Reading of the Foreword

II

The elimination of war

The elimination of war is one of the most cherished ideals of modern times. It would be expected that this ideal comes up from the deepest sentiments of mankind. At the background must be a greater unity of heart, mutual understanding and a settled will to get over nationalistic idiosyncrasies. However Sri Aurobindo points out that seldom the cherished elimination of war arise from deeper motives. "For the masses of men the idea is rather to labour and produce and amass at ease and in security without the disturbance of war; for the statesmen and governing classes the idea is to have peace and security for the maintenance of past acquisitions and an untroubled domination and exploitation of the world by the great highly organised imperial and industrial nations without the perturbing appearance of new unsatisfied hungers and the peril of violent unrests, revolts and revolutions." (CWSA 25, pg.601)

What Sri Aurobindo wrote at the end of World War 1 is still relevant today in 2025. President Trump, the enigmatic US President has declared that he mediated between India and Pakistan and offered both countries trading access to the USA - a move that led to the recent cease-fire, a claim that India vehemently rejected. Earlier he had said that he threatened to stop trade with both India and Pakistan to get them agree to a ceasefire to bring the conflict ignited by India's Operation Sindoor against the terrorist hide-outs in Pakistan (following the Pahalgam massacre) to an end.

"War, it was hoped at one time, would eliminate itself by becoming impossible, but that delightfully easy solution no longer commands credit." (Ibid) Instead of eliminating itself, war seems to perpetuate itself, albeit, indefinitely as is the Russia-Ukraine war. Sri Aurobindo explains that war is now countered by victorious nations by admitting the rest as "subordinate partners or proteges." (Ibid) Statesmen and the masses combine to evolve "a fair and charmingly well-mechanized cosmos of international order, security, peace and welfare." (Ibid) But it is very often the floor of Hell that is paved with these excellent intentions for reason and will of man do not make up the whole of human nature. We have other things too in our armoury of values other than the masks of reason and sentiment which still pampers the game of politics.

War and violent revolutions can be abolished if "we get rid of the inner causes of war and the constantly accumulating Karma of successful injustice of which violent revolutions are the natural reactions. Otherwise, there can be only at best a fallacious period of artificial peace". (Ibid, pg.602) In the long run, it would be more menacing.

Date of Update: 30-May-25