That war makes the state and the state makes war has been a widely accepted proposition since the political sociologist Charles Tilly enunciated it. Our social scientists in general have been reluctant,however,to explore the extraordinary violence that accompanied the formation of independent India,was a critical element in its consolidation during the last six decades,and continues to dominate the headlines today. Those who study Indias international relations have no excuse at all for not delving deeper into Delhis use of force in the conduct of its foreign policy,despite the fact that Indias enduring tensions with Islamabad and Beijing consume so much of the nations blood,treasure,and energy. Its a pity that that there has been no real effort by the Indian security establishment or our academic community to comprehensively study the past wars and crises either for their own sake or to draw lessons from them. Srinath Raghavan boldly steps into this breach by offering what he calls a strategic history of the Nehru years. The effort of Raghavan,a former Army officer who went on to become an academic,stands out for four reasons. For one,he taps into previously unutilised historical material. Second,he seeks to de-mystify the Nehru years by steering away from the traditional impulse to either deify or demonise Indias first prime minister. Nearly five decades after his death,any discussion of Nehru remains trapped in our current political divisions. As a nation,we owe it to ourselves to contextualise Nehru and treat him as a historic figure. Raghavans book begins that long overdue effort at locating our strategic past in its contemporaneous setting. Third,the special value of the study lies in its comprehensive treatment of all major conflicts during the first decade-and-a-half of independent India. While Nehrus handling of the Kashmir dispute with Pakistan and border conflict with China have drawn much attention before,Raghavans account makes them a part of a comprehensive study of all major conflicts that India had to handle in the early years after independence. Of great value are his examination of Indias integration of the two princely states,Junagadh (1947) and Hyderabad (1947-48),the repeated crises in Kashmir during the 1950s and early 1960s,and the tensions in Bengal during the 1950s. This comparative treatment positions Raghavan to offer considered judgements of Indias security predicaments in its early years and Nehrus response to them. Nehru comes out of this volume as a complex figure who was at once an idealist and realist and,above all,a statesmen who got many things right and some wrong as he sought to secure India amidst the tragedy of Partition,the creation of Pakistan,the challenge of integrating the princely states,the emergence of China as a neighbour in Tibet,and the Cold War between the United Sates and the Soviet Union. Raghavans rewarding volume not only allows us to make a more informed assessment of our national security strategy under Nehru,but it also provides a sound basis to reflect on the kind of framework that must guide an India whose relative weight is rapidly increasing in the international system. Raghavan concludes that the most important and relevant aspect of Nehrus strategic approach is his grasp of the nature and the limits of power. He cautions the policy-makers of a rising India not to forget the Nehruvian insight that preserving Indias interests and fulfilling its international ambitions would require a dexterous amalgam of material and ideational resources (pp. 320-21). If his War and Peace in Modern India makes an important contribution to Indias self-awareness of its strategic evolution,we look forward to more from Raghavan,especially on the one issue that he has chosen to put aside in this volumeGoa. Nehrus decision to use force in Goa and to participate in international peacekeeping might hold significance for our current dilemmas on when and under what terms should India project its growing military capabilities.
