Why I Write: Essays

How Arms Control Works

Manto lived through the Second World War and his most productive writing years in India were between 1939–1945. This was the period when nations had converted industrial factories into armament-producing units and the world was awash with weapons. The theory of deterrence was also used, although this was a surprise because it was before the nuclear age. Manto’s response to this development was to write a farcical essay, which was published in 1942, while he was still working in Bollywood. It was only after Partition that his writing became very dark.

International relations is so complex that to understand it is tiresome. In fact one can get lost in that maze if one enters to figure it out.

I’m sure you’ve read about the threat of weapons of mass destruction at least twenty times. But tell me the truth — have you really understood how deterrence works? I don’t think so.

I’m not questioning your intelligence, mind you. It’s just that recently has the thing dawned on me and what I’ve understood about the subject can be put so simply that even a child would not be confused. Interested?

Imagine that you and I are slightly less clever than we are. It’s possible that I possess a pillow and it’s likely that at some point I thump your head with it. Now it’s possible that you in turn possess an egg, which you proceed to smash on my face. My pillow and your egg are weapons of mass destruction — you follow?

To bring about peace, we call a conference on the threat from these weapons. The result of our conference is that we agree to giving you the right to possess a pillow and me the right to possess an egg.

Both now have the material needed to retaliate in equal fashion if attacked. This ensures peace. Neither of us has the right to increase our arsenal without consulting the other, because this would threaten the peace.

After some time, however, I bring to your notice your ownership of a pen knife which could, logically, double up as a weapon.

You in turn point to the axe in my shed — using which I could sever your head with one swing. These discoveries suddenly produce in both of us strong and neighbourly yearnings for maintaining the peace. And so I get myself a pen knife and you add to your property an axe, though you don’t have a garden.

Now, just as it happens so often in international relations, things sour between us. I come over and tell you that since I’m threatened by the equilibrium between us, I should be better off getting a pistol from the market. Your response is to be alarmed and to get a pistol as well as a glittering sword.

To be safe, I get a sword and purely to ensure my security, I get a machine gun and mount it on my car.

Surely peace should break out anytime now. But then you go off to an arms dealer and buy a tank. You also get a bomb which can blow the roof of my house clean off.

Yours truly notices and gets a couple of bombs for himself. I also order (just in case) a couple of cylinders of poisonous gas. The gas can turn you and your children a pale yellow and the skin of your faces the texture of roasted brinjal.

In response you look for a gas that can make my head, my arms and my legs entirely vanish from my torso. You also buy a fighter-bomber and park it in your compound.

We have collected so much explosive material inside our homes now that it’s impossible to think of war.

Even so, we soon fight and destroy ourselves. However, this is incidental and shouldn’t be blamed on us because at least we tried so hard to keep the peace.

— (Originally published as Tahdeed-e-Asliha)