Reality and Belief of Indian Military Affairs

Download or read book Reality and Belief of Indian Military Affairs written by K. K. Singh and published by K.K. Publications. This book was released on with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: India does not admit easily to broad generalizations. It is an extraordinarily complex and diverse society and Indian elites show little evidence of having thought coherently and systematically about national strategy, although this situation may now be changing. Despite India`s cultural greatness and longevity as a civilization, Indian history is often dimly perceived and poorly recorded; given an oral tradition in imparting past events and the destruction of most records, much of this history is difficult to verify. Until the middle of the eighteenth century, Indians knew little of their national history and seemed uninterested in it. Four principal factors help to explain Indian actions and views about power and security: Indian geography; the discovery of Indian history by Indian elites over the past 150 years; Indian cultural and social structures and belief systems: and the British rule. Geography has imparted a view of the Indian subcontinent as a single strategic entity, with various topographical features contributing to an insular perspective and a tradition of localism and particularism. India`s unique culture reinforced this unity and imparted, first, a tendency toward diversity and accommodation to existing realities and, second, a highly developed capacity to absorb dissimilar concepts and theories. This tolerance was strengthened by the caste system, which also helped maintain an extraordinarily durable system and ethic for social relations.