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> If India was so great it's smaller immediate neighbor wouldn't be so hostile towards it, and friendly to CCP. I'm assuming by small country you meant Pakista

> If India was so great it's smaller immediate neighbor wouldn't be so hostile towards it, and friendly to CCP. I'm assuming by small country you meant Pakistan. If so, this couldn't be further from truth. Pakistan isn't hostile toward India because India isn't great; the reason is in the reason of its creation and a relentless need to justify that reason. Pakistan came into existence based on an idea that Muslims couldn't survive in a democratic nation with majority Hindu population as Hindus would be a de-facto rulers. (Although this argument has turned out to be a completely false as in India the population of Muslims have grown from 8% to 14%+ after independence. On the other hand, minority population - Hindus/etc. - have declined considerably in Pakistan.) Be it culture, history or language, Pakistan has most things common with India. If there's piece between both, people would soon start questioning reason to stay separate - together both can be a great powerful nation on the world. Many outside interests (read super-powers) wouldn't like this to happen so they keep fueling aggressive elements. Similarly, rulers of Pakistan can't allow this to happen for obvious reason. Till date, you can hear their leaders justifying separation from India in their speeches by highlighting some stray incident happened with some Muslim in India.

polotics 6y ago
Spot on! Don't you think it's interesting to see the current Chinese ruling class's propaganda on HN always harping on their dreamed up superiority of top-down social organisation? Completely oblivious to the value of chaos. One hope they will learn.
fmajid 6y ago
Not to mention (West) Pakistan waged a genocidal war against its coreligionists in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) when the East Pakistani Awami League political party won the elections. That said, the fears of Jinnah and the Muslim League were far from unfounded. While Gandhi was not hostile to Muslims like the VHP/RSS who ended up murdering him, his vision of India accorded them a subordinate role at best, as with the untouchables. India has always been a pluralist place, and it is not ethnically homogeneous like China (genetically India is composed of a few hundred population clusters that have endogamy higher than 99.9%, higher than Ashkenazi Jews, for example). That's why India is unlikely to ever get a strong centralizing state like China. That also why democracy is a hardy weed in India, and may prove more resilient than the authoritarian Communist regime based on naked force on the other side of the Himalayas. Even the worst disturbances in modern Indian history, around the time of Partition, pale in comparison with the death toll of Mao's Great Leap Forward or his Cultural Revolution.

polotics 6y ago

Spot on! Don't you think it's interesting to see the current Chinese ruling class's propaganda on HN always harping on their dreamed up superiority of top-down social organisation? Completely oblivious to the value of chaos. One hope they will learn.

fmajid 6y ago

Not to mention (West) Pakistan waged a genocidal war against its coreligionists in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) when the East Pakistani Awami League political party won the elections. That said, the fears of Jinnah and the Muslim League were far from unfounded. While Gandhi was not hostile to Muslims like the VHP/RSS who ended up murdering him, his vision of India accorded them a subordinate role at best, as with the untouchables. India has always been a pluralist place, and it is not ethnically homogeneous like China (genetically India is composed of a few hundred population clusters that have endogamy higher than 99.9%, higher than Ashkenazi Jews, for example). That's why India is unlikely to ever get a strong centralizing state like China. That also why democracy is a hardy weed in India, and may prove more resilient than the authoritarian Communist regime based on naked force on the other side of the Himalayas. Even the worst disturbances in modern Indian history, around the time of Partition, pale in comparison with the death toll of Mao's Great Leap Forward or his Cultural Revolution.