The Bengal Famine of 1943: Natural Disaster or Man-Made Catastrophe?
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- Опубликовано: 30 июл 2024
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Source/Further reading:
The Forgotten Holocaust:
Accounts from the Bengal famine of 1943 www.scribd.com/article/460852711
General Overview:
www.globalsecurity.org/milita...
The Famine of 1770:
www.academia.edu/6977392/A_Fo...
The Famine of 1873:
www.researchgate.net/publicat...
The Famine Inquiry Commission (FIC) report:
www.cabdirect.org/cabdirect/a...
Amartya Sen:
books.google.co.uk/books?hl=e...
www.jstor.org/stable/4364836
www.sas.upenn.edu/~dludden/Fa...
Tauger, Oswami and Padmanabhan:
www.academia.edu/25974488/Ent...
The ‘brown spot’ fungus:
www.plantwise.org/knowledgeba...
Prom M. Mufakharul Islam:
www.jstor.org/stable/4132358
Madhusree Mukerjee:
www.jstor.org/stable/24479300
Churchill exonerated?
winstonchurchill.hillsdale.ed...
winstonchurchill.org/resource...
Geophysical Research Letters: Drought and Famine in India (the 2019 Paper)
www.researchgate.net/publicat...
Media reports in 2019 about Churchill’s responsibilities:
www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/0...
www.theguardian.com/world/201...
www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...
www.historyextra.com/period/f...
Get your first audiobook and access to a monthly selection of Audible Originals for free when you try Audible for 30 days visit www.audible.com/geographics or text "geographics" to 500 500!
Do the irish famine
Ak fazlul hoque was a Muslim. Please fact check
Hurricane?
Thank you for bringing out the reality of British Raj to the world
that's the same deal Audible gives to all new subscribers, nothing special about it.
I was eating my same old boring lunch when watching this. My lunch is no longer boring
Dinner for me 😅🤤
My grandma's dad has to sell off her eldest sister just to afford rice to feed his family
I totally agree... Makes you really appreciate everything you have, doesn't it?
In Greece a classic thing that moms say to their children when they don't eat their food is " what you mean you don't like your food? little kids at your age in Africa are starving - be thankful for what you have!! " 😏
@@Pavlos_Charalambous
Hahaha! Here in America I heard the exact same thing growing up! It's wonderful how things like travel the boundaries of language!
As a bengali,thanks for making this video,i am learning indian history of class 7 as i am a 12 year old,thanks now i know this before class/grade 8 thanks again!
Do discuss this in class and try to read the works quoted here. All the best for the future.
@@thomasfrank280 Thanks.
I hope you have good teachers because this video covers issues more complicated than would be expected for your age. Some teachers get upset when you know more than them :)
@@nlwilson4892 Ya i have good teachers,they actually sometimes ask us to tell stuff and actually when things are complicated they tell us to see the things,teachers are good ☺☺👍👍👍
It's so awesome that you're so young and so interested in a channel like this. I hope your education goes well & your deeper interest in history / workings of the world take you places 👍
Holy shit, someone actually covered this in a factual, non-agenda-driven way? This is why I love this channel.
Thanks Darrin. I was the researcher and author for this video (you can check the name in the credits at the very end) and I was striving for a balanced view. Thank you for your comment, it reassured me that the video was indeed non-partisan. Have a great day!
In the course of human events, when are there really non-agenda driven ways?
@@jeanpierrereynoso-fournel4378 Typhoons don't have agendas. also, my point was about the coverage of the incident, not the incident itself. I'm just glad that someone managed to cover this in a way that wasn't propaganda.
@@arnaldoteodorani277 By balanced do you mean giving equal credence to white people who ruled over brown people and thought they were inferior?
@@muffinnman You comment just proves the need for agenda-less content.
As an Indian youth the pictures of history like these keep me working to make progress for my country. We will never let this happen again.
May I make a suggestion? The 1941 Greek famine, it was man made, connected to the Bengal one with both the axis and the British blaming each other for who is most to blame for
England took the food from India to feed its own self in Europe and its Army. Food was grown in India but didn't feed Indians in 1940s..England didn't wanna take responsibility for this because they are having issues with Food.
@@kapuagutchen8171 Why don't you blame the Japanese equally for invading Burma...
Ehhh.... I don't think the Brits invaded Greece. In fact we helped you gain your independence.
@@jimjones8736 because Japan being part of the Axis isnt supposed to hamper the source of nourishment for it's enemies? Also your comment is exactly what the OP meant.
@@user-jn1ts4wl1c If I could understand what you are saying I would reply. I can't, so I won't. Cheers.
1:25 - Chapter 1 - A history of famine
4:20 - Chapter 2 - The famine of 50
10:15 - Mid roll ads
11:30 - Chapter 3 - Supply & demand
18:50 - Chapter 4 - Unsettled blame
I am 44 years old, well educated and well read, especially on WWII, but I had never, ever heard of this tragedy. More research must be undertaken, pictures of kids with bloated bellies and starving eyes hits me like a sucker punch in my soul.
Neither have I. But nor am I surprised by that. World War II overshadows everything that happened between 1939 and 1945.
You should listen to Shashi Tharoor's Britain owes repriations to India speech in Britain itself..you will get a fair idea..
What hits me like a sucker punch in my soul. Is the way the media went from referring to the world wars, as number 1 and 2, insted of first and second. Makes it sound like people expect a number 3 on shelf any day. 1. and 2. if you would be so kind.
It's a well known historic event. It's better known than most other famines of the same magnitude. The reason it is an ongoing debate is because it plays a political role today in Indian nationalism and Churchill bashing in general. I don't understand the need to hang this around the neck of Churchill. To manage a world war is very demanding. I doubt he had much control over what happened in Bengal. One must not forget that the Japanese occupied Burma at the time, a traditional breadbasket of Bengal and in effect had control of the shipping in the Bengal Bay. This was probably a perfect storm of drought, disease, war, bad communication, poverty and incompetence.
@@eirikbelisarius1100 Bengal was and is a Bread Basket... It's a fertile Plain fed by big perennial rivers and called Rice Bowl of India... It has sufficient fish production/day to feed the entire British population for 1 month..
As a Bengali from Calcutta, let me tell you, the hatred Churchill had for us was equivalent to what Hitler had for Jews. Bengal was notoriously opposed to the British rule and saw the most violent insurgencies to gain independence. And Churchill hated us, all that "beastly people with a beastly religion" comments are well documented. The video omits many instances of food supplies which came from Australia and were in Calcutta docks which were then diverted to the middle East for war efforts in the Balkans. Churchill only sought for help when the worse had already happened, although conscious stricken British officials were asking for help for months. So many here do believe that Churchill seeking help was just an eye wash. The real tragedy is, Hitler and the Nazis are vilified for putting 6 million Jews in the gas chambers, yet Churchill is venerated as a hero inspite of starving almost the same number of Bengalis to death. Sooner or later though, the world will know. Thanks a lot for the video. 🙏
The lower classes died in the Bengal famine, they sold their land and property to richer Indians for next to nothing for a bag of rice. Don't pretend all the Bengalis were dying.
The Brits were no better than the Nazis, Churchill was no better than Hitler and what these imperialists did was no less the the holocaust.
I'm from Kolkata, and it's lovely to see the forgotten history of my city getting covered. Please make a video on the birth of the city of Kolkata as well, as that too is a highly controversial topic. Thanks!
Same
Same.
Great comment, I've spent a little time in your home town and the Sundarbans and as a British person this was brought up often when I was talking to the locals.
I'm not sure whether the Famine of 1943 was caused by this...
But I have learnt in school that most Famines after Colonisation of India by the British were caused directly by shortage of Food crop production. Farmers were forced to either sell their lands to the British Government or do cultivation of crops according to their (British) interests. And the British in India were chiefly interested in trade more than ruling. So they demanded most farmable land for the cultivation of Cotton, Indigo, Jute, etc. Thus food production halted in a lot of places, and Famines emerged.
NappyHeaded_ZeroCombs They explain that a bit in the video. Go back to 17:00 and listen from there.
why no mention of tones of Indian crops being sent to britain and europe to be stored for 'future shortages' ?
Fazlul Huq was actually a Muslim, but it's true he was replaced by a member of an Islamic party. Also, it's Bihar, not Bishar. Otherwise, pretty good video👍🏾.
Yeah, I was a little confused when he said Fazlul Huq was a Hindu.
exactly my point
Bihar was not part of Bengal during 1943 famine..it became separate state in 1905
Excellent research done for this one-such a complicated event. I think one of the most disheartening aspects of this story is that, while the people were starving and selling their children, those who had resources to share instead exploited the starving people, buying their land and possessions rather than giving them food and assistance. Humanity was no where to be found it seems.
hoarding may not have been, at least in all cases, as evil as it may appear to us now. While we can look back and see an end to the famine, and know how bad it got, those in the time didn't. It would be natural, not knowing how bad it was going to get, nor how long it was going to last, to hoard food against those unknowns if one had the ability to do so. Speculators, on the other hand, are clearly in the evil side of the ledger.
Excellent research? You are modest :-)
That's the reality of capitalist culture
@@AzadHind572 Holodomor is so much better ;)
Keep up the great content Simon and Co. 🙌🏾👍🏾
Biographics video on Danny.
@@TheJediCaptain but he’s lived all his life in simon’s basement
Why can't people just admit that it might be ALL of those things. The october cyclone, brown dot fungus, Japanese occupation of Burma, inflation of rice prices w/o a corresponding increase in wages, mismanagement by the British, AND the large population of Bengal.
Thats what im thinking...
Yes it is widely accepted. Most Indians take all these accounts into consideration. But it's Brits who fail to see the dark side of Churchill and the British War Cabinet.
@@misterbb4515 Well they did have a war to win, nobody would have been better off if Imperial Japan and the Nazi's won the war. Its not like they were trying to starve people out, they had a lot of complex issues to try to figure out and manage.
Most reasonable people do.
In my understanding, almost every sane persons consider all of these actions as causes. But, academic people tend to debate over which comes first or which caused more. So that in a different or future scenario, they can prioritize which "HOLES to FILL FIRST". But obviously without any doubt, every Hole has to be filled.
Wow, I'm a Bengali who had ancestors who succumbed to the famine and this video was posted on my birthday this year!
Shunlei gaye shihoron boye jaye. Onader atmar shanti chai ar apni khub khub vaalo thakben.
Thank you for calling us ‘Bengali” instead of Indian or Bangladeshi. With the shared culture, Bengali makes way more sense.
I hope they do a video on the Irish Potato Famine as well.
Include the Cornish potato famine as well, I know it happened on the British mainland and thus gets ignored because bad things don't happen to the British we only do bad things. Granted the Irish famine was worse but only a lunatic would treat famines as a point scoring game right?
A natural disaster made worse by incompetent politicians and bureaucrats.
Maybe they can do the IRA bombings on civilian targets too.
England was a scourge on the planet for a long time. Just with nice manners
You mean the Irish Banana Famine?
In 2013, I took a class in university (British Empire and Commonwealth). We were required to read Churchhill's secret war, so the fact that it's mentioned in this video really threw me off. There was a big emphasis on other articles about how while the food sent back to Bengal was having issues and not providing what was necessary, there were warehouses of food spoiling and rotting at the same time...
As a Bengali, thanks for covering this topic. Although I've already read about this in history classes its still nice to hear Simon speak about it.
Brilliant video 👍
Love how they explore as many perspectives as possible... ....
You missed the fact that the famine of 1876 was caused by the lack of land to cultivate subsistence crops as Bengali farmers were forced to produce cash crops like Indigo in their field to supply raw material for industrial revolution in Britain and those field would be unusable for months after reaping, so there was not enough field to grow food for the population. Bengali weavers were also forced to work in the field and authority would severe the thumb of those carpenter or weavers who disobeyed the authority so they wouldn't have any choice but to work in the field as they couldn't weave without the thumb. There was also a revolt against it in 1859 called Indigo revolt.
Btw great video, I really wait for them👍🏻👍🏻.
During entire British and company rule India had many many man made famine because of the policies due to which 30 to 40 million people died but after India got Independence not a single famine occurred in the history of independent India.
Love the videos your make. And how you cover things I've never heard of! Keep up the good work!
The researchers are thorough.
Simon is articulate.
These factors produce good content.
Well done !
3:02 Siraj-ud-doulla was murdered by The Brits and their fellows in 1757, after the battle of Plassey. The British East India Company ruled Bengal from 1757 onwards. Please update the video.
Another awesomely narrated and informative video! My heart goes out to those who were affected. Video topic recommendation: Göbekli Tepe; the archaeological site that pretty much throws everything we know about ancient civilizations out on it's ear.
Siraj-ud-Daula was defeated in the Battle of Plassey in 1757 by East India Company and the Company received the rights of Revenue and Tax collection of Bengal after Battle of Buxar in 1764, so any taxation after that was done by the greedy East India Company
Except that the E.I.C. initially collected taxes through the existing network of local officials. In 1770 they sent out British supervisors who began discovering uncomfortable truths, such as that when the Calcutta government ordered a tax cut due to the famine, some of those local collectors went on taking the old amount and pocketed most of the difference for themselves.
@@marksnow7569 I don't know what you said about events in 1770 is well documented but there is no record of a famine before EIC taking control. If there is anything documented and available online please tag.
Excellent balanced view, beautifully narrated.
I love this!!! I've been listening to him for quite some time now and he is a great factual story teller.
Very well done! Thank you for presenting this in a well-rounded, factual manner.
Sponsored by KFC. Learn about one of the greatest man-made famines in history.
Well played, Mr. Evans.
Don't forget when KFC ran out of chicken in the UK. They just didn't have any chicken, at all. And they remained open.
If only the colonel gave a shit about bengal
I am fairly sure that one day, there will be a discussion about the pandemic of 2019 to 2022, that is hotly debating the question if the high death toll was caused by the nature of this specific new sickness, poverty, overpopulation, or sheer negligence by the politicians... this topic is never easy to answer.
Damn good point.
I would highly say the latter and sheer ignorance and fear mongering media😔. one day I will tell my daughter how I couldnt find One box of diaper or formula this past year.
Does the Xi admin cause it?
@@SlapstickGenius23 by then it will be known as the Xi Dynasty lol
The current pandemic clearly originated in China. Most likely from bats imported from the SARS caves and brought to the Wuhan level 4 biohazard lab. My guess is that human error let loose the pandemic due to sloppy handling and human error. There are about 100 species of bats in China, all carrying viruses.
'Printing money is never a good idea'- as it led to the inflation that meant they couldn't afford their food. Yet here we are in 2020 printing the most in recorded history. We truly never learn 😪
In post ww2 Germany the printing of money caused such a high rate of inflation that one man recalls sitting down for a coffee only to find out afterwards that the money in his pocket is now useless.
Printing money really is fine if you raise taxes as well, at least if you have a fiat currency.
@@rsmith6366 post ww1 you mean?
@@hooliganic2506 That doesn't really solve the problem, not in the long term.
@@rsmith6366 That sounds more like the aftermath of WW1. You sure you're not talking about the interwar period?
Makes you really appreciate everything you have, doesn't it?
it makes you think why world remembers hitler's genocide of jews but not british genocides of india
@@MoizCOUK British vibes
They hide everything
@@MoizCOUK history is written by the victors. Churchill was as evil as Hitler.
Fantastic video, very informative and most importantly impartial 👍
You guys are the highlight to the end of my work day! Thank you for helping us stay educated mate!
This is one of the reasons I love listening to you, you try and inform us on everyone point of view and them let us make up our minds. It's also a great starting point to looking into a topic. Thanks
As an Indian, Churchill was no less Oppressed than Hitler or Stalin.
There was no choice for churchill.And i think churchill was right that the indians were breeding like rabbits thats the reason population of india crossed 1'4 billion.
The Axis weren't the good guys, The Allies weren't either
Then you don't know the efforts Churchill went to to try to avoid the famine. You should read his memoirs.
@@andym9571
Memorias alteradas*.
@@NikoBuraitoPinku2024 " The Defamation of Winston Churchill " by Voltaires Ghost on RUclips. Dare you
Well done, and in good taste for a difficult subject.
Damn. Usually I do other stuff while listening to the videos, but this was another one where I was sort of transfixed by the tragedy involved. I hadn’t even heard of it before. Thank you for making this.
To summarise: all these famines in Bengal were created by bad weather but were hugely exacerbated by British and local policies.
also the war was one of the biggest things
Pretty much yeah instead of a dozen thousand people dying, millions died. So 100 times increase in casualty. So horribly exacerbated by local and British officials.
@@saifchowdhury3581 you're completely forgetting that this happened during a world war. The policies had an impact but the war also contributed majorly to the number of deaths.
@@leagueofdead569 the brits even stopped food aid from US, canada and Indians over seas to bengal during famine. Churchill stockpiled the food of bengal in UK and asked that Indian deserve famine for breeding like rats and why Gandhi hasn't died yet? Can't beleive people still defend that monster.
@@leagueofdead569 You're right. The key is to figure out roughly how many of these deaths were the officials responsible for.
A very important history to remember.
Amazing when you just discovered that India bengals famines was because a population could not be self sustains due to natural disasters but was dependent on another poor nation rice grains (Burma) but 🇬🇧 couldn’t provide this due to 🇯🇵 Asia conquest plans . Ww2 history should be taught in school especially in 🇬🇧
This was a good topic. Thanks geo-crew!
As a Bangladeshi, I’ve first heard of this famine from my father, it is clear Winston Churchill is not “a hero”
Churchill was a hero for the British highest class only and king and country ......he hated Gandhi for killing the Indian cash cow.....😂😂😂😂
Hey just wanted to say I really appreciate this video. Spent so much time listening to the left and the right scream their own version of events it is relieving to hear a balanced approach that sticks to the facts as much as possible.
I wish people would apply this same balanced approach to events like the russian famine of 1921
@@josephrusso4828 In what way? As far as I know it was caused by years of war combined with the transition to communism. Are people trying to blame someone for it?
@@ProjectEkerTest33 Yes, people try to blame the bolsheviks when the famine was actually caused by the civil war, natural famine, and the actions of some of the peasants.
@@josephrusso4828 I mean the bolsheviks were part of that no doubt but definitely not the only cause. Pretty much all sides in the civil war took food from the farmers
@@ProjectEkerTest33 Exactly, if the capitalists were in charge, the exact same thing would’ve happened, yet people still blame the famine deaths on socialism.
May good fortune be part of you today and tomorrow. Lovely month!
Thanks man .it feels nice to be have your voice heard
Fascinating. Never knew about this. Thanks!
The combination of crop failures and government inaction/incomitance in this video reminds me of a couple of the potato famines Ireland faced in the 19th century. It wasn't a colonial governorship that time, but the UK Parliament.
So much food was going from ireland to UK. Plenty to feed the people. Yet the UK was buying it and taxing it instead. They didn't care about the Irish. The Americans where the ones who sent the real relief aid and that was gathered through the population, not the government.
But in the case of Bangladesh’s famine, which was horrible, no doubt, it was because Britain was fighting the Nazis in Germany. The British Isles couldn’t help because Hitler had control of most of Europe and the British had to make sure their island didn’t fall to Nazi rule.
@@CoreyStudios2000 "couldn't help" you mean take food which bengalis produced
@@joshuajohn8870 Well, the British weren’t given much of a choice when Hitler was near the very doorstep of their island. War is a tragic thing and what happened to India was a clear example of how people were left with difficult choices when confronted with an invading force. Know, however, that it isn’t the only one and it’s not just a “white guy” thing.
@@CoreyStudios2000 they had enough food reserves as the war was nearly over. They kept taking shipments food to help with post war recovery.
Great content but little bit of correction ,I m from Bangladesh and Fazlul Haq was Muslim . He was removed from his post because he was critical about British rule in Indian subcontinent. He have his own Wikipedia article if anyone interested.
so much happy news in the world right now. thanks for providing balance, Simon
Hello Simon. Greetings from Bengal, India. Thank you ever so much for covering this. People all over the world rarely hear of Churchill's handiwork in our neighborhood. I remain an ardent fan of your channels, please keep it up!
Handiwork? Did you actually watch the video and understand the nuances
@@pensacola2015 My ancestors understood the nuances on a very personal level. Pretty sure I need your feedback for nothing at all.
@@Aldarinn In that case, why don't you say the contents of the video are incorrect, or are you hiding behind the skirt of faux anger to illicit the ownership of a weak argument. Seems fashionable to wholly blame one individual during a global war, as opposed to recognising the multitude of complex factors that contributed to the ghastly famine. I'm pretty sure I don't need your advice about having more than one thought at the same time to take a measured approach.
@@pensacola2015 Well we do not need each other and that's only good. For all your babble the UK is becoming a third rate economy just as it deserves to be. Maybe India can loan it some money if the broth starts getting too cold for them.
@@Aldarinnuhh...
He didn't blame Churchill for it.
As mentioned in the video, the famine had many reasons.
Maybe you should cool your mind and come back later??
If you have the means, you have the responsibility.
Marcus Aurelius ?? Not sure if I spelled it right! But he is the 1st documented saying that!
@@chrisdixon2486 I am not sure I can attribute the quote accurately, unfortunately - that's why I didn't bother.
Needless to say, it was someone far wiser than I will ever be.
Bravo you succeed in delving into the dark corners of humanity and bring them to light. This is a favorite chanel.
Another first class video about a forgotten part of history.
I learned only about it a few years ago, when I read through one of the newer books about WW2 (I think it was "All hell let loose")
Not much of a controversial here. Besides that it was forgotten for so long, treated like a WW2 collateral damage.
Thank you for bringing this up.
But isn’t it the government’s job to take care of the people whom they rule?
not necessarily. an imperial establishment is basically an entrepreneurial governance. so, in times like those, it would have been easy for the colonial britain to justify that the welfare of those they expected to profit from was secondary to the profit itself. 1943 was when england started to kick hitler in the nuts and for them, winning the war carried the utmost importance, the frontlines of which demanded essential supplies.
@@KishoreMathers you can find numerous white dudes in the comment section justifying the deaths because Britain was apparently protecting the world
@@misterbb4515 ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
its not necessary british were crony capitalists they mean to profit . well today also if u see the more india becomes capitalist the more poor people will suffer like migration of indian labourers 2020 (man made disaster)
well technically yess, however the British were not in India to rule them they were there for their economic advantage of Britain. They gave no shit about Indian people and treated them worse than animals
You should talk about North Korea's famine too, which I think you may have briefly touched in your DMZ video. Love all your channels, keep it up!!
The most logical reason to me is, the rice went to market. Even today this could happen. Some rich pos figures his profit for the year is worth more than 3 million people. Things are getting scary now.
Yup. If you don't have to face the people you're screwing over, it's so much easier to screw them over.
Great analysis of the research!
Great content!
Glad to see my city getting covered. Keep em coming Simon!
Siraj-ud-Daulah died in 1757 at the Battle of Plassey against the EIC. Also, the Nawab was no longer in charge of Taxation in 1768. The EIC had those (diwani) rights since 1765 (following the Treaty of Allahabad signed with the Mughal Empire). The EIC raised the tax rate fearing a fall in share prices...
Siraj-ud-Daulah did not die in battle. He was executed a few days later.
Also, the EIC tax situation is not quite as simple as "raised the tax rate". When Warren Hastings reported that the tax revenue was "violently kept up" during the famine, he was referring to the activities of the local Bengali officials, as helplessly observed by British supervisors who did not at the time have the power to prevent such abuses.
It was during Robert Clive rule 1770 famine occurred.
I would like to recommend a companion piece on audible that goes well with this video "Nectar in a Sieve" It really helps an outsider gain empathy for struggles in India during the late 1940s early 1950s.
Nice timing
Gotta remember Great Britain fell apart pretty much during both wars. Their ships were sunk at every opportunity so that greatly affected moving goods. Also they were busy being bombed into gravel
So they killed 5 million people ? Makes total sense
@@sammynochains3455 its the war who kills them you donut
@@sammynochains3455 Also since the mid 18th century until 1945 they killed even more people if you add that up it is more than that what Germany killed in WWII.
My uncle served in the US Army at the China-Burma-India Theater during the war. He was warned to avoid beggars- there were so many- lest they mob and attack you for your money. They were starving and he saw it. The miracle for him was that he survived disease and the drugs to treat them, the fierce fighting against crack Japanese troops, the insects and leeches and infighting with the supposed Allies. By the time Allied forces reached the China border, he was shot in the shoulder and his war was over. He awaken a week later in the other side of then India, in a hospital in Karachi.
The official and scholarly analyses of the causes of the Bengal famine smell like the excuses made of the Irish famine a century earlier: wet weather, plant fungus, overpopulation, yadda yadda et cetera. But as with Ireland, the British overlords had the means and resources to alleviate the disaster in India and didn't for "logistical necessity". Both disasters underscored British hostility to its colonized populations with official policy.
The way I read Winston‘s The Second World War it comes down to one issue: shipping
As little as they had for military operations, Hitler and imperial Japan is as much to blame as the weather.
Only the British are to blame. Deflections are pointless here. All they had to do was to not build an empire to begin with.
@Aldarinn only naive fools with this statement are trying to put contemporary politics to what was a different time period and its circumstances. It is like those who said let us ban slavery but the time period they were asking for was like more than a thousand years ago.
Here is a list of years with significant famine in Bengal.
963,
1033,
1291,
1344-1345,
1469,
1574-1576,
1630-1632,
1769-1773,
1783-1784,
1787-1788,
1790-1792,
1860-1861,
1866-1867,
1873-1874,
1896-1897,
1943-1944.
Churchill had his first Government role in 1905 in case you didn't know, as Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies. He was born in 1874.
So, tell me again how Winston was responsible for these? Bengal had many famines, 1943 was just another in the queue.
Brian.
I do appreciate your videos, as they tend to go into history that's not widely known/taught. I had never heard about this until now.
I know you're going to get a ton of these, but I hope you do consider doing a video on The Holodomor in Ukraine. 1932-1933. I visited the museum in Kyiv, and it was sobering to see the endless names of victims and hear the tolling of the bell for so many victims.
I need to know more about this.
Yep, that woul be a good one.
I'm fairly certain he's already done a video about the Holodomor on one of his other channels.
Edit: I just realized how old this video (And therefore the comments) are. Presently I know that a video about this topic does exist, with Simon as the host. What I am unsure about is when it was released. But that's almost irrelevant because one thing you can say about all of Simon's videos - They stay relevant and the research that goes into them rarely has to be updated. I wish the larger news outlets were as rigorous about facts as Danny and Simon and the rest of his team are!
This is an incredibly well done video. One factor you've left out is the policy of price caps for rice. It said basically that prices must be lowered, with the local governments hoping that lowering prices would make food cheaper for locals. Sadly of course, forcing lower prices meant that food was taken away from these areas and sold to neighbouring regions where prices were allowed to climb higher. Incidentally this is why price caps never work.
My grandpa was born in Barisal district in 1940s Bengal. Thanks for making this video. There is a rhyme on ww2 in bengali which actually mocks the british. It says, Sa Ra Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni, bom feleche japani, bomer bhetor ghokhra shap, british koy bapre bap!. It means, the japanese are bombing and there are king cobras inside bombs and british are afraid of it.
And Tiger of Bengal, AK Fazlul Haque was a muslim.
I first read that title as the beagle famine of 1943. I was thinking "poor Snoopy, wtf was Charlie Brown doing/thinking?"
@NappyHeaded_ZeroCombs
Thats nuts.
PEANUTS
@NappyHeaded_ZeroCombs Ok GenZ'er. You obviously haven't heard of a comic strip, Peanuts in particular. Google it.
I dont imagine this will be a controversial comments section lol
Nope, pretty sure there's a rare consensus here.
Just horrible, and heartbreaking ...words fall short.
@@JSkyGemini I don't really see the consensus you're talking about.
It was strange. anywhere Britain ruled other people the Famine killed people by their millions, from India to Ireland etc. very strange.
So two places out of the many that were part of the empire.
British rule also increased living standards , life expectancy, population, unfortunately you can’t have it both ways!
@georgehetty7857 bruh 🤡 u r an entire circus
@@georgehetty7857that was only applicable for the British only, ofcourse to provide for to their EMPIRE they had to improve and increase transportation and labour, so its all for their own good not that they were there to make indians life any better 🫤
So you saying that " can't have both way" doesn't apply to indians , the cost of so called good living standards was to much for the poor indian,
Bengal famine wasn't the only atrocity, we have more in the books , jaliawala baag , madras famine etc.
@@wendyu5076 Bollocks ……old chap!
Dude your concise and sleek format is so easy to engage with. I prefer you to the Green brothers.
Norman Borlaug was my great Uncle, and it's always interesting to hear his name. I actually visit his wife nearly every time I'm at my grandparents on my mother's side, as they still live in the same town. She's one hell of a woman, still living in her own house, largely without help. My grandparents are the only real help, but they are more of friends than aids, and visit basically weekly.
Quite surprising
The initial tax hike from the governor and the inflation generated by the central bank, is plus the impossibility of trade with Burma due to ww2, those are for me the main reasons
British genocide when spoken with British accent would miraculously turn it into "it's a tragedy". Nice, just nice. Also, maybe that's why Tony Blair is never persecuted for crimes against humanity for Iraq invasion. It's his accent. If he has Arabic accent, that would be another story entirely.
Yup, two standards of justice; one merciful for the wealthy/powerful. while another, more harsh standard for the rest of us plebs.
All 4 of my grandparents lived through that era in Chittagong. My maternal grandmother was a kid but the rest 3 were young adults. Then they lived through the 1971 liberation war. I don't think I will have the mental capacity to go through things like these and then go on to live a happy life.
Can't imagine the horrors they have suppressed in their memories!
Well, the local and British officials had had stored a lot of crops in 1942 which they did not release in 1943 to the common people.
Great Information👏👏👏👏
"one quarter below normal levels." Does that mean the rains were 3/4 of normal?
Great video!! Please make a video about Dhaka. Love from Bangladesh 🇧🇩🇧🇩🇧🇩
This one will take 2 or 3 passes to fully digest due to the multitude of statistics and reference points. Let's start from the top. My audible recommendation is Churchill's Secret War.
You are very fair and balanced. I'd be interested in your perspective on the Irish Potato Famine.
"If more than one thing may be true, more often than not both are."
This completely skimmed over the fact that Churchill ordered that diversion of US and Canadian aid to his own, already well supplied troops. "They should learn to look after themselves as we have done".
Comprehensive report - the 2019 news outbreak was particularly adeptly handled.
Simon, please think about doing a piece on Saharawi and it's "unique" border. It's a very interesting story about 2 declining European empires, 2 Super Powers and it's three immediate neighbors.
Bengal Famine and Bangladesh Separation (East Pakistan-1971) are two suppressed issues in Geopolitics. Bollywood does neither have the balls to produce films on these issues nor they have close to reality. I must say somebody from Hollywood should depict this at least in cinematic reality. I am enthusiastically waiting for someone will make a movie showing the truth of these two tragic histories...Thank You
Seems you don't have no balls to kid. Your here talking like a indian women that wants to get her drama fix!
And do you know cinematic reality is anything but reality, don't you know hollyweird is nothing more then an illusion and anything but the truth or I take it bollywood got you confused?!
I never knew about this famine
Oh, and another idea for Geographics: Rammstein Airbase and the nearby Landstuhl Regional Medical Center.
As a person living in Kolkata, other than the pronunciations which have been butchered (I don't blame you lol), it is actually pretty well made.
Well done!
Malthus didn’t blame the famine on the immorality of the poor? He certainly seemed to enjoy being a shield for the rich and powerful.
The more I listen to this kind of content, more I realize how much American education has failed me
Can you explain why British colonial history would be covered in an American history class? At High school level and lower? Should have gone to college.
@@scottkrater2131bruh
18:50 Ahah! I was waiting for this, started to think you were going to mention it *8 )
you sir have earned my subscribe
How is KFC still not sponsoring every Simon channel 🤣
Who says they aren't? Allegedly
As a bengali from Bangladesh, i thank you to uphold the atrocity,my great grandfather helped people as much as possible
So, what does everyone think? Was it a natural disaster or a man-made catastrophe?
A natural disaster that was made worse by a ongoing conflict. The hurricane and the blight it spread destroyed swathes of rice crop. Coupled with the fact that the Empire was already struggling to feed Britain, Greece and other parts within and without, it is of no surprise that the disaster unfolded as it did. Not to mention that the countries that were relied upon such as the Philippines, Singapore and Burma to provide rice incase of a famine were currently occupie by the Japanese. And while Britain was to increase the supply of grain, wheat and other supplies to Bengal from places like Iran and Australia (while battling the fact of the limit of the amount of ships they possessed as well keeping an eye out for Japanese submarines) it could not keep up with the demand as more and more crops continued to fail.
Smallpox, grain fungus, cyclone, famine and a cast system!
British induced one..clear and simple..
@John Higgins lol it could have been reduced significantly if the stockpiles would be kept in india rather than sent to Europe..simple arithmetic is not that difficult..English Raj didn't bother to do so...people died..millions..
@@5ryans War makes virtually everything worse!