Non-Western Powers Colonizing India

I get the feeling that Divide and Rule is given far more credit than it deserves. Its not like any foreign ruler could come into India, play one kingdom against another and conquer the country.

The British managed to do that, not because of their policy but because of their technological superiority. After all, even a divide Indian empire could field an army many times the size of most European force. And if you look at the major battles between Indian and British forces (with the exception of Plassey), you'll see that the natives lost not because they were fighting amongst each other, but because they were unable to match the firepower of the Brits in the battlefield.

Neither the Chinese nor the Turks had that level of technological superiority over the native Indian Kingdoms.

Is that actually true? I haven't looked all that deeply into it, but I was always under the impression that the Europeans advantages over the Indian forces were based on tactical superiority and political maneuverings, rather than technological superiority.

And it really depends on the time period. The 19th century British had a decided technical advantage over Indians, Chinese and Turks alike. The 17th century British? Not as much. It wouldn't take much for the Turks or Chinese to achieve a level of technological superiority over Indian kingdoms.
 
Is that actually true? I haven't looked all that deeply into it, but I was always under the impression that the Europeans advantages over the Indian forces were based on tactical superiority and political maneuverings, rather than technological superiority.

Plassey is one example where political maneuvering played a crucial role. But even Plassey can't be considered as classic 'divide and rule'. In Plassey it was not the case where one Indian ethnic group was turned against another. It was just that the commander betrayed his own king to earn a hefty reward. It's actually pretty similar to the Ming commander opening the gates to allow the Manchus into China.

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And it really depends on the time period. The 19th century British had a decided technical advantage over Indians, Chinese and Turks alike. The 17th century British? Not as much. It wouldn't take much for the Turks or Chinese to achieve a level of technological superiority over Indian kingdoms.[/QUOTE]

IIRC, the Mughal and Maratha militaries was not that behind the Turks and Chinese, so it would take a lot for the Chinese or Turks to gain the same level of technological superiority that the Europeans enjoyed.
 
Sure, but Greek colonies in the western Mediterranean were hardly the centre of civilization in that period, they were the frontier. And I would argue that for most of the Middle Ages, the centre of Western civilization was centred around the Muslim Middle East and the Byzantine Empire, so my point still stands.

Neither of those are really Western, though. According to Huntington Islamic and Orthodox are their own civilizations...
 

Thande

Donor
Is that actually true? I haven't looked all that deeply into it, but I was always under the impression that the Europeans advantages over the Indian forces were based on tactical superiority and political maneuverings, rather than technological superiority.

This is true. The Indian armies were often superior to the British and other westerners in terms of technology, especially artillery: Indian artillery was better than British or European well into the early 19th century. As you say, Britain won because of a combination of political power plays and tactical superiority: primarily because the aristocratic Indian states only cared about cavalry and artillery and neglected their infantry, whereas the EIC trained its infantry to the same standard as the infantry-focused armies that fought in Europe.
 
Mainstream academia and media certainly do. You don't have to buy his argument to use his terminology.

We don't have to use his terminology either.

I have been much more influenced by the notion that "Western" culture can be traced from the cultures that ultimately descended from the Hilly Flanks agricultural region, which spread to Mesopotamia, Egypt, and beyond. So my conception of "Western" culture includes everything ancient Egypt, Greece, Persia, Rome, medieval Europe, the Islamic world and eventually Russia and the Western extensions in the Americas and beyond. This is in contrast with the other places where agriculture arose independently: China, northern India (maybe), New Guinea, Peru and Mexico (and, I believe, the eastern Sahara, but that was a bit of a writeoff).

This model is largely based on "Why the West Rules...For Now" by Ian Morris, and it admittedly has some issues. But I prefer it greatly to Huntington's "civilization" model, which was based almost entirely on the prejudices of an American scholar.
 
We don't have to use his terminology either.

I have been much more influenced by the notion that "Western" culture can be traced from the cultures that ultimately descended from the Hilly Flanks agricultural region, which spread to Mesopotamia, Egypt, and beyond. So my conception of "Western" culture includes everything ancient Egypt, Greece, Persia, Rome, medieval Europe, the Islamic world and eventually Russia and the Western extensions in the Americas and beyond. This is in contrast with the other places where agriculture arose independently: China, northern India (maybe), New Guinea, Peru and Mexico (and, I believe, the eastern Sahara, but that was a bit of a writeoff).

This model is largely based on "Why the West Rules...For Now" by Ian Morris, and it admittedly has some issues. But I prefer it greatly to Huntington's "civilization" model, which was based almost entirely on the prejudices of an American scholar.

I subscribe to the idea that Western Civilization doesn't emerge until the late period of the Roman Empire and doesn't solidify until the Great Schism. The ancient Egyptians, Mesopotamians, Hebrews, and the classical Greeks certainly had key influences, as did the medieval Muslim World and the Byzantines, but they themselves were not "Western". My idea of a "civilization" in this sense depends on how much interaction and shared cultural traits the comprising nations have with one another.

BTW, just because someone is American or British or any nationality doesn't make them any more or less biased than an individual of any other nationality.
 
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BTW, just because someone is American or British or any nationality doesn't make them any more or less biased than an individual of any other nationality.

Because his model was clearly based on his own personal prejudices and view of the world. Making the Hispanic world it's own civilization, but making the Islamic world a single civilizational bloc? "Africa" as a single civilization? I really don't have much respect for his categories and terminology.

Your view of the Western world is probably the most common view, though, the whole Catholic-Protestant Western Europe-Atlantic combine thing. It does have a lot merit to it.

Anyway, my original point was simply that I disagreed with the idea that throughout history "Europe and the Mediterranean" was one of the three main centres of civilization, but that rather it was "the Middle East and the Mediterranean, and later Europe".
 
Anyway, my original point was simply that I disagreed with the idea that throughout history "Europe and the Mediterranean" was one of the three main centres of civilization, but that rather it was "the Middle East and the Mediterranean, and later Europe".

I fully agree with that. There's a "continuum" of civilizations - or a continuum of cultures forming a civilization - which spans Europe, the middle East, North Africa and Russia, IMHO.

Now for the initial question whether other powers besides "Europeans" could colonize India, I'd say that post, say, 1600 there's only the Ottomans and the Chinese left which qualify for this (and quite frankly we could discuss whether the Ottomans are truly non-European).

For China, they were very uninterested in colonies IOTL. Furthermore, as proved by Zheng-He's expeditions, the Chinese would probably be content with being recognized as overlord but would not engage in direct rulership as the European colonial powers.

For the Ottomans, there are TLs on the board which have them conquer parts of India. Easiest way IMHO would be an Ottoman-Portuguese war in which the Ottomans conquer some or all Portuguese factories in India. Isn'T this what happened in your timline, Tormsen? Or do I confuse it again with that other timeline I read by Maverick?
 
Because his model was clearly based on his own personal prejudices and view of the world. Making the Hispanic world it's own civilization, but making the Islamic world a single civilizational bloc? "Africa" as a single civilization? I really don't have much respect for his categories and terminology.

Your view of the Western world is probably the most common view, though, the whole Catholic-Protestant Western Europe-Atlantic combine thing. It does have a lot merit to it.

Mind you, I don't think that all of Huntington's divisions work. For example, I don't understand why he lists the Anglo-Caribbean nations as a separate, non-Western bloc, yet at the same time claims that the Pacific Island nations are part of the Western World. The Sub-Saharan African and Latin American "civilizations" are tricky, too. Certainly, there's a lot of diversity in Latin America, and some countries are much more Western than others, like Argentina compared to Bolivia. I think Africa one was mostly based on colonial and post-colonial ties.

Anyway, my original point was simply that I disagreed with the idea that throughout history "Europe and the Mediterranean" was one of the three main centres of civilization, but that rather it was "the Middle East and the Mediterranean, and later Europe".

I agree with that.
 
If i'm not wrong, in the early middle ages Tibet expanded almost all over the course of the Ganges... so instead of Muslim invasion we can had an invasion from himalayan buddhism states ( Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet)
 
Wasn't Cochin or one of those bits in the south more or less a Chinese tributary at one point?

It's hard to say- IIRC the trouble is that there's not that much solid evidence. It's unclear if it was actually a regular tribute or an occasional one given by/to envoys. Remember, according to the Chinese view of the world, anything given to the Emperor is tribute. It's probably more accurate to see such things as state gifts to visiting envoys.
 
If i'm not wrong, in the early middle ages Tibet expanded almost all over the course of the Ganges... so instead of Muslim invasion we can had an invasion from himalayan buddhism states ( Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet)

Arguably Tibet could be considered part of the Indosphere, culturally speaking.
 
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