Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c51.s1: § 1. Guerilla Warfare of the Marathas—its defects
Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c51.s1
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§ 1. Guerilla Warfare of the Marathas—its defects
v4.c51.s1.1
The old Maratha method of fighting is usually called guerilla warfare; but it was quite different from the tactics followed by the Spanish guerrilleros against Napoleon's troops in the famous Peninsular War. Indeed, the Maratha fighters are best described by their Persian title of "predatory light horse" (*ghanimi fauj*.) Their chief characteristics were that they moved in large bodies—"myriads of horse" as Munro wrote to Wellington,—and they could cover long distances very quickly, being unencumbered with artillery, baggage, munitions and even food supplies, as they and their ponies lived on the country. But unlike the Spanish guerillas they had no muskets and could effect no ambuscade by small parties, such as terrorised the French armies in Spain. When forced into a battle in the open, their plan was to ride down the enemy by a tumultuous charge, enveloping him from all sides at once. Hence it followed that against artillery and walled posts held by trained musketeers, the Deccani light cavalry was powerless. No doubt, they did incalculable economic damage and in a single week's raid could destroy, like a locust swarm, the crops and trees and industrial plant of a whole district. It took a generation to fully repair the ravage of a single raid of the Marathas and to restore production to its former condition.
v4.c51.s1.2
The guerilla system of the Deccan had an inherent defect, and this became evident in the second half of the 18th century. Guerillas can operate best when they fight in an area where the people are friendly to them, and supply them with food and intelligence, thus enabling them to move in complete concealment from their enemy. But where such irregular horse is operating outside its homeland, it antagonises the local population by sucking the substance of the country, and this handicap lessens the secrecy and speed of its movements. Moreover, the predatory horse can only cut off small provision supplies and stragglers, but cannot drive away a regular army from the field or from a defensible post, if the latter has stored provisions in advance.
v4.c51.s1.3
Then, in the late 18th century, the European-led armies in India had an increased proportion of muskets to pikes in each battalion, and improved the number, mobility, and fire-rate of their light guns. The Maratha light cavalry felt itself more and more helpless in confronting such enemies; in fact the Marathas could operate successfully against the new model if the latter was on the march with cumbersome guns and baggage—as was the case with Cockburn at Talégaon and Goddard in the Borghat, where the Marathas were defending their own broken country. Here the superior arms and discipline of the European-led troops were neutralised by the failure of their supplies and the exhaustion of their munitions. But so long as the ammunition lasted, the predatory light horse durst not approach them.
v4.c51.s1.4
As was to be expected, the Maratha light horse refused to face the campoo* unless it was given fire-protection of its own. In the Lakheri campaign (1793) before the final battle was joined, Holkar’s men avoided battle and only tried to “go round the battalions” of De Boigne by carefully keeping out of the range of their enemy’s guns. The impotence of horsemen against musketeers was proved on the field of Panchilas, which preceded the battle of Lakheri by three days and determined beforehand the result of the latter battle. At Panchilas, the wild Malhar Rao Holkar II with his indigenous cavalry made a detour round one flank and threatened the rear of De Boigne’s army, but being confronted by steady musketeers and quick-firing light guns on that face, he broke and fled away; and then the rest of Holkar’s army, which had been waiting to profit by the success of this cavalry charge, left the field without striking one blow! [*Holk. Kaifiyat.* 62-63, “gherāgheri”.]
v4.c51.s1.5
∗ For the sake of convenience I use the word campoo for these European-trained brigades and the word fauj for the old type of Indian troops, mostly cavalry. Words like campoo, paltan, (battalion), kumedan (Fr. commandant), manjar (major), jarnal (General) have come from the French and become naturalised in our indigenous histories and despatches written in Persian and Marathi.
v4.c51.s1.6
When the fighting was not a skirmish but a grand field action or when the fate of a long campaign is considered, the worst defect of the indigenous type of Indian armies was found to be not its lack of superior fire-arms but the utter absence of integration among its various parts and the want of a brains trust among its leaders. As the French soldier-politician the Comte de Modave observed in 1776: “The army of an Indian prince does not form a regular whole as among us. The different bodies which compose them have no connection with one another. No staff officer, particular or general, is seen among them. Nor is there any subordination of the chiefs to the supreme chief of the army, or any connection or dependence of one to the other. . . Every individual body of soldiers provides itself as it can and as it pleases, with provisions and munitions. (*Journal du Voyage*, tr. by me in *Islamic Culture*, July 1937.)