Lord Wavell

Monday, Jul. 16, 1945 Time

Soldier of Peace

In Simla last week, 21 Indians and one Englishman struggled to solve one of the world's most vexatious problems — giving self-government to India. The Englishman bore the resounding proconsular title of His Excellency, Field Marshal the Right Honorable Viscount Wavell (rhymes with naval) of Cyrenaica and Winchester. It mattered little that the title of Viscount of Winchester was as exotic in Simla as the Maharaja of Patiala would be in Wapping Old Stairs. In Lord Wavell was embodied the military might and the political glory of one of the only three great powers to survive the world's first total war.

The 21 Indians scarcely represented a nation at all. Chiefly Hindus and Moslems, they were members of violently hostile religious communities, mutually contemptuous, mutually recriminatory. But if they did not represent a nation, in the modern political sense, they represented something much greater. They represented India, one of the supreme symbols on the cultural horizon of mankind.

Ancient of Days. India, among nations, is the ancient of days. Before even China, there was India. Before human memory congealed from legend into record, India loomed from the unimaginable reach of time. Its landscape matched its origins —an immense wedge of the world, vast plains cracked by a too hot sun, vast jungles writhing with growth from too dense rains, vast cities melting under the unflagging onset of oblivion and the soft decay of stone itself, 400 million people pullulating in a too frantic drive to defeat the multiplicity of daily death.

Four thousand miles of all-but-harborless coast and the width of the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal shut off the Indian subcontinent from the western desert world of Semites and the eastern twilight world of Annamese, Cambodians and Malays. Along the north, the highest mountains in the world, the Himalayas, walled off India from the mass of Asia.

Capacity for Greatness. Every nation is obsessed with one problem which is the measure of its capacity for greatness: Egypt with immortality; Greece with beauty; Rome with administration and law; France with rationalism; Germany with war; Britain with the freedom of the individual man. India, islanded by sea and land, and haunted by the hourly wanton foreclosure of life by death, looked within and found that its obsession was the soul and its creator, the problem of good & evil. It embodied this vision in one of the world's great faiths (Buddhism) and in religious works of great power (the Vedas and Upanishads). India, under its squalor and its filth, its superstitions and its cruel ties, its babble of 75 languages and dialects and hodge-podge of peoples, its lethal famines and lethal wars, was nevertheless the most intensely spiritual area on earth.

In its obsession, it worshipped God under all forms, from inexpressible abstraction to inexpressible obscenity, from the monkeys which defiled villages and ruined precious crops, to the snakes which every year killed 20,000 people. More extreme devotees, the Jains, even placed cloths over their mouths and noses lest they breathe in and kill forms of life too minute for vision but nevertheless God-created.

Historic Irony. In 1750 this God-obsessed nation suffered one of history's supreme ironies: its conquest was begun by the world's No. 1 modern industrial power — Britain. For a century India supplied a large part of the capital wherewith Britain financed its industrial expansion and presently formed a big part of the market to which Britain sold its manufactures.

For two centuries tiny, remote Britain ruled India by the policy of divide and conquer. The differences between India's Hindus (256 million) and India's Moslems (92 million) were more than religious; they were almost organic. Says Moslem Dr. Aziz of the Hindus in E. M. Forster's A Passage to India'. "I wish they did not remind me of cow dung." Britain was suspected of setting the Moslem League against the Hindus, slowly acquiring political maturity as the majority in the All-India National Congress. Against the caste Hindus she played the 40 million Untouchables, whose very shadow, to a high-caste Hindu, is defilement. Against both she played the panoplied, privileged world of the Indian princes and the martial nations of the Sikhs and Gurkhas.

Inspired Discernment. Then in Natal, South Africa, (circa 1905), a lean, struggling, expatriate Hindu lawyer, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, had a political discernment of genius: in God-obsessed India the politics of liberation must take the form of a religious struggle. Doffing his European store clothes and donning a dhoti, the little man moved against the British Empire in the name of four principles: satyagraha (acceptance of Truth), ahimsa (non-violence), swadeshi (home industry), swaraj (independence). From then on, the history of Indian-British relations has been a long, painful procession of thousands of nonresisting Indian nationalists passing in & out of British jails, or under the lathis (staffs) of Britain's police.

Many of the Congress leaders who sat around the conference table with Lord Wavell at Simla last week had spent more time in the last few years inside than outside of his jails. Among them were the Congress Party's Moslem President Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (both newly released from jail), and the Congress Party's moderate, resourceful lawyer Chakravarti Rajagopalachariar. In the background hovered the little man in the dhoti, Mohandas K. Gandhi, freed over a year ago. He was not participating in the conference, but his influence permeated it. Also present were the Moslem League's dapper, fractious President Mohamed Ali Jinnah, the Sikh leader Tara Singh, the Punjab's nonLeague Moslem Premier Malik Khizar Hayat Khan Tiwana. But the man on whom, more than on any other, the future of 400 million Indians depended at this climax of 200 years of British rule, was the short, thickset, smiling, one-eyed, taciturn Englishman at the head of the conference table.

Soldier v. Non-Resister. Lord Wavell was the latest scion of a long line of soldiers. The name Wavell (spelled in 60 different ways) runs like a minor but recurring theme through a thousand years of British history. It begins with William de Vauville, a Norman kinsman of the Baron de Briquebec, who came to England with William the Conqueror. A De Vauville fought in the Crusades over the same Near East deserts where his famed descendant was to fight five centuries later. Three Wavells (the first in 1478) were Mayors of Winchester. Of a 17th Century Richard Wavell, preacher and friend of John Bunyan, it is recorded that "like Bunyan [he] was only too familiar with the inside of jails." A 19th Century Wavell discovered the mineral wavellite.

The past three generations of Wavells have produced three generals for the British Army: Lord Wavell's grandfather, Major General Arthur Goodall Wavell, soldier of fortune who fought in Central America; and the Viceroy's father, Major General Archibald Graham Wavell, who fought in several of Britain's colonial campaigns.

Archibald Percival Wavell was born (1883) near his father's barracks in Essex. He was cradled to the blare of bugles, lulled by the thud of marching feet. At the age of six, he first saw India (on the same trip he also took his first look at Egypt). A boy of few words, he noted briefly in his diary: "Went ashore at Port Said." He received a stern classical schooling at Winchester (the twelfth of his line to go there), proceeded comfortably through Sandhurst, then, like his father before him, joined the Black Watch Regiment, in which he was a kilted second lieutenant. As a subaltern he saw the tail-end of the Boer War. Later Wavell returned to India for a spell of soldiering, pigsticking, horse racing, and Kiplingesque social doings at Peshawar.

In the Ypres offensive in World War I, Wavell (a brigade major) lost his left eye. He tried concealing his blind eye with a monocle, later gave it up.

The Desert Fox. In 1917, Wavell was sent to Palestine to join the staff of Lord Allenby, master of desert warfare and conqueror of the Turks. The association marked a turning point in Wavell's career. He emerged from the campaign with: 1) an intense admiration for the military genius of Allenby, which later flowered in the biography, Allenby: A Study in Greatness; 2) two hard-won Turkish nicknames —"the desert fox" and "the greatest bloodhound." In a terse footnote in his poetry anthology. Other Men's Flowers, Wavell recalls how Lord Allenby, who had just received news of his son's death in action, quietly recited Rupert Brooke's sonnet, The Dead:

These hearts were woven of human joys and cares,

Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth.

The years had given them kindness, Dawn was theirs,

And sunset and the colors of the earth.

These had seen movement and heard

music; known Slumber and waking; loved; gone

proudly friended;

Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone; Touched furs and flowers and cheeks. All this is ended.

There are waters blown by changing winds to laughter

And lit by the rich skies, all day. And after,

Frost, with a gesture, stays the waves that dance

And wandering loveliness. He leaves a white

Unbroken glory, a gathered radiance,

A width, a shining peace, under the night.

This desert-fighting phase first brought out in Wavell an urge to express himself Biblically to his officers, a habit he developed to a high degree in his later Middle East campaigns. For a warning against unexpected rainy seasons in desert climates, he drew on Elijah's message to Ahab in I Kings, 18:44 ("Prepare thy chariot and get thee down, that the rain stop thee not"). The danger of floods in Palestine he underlined with a quotation from Jeremiah 12:5 ("How wilt thou do in the swelling of the Jordan?"). The folly of expecting military assistance from Egypt he expressed through II Kings, 18:21 ("Now, behold, thou trustest upon the staff of this bruised reed, even upon Egypt, on which if a man lean, it will go into his hand and pierce it").

Soldier to Proconsul. In 1937 Wavell returned to the Near East as commander in chief in Palestine and Transjordan, largely stamped out the bloody Jewish-Arab riots. In 1939, he assumed command of the British forces in Egypt. World War II swelled his Egyptian garrison into the Imperial Army of the Nile, an amorphous instrument which he painstakingly fashioned into a weapon that drove the Italians out of Cyrenaica. It was a famous victory at a time when Britain, standing singlehanded against the Axis might, was staggering under successive defeats. For the first time the name of Wavell was heard round the world.

In 1943 Wavell doffed his uniform, was made a peer and Viceroy of India. The soldier became the proconsul. But he was unlike any other proconsul who had ever been seen in India. Hitherto it had been deemed a necessity to surround the Viceregal office with a pomp and pageantry that would dazzle even India's dazzling princes. Wavell's predecessor, Lord Linlithgow, a thrifty Scot, used to travel around India in a luxurious, cream-colored train because "Indians are impressed by these things." The new Viceroy arrived in India in a rumpled lounge suit. Instead of taking the royal route through Bombay's imposing "Gateway to India," he went direct to New Delhi. He shunned parades, fanfares, ceremonial welcomes. He shattered tradition by casually meeting the outgoing Viceroy on the steps of the Viceregal Lodge. At his parties he and the Vicereine, motherly Lady Wavell, a soldier's daughter, mixed freely with the guests, instead of having them led into the Viceregal presence in relays for a few moments of stilted conversation.

Proconsul & Politicians. Lord Wavell had assumed office at one of the worst moments in British-Indian relations. Sir Stafford Cripps' mission had failed. The Indian leaders had rejected his proposals for self-government after the war, demanded immediate independence. Gandhi urged Indians to sabotage Britain's war effort. Singapore had fallen and the Japanese were streaming through Thailand and Burma. Wavell went patiently about his task of winning the confidence of the Indian leaders. He began with drastic, effective measures to curb the famine sweeping Bengal. It was an encouraging start.

With the Indian leaders who were not in jail the Viceroy engaged in earnest discussions. But most of the time he listened. With the jailed political prisoners he carried on a correspondence marked by understanding and humanity. Indians accustomed to word-jugglery and nebulous formulas noted with surprise his crisp, matter-of-fact candor. He impressed them as a disciplined, cultured administrator sympathetic to Indian aspirations, less concerned with his office than with Indian good will. To Gandhi (then in jail) he wrote: "I am in entire accord with that aim [Indian self-government] and only seek the best means to implement it without delivering India to confusion and turmoil."

Hating publicity, Wavell was nevertheless the first Viceroy to hold a press conference. Good-humoredly, he adjured photographers to picture his "bad" eye as well as his good. In his first address to the Legislature he criticized the Moslem League's plan for Pakistan (the idea of an independent Moslem state) (see map). Said Wavell bluntly: "No man can alter geography."

For 18 months Wavell went about India, a British pilgrim in search of understanding, absorbing the atmosphere of the age-old land, trying to feel his way toward solution of its problems. India, he decided last spring, was ripe for self-government. He broached his idea for a modified Cripps Plan (TIME, June 25) to Gandhi and other leaders. Assured of their willingness to consider his scheme, the Viceroy flew to London.

The Wavell Plan. He found Britain's leaders engrossed in the war's end, and the coming general election. Said Prime Minister Winston Churchill testily: "Why trouble me about this business now? Can't you wait?" Wavell said no. Britain had pledged her word that India should have self-government when the war ended. Britain must keep her word. If she was to win Indian good will, it was vital to break the three-year political deadlock at once. The situation must not be allowed to drift dangerously while momentous events brewed in Asia. Said Wavell grimly: without a new offer backed by the Government he would not return to India at all.

For two months he cooled his heels in London, waiting for the Cabinet to approve his plan. Then it was modified and passed.

As presented to Congress and Moslem leaders, the Wavell Plan awarded to Indians all posts (except Defense) in India's Executive Council—the equivalent of a national cabinet—"on a balanced representation of the main communities, including equal proportions of Moslems and caste Hindus." The door was left open for the native states, but there would be no coercion. Dominion status, as promised in the Cripps proposals, was still the goal. The Wavell Plan brought it almost within reach.

As an earnest of his intentions, the Viceroy released eight Congress leaders interned since 1942, invited chosen representatives of all parties to Simla to discuss his plan. The talks proceeded briskly, but stalled on the clause granting organizational parity to Moslems and caste Hindus. Canny Jinnah balked at the prospect of being outvoted in a Hindu-controlled Council. Hastily the factions adjourned for further consideration.

Lord Wavell waited quietly while the endless corridor conferences proceeded. He had come far, he had no intention of jeopardizing the success of his mission now. The Congress leaders were willing to take office. The Moslem League would scarcely allow itself to be squeezed out of India's new government by the Congress ministers and nonLeague Moslems. This week, when the Simla conference convenes again, the prospects for settlement are bright.

Next, Dominion Status. The stakes were greater than India itself, for they included the Empire and the world. The Wavell Plan was the first step toward Dominion status. When that was accomplished, India would become an equal partner in the Commonwealth, free (if she so desired) to secede from the Crown. Was Britain not risking "the brightest jewel of the British Crown?" Indians were not Britons linked by ties of blood and sentiment to the islands in the distant northern sea.

Perhaps. But Dominion status would confer undeniable advantages. India would join a free concert of nations who wielded an influence in world councils more potent than the sum of their parts. Industrial India, with a swiftly rising output (mostly steel and textiles), would expand most rapidly under the careful nurturing of imperial preferences. If the princes* came in (as they almost certainly would in time), the Dominion of India would become a mighty anchor in the storms that might ravage postwar Asia.

In his poetry anthology, whose footnotes are often as revealing as an autobiography, Lord Wavell had quoted one stanza of Poet Matthew Arnold's long, gloomy Obermann Once More:

The East bow'd low before the blast,

In patient, deep disdain.

She let the legions thunder past,

And plunged in thought again.

But none knew better than Lord Wavell that India was no longer content to remain plunged in thought. All Asia was astir. If Britain wished to keep India in her Commonwealth, she could only hope to tighten the bonds of Empire by loosening them.

Not until that step of high statesmanship had been achieved would India's Viceroy be free to turn to another project —a biography of Belisarius, Byzantine conqueror of the North African Vandals.

*The princes rule 562 autonomous states (715,964 sq.mi., pop. 95 million), not as part of British India but under British suzerainty.