| by Shenali Waduge
( November 9, 2012, Colombo, Sri
Lanka Guardian)
The British Empire was the world’s first global power and largest empire with
dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and territories controlling close
to 500m people covering over 33,700,000 km2- quarter of the world’s landmass.
In 1909 the British Empire encompassed 20% of the land area of the Earth and
23% of its population. All the roads to all the evils that exist globally lead
to Great Britain and the violence sown by one system and their engineering of
sectarianism. It is this legacy of criminal history that has been passing on
unabated and not a single country has been afforded an apology thus far. It is
in looking back at history that one would find all the answers – it is history
that would set the records straight. It is for these reasons that certain
quarters attempt to through their international offices subjugate history.
"We are not a young people with
innocent record and a scanty inheritance. We have engrossed to ourselves — an
altogether disproportionate share of wealth and traffic of the world. We have
got all we want in territory, and our claim to be left in the unmolested
enjoyment of vast and splendid possessions, mainly acquired by violence,
largely maintained by force, often seem less reasonable to others than to
us" – so said Winston Churchill denoting the mindset of all imperialists.
Would anyone think the British capable
of burning down villages to the ground, seizing and raping women and children
on orders, hanging prisoners without trial, starving locals to death, infecting
natives with smallpox, getting natives addicted to opium and alcohol – these
are just a few of the crimes attributed to Great Britain.
The wealth of the imperial countries –
its gold and raw materials were all robbed, the people of these nations whose
lives were without the complications and complexities it suffered as a result
of colonial rule needs to be reiterated. There were no equity, justice and
impartiality, there were no good governance that was given as a legacy, all the
niches that were carved out have only served to continue to divide from the
first divisions carved out to facilitate the rule of the colonials.
None of these former colonials welcomed
British or European rule – their nations were all occupied by force. It was not
only the natives that were mercilessly killed and executed, their lands were
transformed to cash crops, they brought in guns and cannons, their “deals” and
“agreements” were insincere, they destroyed the culture and heritage, the
religious bonds that existed and in its place a legacy which we are yet to
shrug off yet the ignorant remains grateful to the arrival of these colonials.
Ceylon/Sri Lanka
The British ruled Ceylon between 1815 to
1948. When the British landed in Sri Lanka its population was just 800,000 by
the time the British left 150 years later that population had risen to 7m –
there was never a time until repatriation in 1971 and 1981 that the Sri Lankan
Tamils outnumbered the Indian Tamils who brought in as cheap labor from
India.
The brute force used in Sri Lanka was
only a replica of the brutal policies used by the British in all other colonies
and territories. Kandyan chieftans were promised unconditional warranty that
Buddhism would remain inviolable but these were never kept. Entire villages and
farms were torched, cattle slaughtered, vegetation’s burnt to the ground and
people killed remorselessly. Lands were taken by force to start cash crops
resulting in diverse affects to the environment and natural surroundings. The
aim of the British was simply to annihilate the traditions, customs, culture
and religion of these natives in order to facilitate the plunder of wealth of
these nations.
The Uva Rebellion/Third Kandyan War
(1817) turned into a guerilla war with rebels being brutally massacred by the
British. The Madulla massacre was one of shoot-to-kill policy leaving not a
woman or child spared. When despite rescuing over 294,000 Tamil civilians the
British Government is crying genocide and war crimes why have they remained mum
over 200,000 deaths in 1848 when orders were to kill anything above 8years!
Refer the House of Commons Committee for
the gory details that would include how Lt. J. Maclaine of the 73rd Regiment
whose pastime was to watch Sinhalese men being hung one after the other whilst
enjoying breakfast!
Even the animals were not spared –
elephants the mode of transport used by both King and villager alike for
cultivation, tanks, religious processions soon became the target of huntsmen
who designed weapons from England. Samuel Baker headed the elephant slaughter
killing 30-40 elephants on a daily basis – calculate this into 150 years to
estimate the number of elephants the British have killed as a sport in Sri
Lanka. There are plenty of memos to prove these allegations though most of
these hidden secrets have been destroyed by the British.
The British laid siege on hundreds of
natives in the colonies who like the Sinhalese were men who were protecting
their nation using just bows and arrows!
Do these crimes started and spread from
the British Raj to the present not pale in comparison to the other crimes which
were drawn upon these original methods?
Justice for Mau Mau rebellion –
Kenya
It took over 60 years for justice for
victims of the Mau Mau rebellion because the British Government took away all
evidence of their atrocities and destroyed evidence against them – atrocities
that included “roasting alive” Kenyans, beating natives to death, concentration
(internment) camps where men were anally raped using knives, broken bottles,
rifle barrels, snakes and scorpions, even making a special tool to crush and
rip off testicles by British forces. These detention camps held more than
160,000 Africans between 1952 and 1960. The Mau Mau court hearing charges
numbered over 400 brought by 4 elderly Kenyans – 2 victims of castration.
If these were not horrific enough pliers
were used to mutilate women’s breasts while men were rolled up in barbed wire
and kicked around the compound. This is Britain that is preaching human rights
after committing 200 years of human rights abuses! The same Britain that makes
heartening appeals to the International Criminal Court while it remains guilty
of depopulating natives of Diego Garcia so that it could give its buddy America
a military base to carry out renditions and human torture – so has the British
learnt lessons inspite of its colonial crimes?
It was through the Mau Mau hearing that
emerged that the Foreign Office held 9500 files from 36 other former British
colonies secretly further emphasizing oppression by imperial forces a hidden
past that no British child is today aware of. Yet Britain and its present and
future generations are beholden to know how Britain became the society it is
from the looting and plundering nations and completely destroying the unity
that existed amongst the indigenous peoples.
India
India was Britain’s prize catch but it
had its own share of British atrocities. English East India Company did
pittance to help the famine since rice fields were turned into poppy
plantations to grow opium. The famine brought down the population from 150,000
to 30,000 in Dhaka as part of the Malthusian population theory adopted by
British advisors to starve natives to death. The 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre
led to hundreds of unarmed civilians ordered to be killed by General Dyer.
During the Partition of 1947 where the largest mass-migration took place upto
3m died and Britain simply abandoned its responsibilities. 6-7m Indians had
been starved to death by the British in 1943-1945. The Indian Holocaust is in
excess of 1.8billion between 1757 and 1947. Are British human enough to tie
thousands of Sikhs to gun cannons and fire!
We cannot reiterate enough that the real
villains of the world are those that own the Bank of England established in
1694, the US Federal Reserve who control the World Bank and IMF as well as the
world’s intelligence agencies – a network known as the “Club of Isles” having
$10trillion in assets. The square-mile City of London is a sovereign state run
by the Bank of England which is a private corporation and not subject to
British law. Yet the Bank can even dictate to the British Parliament and it was
these very bankers that created the British Empire.
Today democracy is simply a means to
control society using mass media and education systems.
The power of the banks is their monopoly
over credit using Government’s credit to print money and forcing taxpayers to
make billions in interest for all Central Banks are private institutions that
give credit to businesses and individuals. It is not hard to fathom how bankers
have been destabilizing society and creating one crisis after another forcing
those who depend on credit to remain mum.
There are many who view that what
happened is past and should be forgotten. Well that appears to be directed at
only white crimes – but these same Governments blow hot and cold over crimes
that are not half as horrific as the one’s that were systematically part of
plundering nations. Imperial amnesia is nothing that can be swept under the
carpet. It is what connects the roots to the ills that prevails globally
throughout the third world.
What the British Government needs to
understand is that apart from its crimes committed as part of imperial policies
what is more horrific is the manner it attempted to illegally conceal and
destroy documentary evidence of its colonial crimes secretly kept in the
Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s security premises in Buckinghamshire. The
atrocities committed by the British East India Company and the British Raj are
what BBC’s Channel 4 should be showcasing first.
The question remains why politicians and
media alike are afraid to accuse Britain of its barbarism which is an important
part of history of man. Why have historians themselves failed to associate the
brutality of an empire that spanned such a land mass affecting the lives of
millions of people? We are talking about centuries of hidden history, hidden
crimes and imperial amnesia.
The British was responsible for the
death and destruction to millions of people throughout Asia and Africa.
Indigenous heritage had been annihilated and in its place natives were
Christianized and people marginalized and decentralized to create chaos with
political administrations leaving people fighting for territory and power.
All that the West proudly enjoys were
built from gold, spices, opium, oil, minerals all looted from the colonies while
natives were turned into slaves and today suffering from poverty and a new wave
of neo-colonialism.
Britain stands accused of crimes against
humanity of not just one nation but several hundred, not just a handful but of
millions of people. Britain stands accused of slavery, plundering of land and
natural resources of territories belonging to the Indigenous people. Should
Britain not be compensating these countries at least 20% of the value of goods
produced and extracted from the resources since late 1400s? Should Britain not
compensate for the damage done to the environment as well as compensate for the
cruel and inhuman manner women were raped and impregnated as a policy.
How much should the United Kingdom
Government pay the world’s citizens for centuries of imperialism, wars,
diseases and mass murder - $58 trillion or $8350 for every living person was a
suggestion – is this really enough to cover the injustice suffered and the
injustice that still prevails – it is when China becomes the sole superpower
and Britain faces its decline when reparations demands will surface!
The world needs to know exactly what the
European powers – the French, the Italians, the Germans, the Belgians, the
Portuguese and the British empire did to the people of the world and the legacy
that these nations continue to be burdened with.
Yet, if the German government could
formally apologize for the enslavement and genocide of the Herero peoples of
Namibia, French showed some resent over Atlantic slave trade though yet to
apologize to Algeria, in the 1980s the Canadian Indian Tribal Chiefs were given
a public apology, while in the 1990s the Maoris of New Zealand were extended a
public apology….
It is now time for the British to
apologize for its crimes.
Why can’t the British apologize to the
rest of the world for its crimes against humanity?
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