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No I disagree defeat in itself is not necessarily good for a country. Yes, Germany and Japan arose from the ashes but there are many other variables in play and therefore you are wrongly reducing this to one variable - defeat.
I think with a doubt total war is good for a country - By that I mean a protracted war that involves the entire nation in a life and death struggle. WW2 or the Iraq and Iran [in particular Iran ] war are examples.
The reasons are total wars involve millions of men and the result is society becomes moulded into one. A nation is born out of blood and guts of men killed. Such wars are equalizers in that any regional/sectarian/tribal or class differances are bridged as men of all backgrounds lie and spill their guts in the mud. A common national spirit is forged.
It brings out the collective spirit and discipline. It reinforces hard work anmd sacrifice for the collective good and it breads national pride. In addition total wars take a heavy toll on men and having faced real bullets men tend to be humble and less prone to rash rhetoric that typifies our people.
In addition there social implications. With so many men gone to war social norms start breaking down. Class differances are reduced as rich and poor sleep in the mud and take bullets. Because of shortage of manpower millions of women are drafted into work and some even end up working in positions reserved to men. This helps to emancipate women.
So I would suggest total war is good for a country however on the other side of coin is the maimed and killed which will run into millions. So I am not suggesting go have war but I just want to point out these type of wars do produce strange benefits. most European countries have been through these type of wars. W in South Asia have in comparison had nursery fights in Kindergarten school yard. Consider Battle of Somme. In one day British Army had 60,000 killed. By the time the battle was over 1 million men were dead. India, Pakistan in 65 years put togather have not lost half the men the British lost in one day.
Battle of the Somme - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
arp2041
For god sakes why do you Indians keep bringing up 1971 as example of titanic victory. Even before the first Indian soldier took a step forward the outcome was a foregone conclusion. Would you expect anything else than a total defeat? Lets just recap and look at some facts from which you can conclude Pakistan Army was doomed from the start.
Do you lot use the 1971 defeat of a smaller country whose outnumbered army was swamped in the Bengal delta to mask the beating India got in 1962 at the hands of a country in your own size league, China?
1. Almost all of the 60 million Bengali population was hostile to Pak Army.
2. There was general insurrection [ civil war ] going on involving Pak army and Mukti Bahini and other Bengali rebels aided by India.
3. East Bengal is
1,200 miles from Pakistan with no GLOC. Logistics supply is either by air [impossible in hostile Indian airspace] or sea [ possible but involving sea journey of about
2,400 miles sailing
astride Indian coastline
vulnerable to attack from Indian Navy.
4. Bengal is a delta region ill suited to mechanized forces and alien to mostly Punjabi/Pashtun soldiers of Pak Army but ideal terrrain for the Bengali guerrilla fighters who are operating on home turf.
5. East Bengal was surrounded by India on 3 sides with the sea on the 4th side.
6. Total strength of Pak Army is nearly 90,000 men including staff, logistics etc. Most of this force was deployed on counter insurgency operations and was never intended to handle a Indian attack at the same time. [ As a example there are over
140,000 NATO troops in Afghanistan in a country of
25 million - East Bengal had about
60 million people with
90,000 Pak soldiers ] Yet as we know the combined might of NATO is struggling to control the insurgency.
As if the six points above are not taxing enough for Pak Army [ clearly it's hands were already full] India joins in.
7. India is nearly 7 times bigger than Pakistan that would [ all things equal ] equate to 7 times more resources.
8. India throws all it's might on three sides of East Bengal and working in synergy with Bengali irregulars defeats the pinned down, overwhelmed Pak forces.
Even a friggin superpower would have had problems. In addition West Pakistan [ something Bengali's complained about with some justification ] concentrated on defence of the west wing. The east wing had hardly any air cover and nominal air force deployed thereby underlining Pak prejudice and double standards.
The policy was 'defence of Pakistan lies in the west' which was another way of saying 'as long as west is safewe don't care about the Bengali's'. Even the 90,000 men were the result of additional forces broughty in to quell the rebellion. Essentially these were light infantry units to tackle the Bengali populace.
Considering these points would you expect anything else than defeat? Even FM Runstedt or Rommel would have given up. The real crime was GHQ should have realized this the moment India attacked or better even before and put truce in place and voluntarily pull out. But nobody was big enough to do that.
