philosophers should become Kings. Since neither of these has ever happened -the exceptions serve only to prove the rule -- folly has usually characterized the actions of great states.

To illustrate her thesis the author spells out, in great detail, four examples of mind bogglingly perverse and wooden headed state actions. The examples are chosen from Western history alone and include the incident of the Trojan Horse, the actions of the Renaissance Popes and the consequences thereof, the loss of Britain’s American Empire and the disaster that was America’s involvement in Vietnam.

To evoke curiosity if not interest in the book -- the prime purpose of this blog -- the folly that was America’s misadventure in Vietnam is briefly outlined.

When the Second World War ended, French pride was in tatters given France’s collapse in the face of Guderian’s panzers. To restore French self- esteem, President Charles de Gaulle felt it necessary to regain control of French colonies in Indo-China. To push the US president to help France in this context, Charles de Gaulle highlighted the danger to Europe and the ‘free world’ of Soviet expansionism and also underlined the importance of France as a shield against Stalin and his cohorts. Fear of Soviet ambitions in Europe and elsewhere overcame Roosevelt’s personal opposition to colonialism, and US involvement in Indo China began.

A week after the Japanese surrender in August 1945 Ho Chi Minh leading the Viet Minh, declared Independence and a conflict that was to last three decades and cause humongous losses to human life and property, began.

At the start, French troops with US assistance, arrived in Vietnam and began a brutal attempt at suppression of the Vietnamese independence movement. They did not succeed, however, and the debacle at Dien Bien Phu spelt the end  of the French attempt to regain control of their erstwhile colony. Vietnam was ’partitioned’-a “provisional demarcation not constituting a political or territorial boundary” by the Powers that be on the basis of a Geneva Accord in 1954.

The US political establishment, pushed by the Anti Communist hysteria of the far right, had convinced itself that it was in US’s National Interest to resist the Red Peril everywhere in the world , even in far away Vietnam and surrounding areas.

As a consequence, from ‘assisting’ and ‘advising’ in the war against Communism and Uncle Ho, the US segued over time, into taking over the war from the French. They set up a client in South Vietnam -- a corrupt, ineffective and unpopular regime - and flooded the area with advisors, black ops and massive air support. The creeping escalation of US involvement can be seen from the fact that by end 1962 there were 11000 US troops in Vietnam and less than a year later 17000. All of these were, of course, for ‘training’ and ‘logistics support’. Despite repeated advice from noted experts the US, commitment to its very undeserving client did not waver; nor did the conviction that it was in the US’s ‘national security interest’ to continue a distant and hugely expensive war.

Once Lyndon Johnson became President in late 1963, matters escalated. The US establishment seriously underestimated the Vietnamese determination to fight for Independence and to resist the horrific bombing that Operation Rolling Thunder unleashed on North Vietnam. The assumption that the ‘slopes’ could be bombed into submission proved wrong and all the Napalm and the defoliants and the regular ordinance could not end the conflict. US troops were sent in greater number by mid 1965 onwards. By mid 1967, 463000 US troops were in Vietnam and 70000 more were asked for.

The war dragged on and since the draft excluded those pursuing higher education, it was largely the poor and the ill-educated that ended up in Vietnam -- those who could make their way into ‘higher education’ did so and the others went to war!

As the costs mounted and public pressure to end the war increased, the American establishment’s determination to not loose a war and thereby loose face, weakened. Negotiations to try and end the conflict, to try and salvage ‘peace with honor’ began in 1968 and by 1972 most American combat troops had left Vietnam. In 1975 the South was overwhelmed and the war came to an end.

The numbers(American of course), howsoever accurate, were--45000   dead and 300000 wounded and approximately $20 billion spent every year for ten years. Since American involvement, in various forms, lasted 30 years, the real cost in both men and material was probably much higher.

Aspects of American folly in Vietnam can be summarized as under:

The invention of endangered national security interests, assumption of the omnipotence of American power and American arms, refusal to accept the hard facts on the ground and sage advice of experienced diplomats and soldiers and a gross underestimation of the North Vietnamese commitment to their goals.

The folly of the British ruling classes in their dealings with their American colonies, the folly of the Renaissance Popes and the folly of a succession of American Presidents and their cohorts for three decades after WWII all underline the disastrous possibilities inherent in the concentration and exercise of political power. Power not only corrupts, but also leads to ‘a failure to think’ and the sense of responsibility that must accompany power fades as the accumulation and use of power increases.

A few interesting quotes that may evoke a sense of déjà vu amongst some, are a good way to end this post.

About Phillip II of Spain a historian remarked ‘No experience of failure of his policies could shake his belief in its essential excellence.’

‘Louis XIV was considered a master monarch because people tend to accept a successfully dramatized self-estimation. His capacity for tolerating differences atrophied and he acquired the Disease of Divine Mission. All the King heard was praise.’

‘The trappings and impact of power deceive us, endowing the possessors with a quality larger than life. The reality is that they are like ordinary men, often acting unwisely, foolishly, perversely as people often do.’

To reiterate, the book is not easy to read but very well worth the effort.

Happy reading.

 

A Kashmir Holiday

Kashmir is mindbogglingly, breathtakingly and heartbreakingly beautiful. The adjectives are chosen after due consideration. The mind finds it difficult to absorb and describe the beauty, hence mindboggling; the beauty -- especially of the high valleys, clear frothing blue-grey river waters  and the looming snow dusted mountains -- is like a punch in the solar plexus hence breathtaking and all this is experienced in the shadow of the gun and a faint but all- pervading miasma of bitterness, suspicion  and potential violence, hence heartbreaking.

But life flows on despite the machine guns, the spot checks, the traffic jams to make way for armed forces convoys and the undercurrent of fear that is inevitable in such an environment. Children walk to school chattering, horsing around and checking their cellphones as children do everywhere on earth; the apple crop is ready to be harvested and the walnut crop is drying by the roadside, to be sacked and loaded onto tempos for transportation to the markets. I was told the growers get one rupee per walnut! Compare this with walnut prices in Delhi and one realizes the gap between retail price and returns to the agriculturist who has surplus to sell.

Srinagar has the Dal Lake amongst many other attractions and a cynical outsider could be pardoned for assuming that the houseboat experience on the Dal would be an unpromising, touristy experience with smelly stagnant water, unprepossessing facilities and aggressive vendors peddling cheap junk — and one would be quite wrong!!

The Srinagar lakes are in a bowl with mountains looming over them and the impact of it all was quieting.

The best veg food we had in our seven days in Kashmir was on board a houseboat; the water in which we were moored was not smelly at all and the shikara ride was quite a joyful experience. Vendors did approach but did not persist when we showed no interest and were uniformly polite and not pushy at all.

 The morning came to consciousness (my apologies to the poet) slowly and softly with the odd shikara going about some early business on an otherwise empty water surface.

And slowly the stirrings of commerce were felt with the smell of wildflowers brought up to the side of our houseboat as we sipped tea and soaked in the silence. The price mentioned for a bunch of flowers was high but we paid it quite gladly – we were happy to give back, in our small way, for the experience that was simply there for the taking.

After a day on the Dal we drove to the valley of the Lidder. In other words, to Pahalgam and points beyond -- Aru Valley, Betab Valley and Chandanwadi (where the Amarnath Yatra starts).

The Lidder flows down from glacial heights in two streams that meet in Pahalgam -- the Aru valley lies on one arm and Chandanwadi and Betab Valley on the other.

Our hotel was located downstream from Pahalgam -- a sparkling new little gem of a place with a superb view down the valley from front facing windows. Construction of another hotel on an adjoining terrace blocked off the valley view from the side. Very modern heavy-duty trucks were ferrying building material down the hillside and obviously several terraces had been sold for construction -- the fruit trees on them were dying and the fruit withering on the branches.

The cynic in me saw the onset and determined progress of the Naini-Tal, Bhim Tal syndrome: the shades of green -- thick stands of tall pine and other trees -- flowing down the valley of the Lidder will very soon be replaced by a cascade of colorful concrete flowing alongside the Lidder. It would perhaps be wise to get a view of nature at its beautiful best in the region before it is butchered on the altar of tourism promotion.

The Aru valley is a short drive from Pahalgam and absolutely mind blowing. The road ends there and a gently sloping valley reaches up to the foot of soaring mountains, the tops of some of which were lightly dusted with snow. It is a place to just sit around, look and absorb nature at its spectacular best while ignoring the tourist trash on the ground --the ubiquitous empty plastic packs of snack foods that herald the onset of development and the success of marketing strategies of Multinational food processing companies.

A piece of friendly advice -- do not buy ‘pashmina’ stoles from itinerant vendors here or anywhere else. Buy them and other great stuff -- dry fruits, pherans, shawls etc  from  known shops in Srinagar to be assured  of quality and reasonable  prices.

A feature of tourism in Kashmir is the penchant that tourists have of getting themselves photographed with pigeons sitting(sic) on themselves. The photographer carries a plastic basket with pigeons in them and approaches you singing ‘Masakkali, Masakkli..’!!And it obviously does give him  some revenue!

Not wanting to be memorialized in this fashion we requested one such entrepreneur for permission -- and the privilege -- of photographing him with his birds for the rate he was offering to photograph us.

The Betaab Valley is named after the film Betaab that was reportedly shot there. Essentiially it’s a big park alongside the gently flowing, blue-white Lidder -- no rocks here so no rough and tumble of frothing waters as can be seen at Chandanwadi.

The Lidder at Betaab Valley

The valley is a popular picnic ground and busloads of school children were making merry as were tourists with cameras and packets of chips. But despite the crowds, just sitting by the river and watching it flow created a space of silence around one for a short while.

And then there was Chandanwadi -- the starting point for the Amarnath yatra . Here too was the Lidder, but in a narrower, sprightlier more bubbly avatar, bouncing over rocks on a narrow streambed rushing downhill while tourists took selfies and ponies trudged up the track.

Yes, tourism in Kashmir includes a lot of sturdy ponies and a great deal of horseshit, which can be a trifle disconcerting for those of us unused to animal excrement liberally decorating roads/paths in several places.

From the Chandanwadi Parking lot

The start of the path

The horses and the trash by the path

From the Pahalgam region it was back to Srinagar for some shopping and a trip to Doodhpathri, a magnificent expanse of green meadows, a

white-water river, towering mountains all around and yes, loads of tourists, locals picnicking and, of course, horses.

The drive to Doodhpathri, once one is out of the urban clusters and into the wilderness, is an experience in itself -- nature wild, green and overwhelmingly beautiful! Words do fail one; one is pushed to using all the seemingly trite words and hackneyed phrases which are simply grossly inadequate to describe what one experiences.

A practical observation: everybody we interacted with -- drivers, vendors, hotel and restaurant staff, salespersons in shops, shikara  boatmen….. were polite, considerate and pleasant; a very agreeable change from the aggression one has to deal with all too often elsewhere.

One cannot ‘do’ Kashmir in a hurry. One has to spend time just being there: walking around, checking out the treks if one is sprightly enough, shopping…and absorbing it all slowly. And one has to do it before it is all swallowed up in colorful concrete and plastic wrappers.

While Kashmir is definitely expensive, the products it is justly famous for -- walnuts, shawls, stoles and not to forget, walnut brownies from a particular shop in Srinagar -- can be bought at a fraction of the price one pays for them in Delhi and the quality is way way superior.

Do visit Kashmir -- it is well worth the expense and effort.

Mindboggling, breathtaking, heartbreaking, quite, quite overwhelming.

Some Perspectives

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Two poems from a volume titled Nanda Devi

 

More than thirty years ago, my father, Satish Datt Pandey, published a slim volume of poetry in Hindi titled Nanda Devi. Today, listening to Lata Mangeshkar's 'Ae mere watan ke logon' brought to mind two of my favourite poems from Nanda Devi. The context in both cases is similar -- the 1962 war in case of the song and the 1971 war in case of the poems.

Happy reading!

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