India's Ad Hoc Arsenal - Publications - SIPRI

8 INDIA'S AD HOC ARSENAL'native' subjects and, from the other direction, Indians were able to find acommon cause against the British, which encouraged nationalist sentiments.The lack of attention to events and trends outside the Indian sub-continentwas an important if understandable oversight on the part of the Indian nationalists.The geographic involvement of the Indian sub-continent in an emerginginternational system had come about almost a century earlier with the Treaty ofTilsit in 1807. This treaty represented an attempt by Napoleon Bonaparte toeliminate Russia from the European balance of power. In order to consolidateand preserve the Napoleonic empire, he had to isolate Britain, which could bedone most effectively by diverting Russia away both from events in Europe andfrom a possible alliance with Britain. Consequently Napoleon persuaded TsarAlexander I to accept the illusion that he could become Emperor of the Eastproviding France did not interfere. In return, Alexander would allow Napoleonto consolidate his empire in the West.The direct importance of the Treaty of Tilsit for the Indian sub-continent wasnegligible. However, it was not without indirect significance for two reasons.First, although Britain was able to check Alexander's expansion eastwardstowards Persia and the sub-continent, the geopolitical importance of Russia forIndia became an established fact which has barely altered since. Second, thesub-continent became for the first time an integral part of a wider geopoliticalframework. Hitherto India had been a largely imperial prize by virtue of itssize, remarkable wealth, raw materials, indigenous products and enviable markets.Essentially, the Indian sub-continent was an end in itself. The rise ofRussia and its role in the European balance of power, coupled with its geographicposition and potential for expansion to the east and the south, implicatedIndia in international political developments beyond South Asia. By theinitial decades of the 20th century the Indian intelligentsia had started torespond to geopolitical developments. External issues were far less subtle thanbefore and the interpreters within the INC more receptive than their predecessors.11. Independence, partition and the war of 1947During World War I Indian troops contributed to the British effort on theWestern Front and also served in Egypt and Iraq. The cost was considerable:62 056 Indian troops were killed during the war; fewer than 1000 wereofficers.6 The educated officers, at least, had some sense of why the BritishEmpire was at war with Germany and of the role of India, whereas the jawans(infantry soldiers) would have had little political understanding as to why,against whom and for what they were fighting. However, a significant gainduring this period for India was that the British rulers were forced to accept theimportance of the consent of their Indian subjects in the running of the IndianStatistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire During the Great War (War Office: London,1922).