# Churchill was a genocidaire **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 6, 2017, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607 "2017-09-06T02:35:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![filmstar-en](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/50afbb/32.png) [@filmstar-en](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmstar-en)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2021, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/83 "2021-03-31T02:35:41Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > If he did the things that Mukherjee accuses him of, then there’s no room for opinion on the matter. The dispute is solely over whether he did them. That’s a question of fact. That is a big If…Mukherjee is a sensationalist writer with a Indian Nationalist interpretation of matters relating to Churchill who has scant evidence to back up her case. Did Mukherjee actually claim Churchill orchestrated a deliberate genocide in Bengal from his bunker in London in 1943 or is that your interpretation of her interpretation? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2021, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/84 "2021-03-31T14:59:21Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > > [@Acsenray](#): > > > > We don’t use “genocide” to mean “exactly what Hitler did.” > > I mean if you ask 100 people on the street what the definition of genocide is “what Hitler did” will be the most common answer. That’s people giving an example of a genocide, not the definition of genocide. We have recognized plenty of genocides, or attempted genocides, that fall far short of Nazi Germany. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2021, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/85 "2021-03-31T14:59:52Z")
> [@filmstar-en](#): > > That is a big If Perhaps it is, but it’s still a dispute over facts, not opinion. ---
**Author:** ![filmstar-en](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/50afbb/32.png) [@filmstar-en](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmstar-en)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2021, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/86 "2021-04-03T00:16:54Z")
Maybe this question will be answered by this new documentary series about Churchill. It is from a UK TV channel. It is free to view, but the ads have to be managed to make it tolerable. [https://www.channel5.com/show/churchill/](https://www.channel5.com/show/churchill/) ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2021, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/87 "2021-04-04T17:51:50Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > I mean if you ask 100 people on the street what the definition of genocide is “what Hitler did” will be the most common answer. Is the street in Armenia? Or Cambodia? ---
**Author:** ![am77494](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d2c977/32.png) [@am77494](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/am77494)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2021, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/88 "2021-04-05T20:44:17Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > What’s not in question is that Churchill was a racist motherfucker who intentially engineered the starvation of possibly over 4 million Bengalis for no other reason than spite. Churchill was just another in the line of English MFs. Let’s not forget that the severity of the famine itself was largely engineered by the English. They did this by forcing farmers to grow Indigo and Opium, where they would have grown sustenance crops. @Acsenray - thank you for bringing up this topic. I am not much of a debater, but I see that the tide is turning. ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2021, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/89 "2021-04-05T21:28:19Z")
If by “the things Mukherjee accuses him of”, you mean “deliberately engineering a famine in Bengal for ?? reasons”, no evidence from any source other than Mukherjee has been offered to support that claim, and Mukherjee’s claims appear to dissolve in the face of cursory fact-checking. When you re-opened this thread, your link said that scholars said Churchill “contributed to” the famine, and that sentence linked to a Guardian story from 1943 that criticized the British colonial leadership’s incompetence, but didn’t at all suggest that deliberate malice was involved, and didn’t mention Churchill (though obviously he was ultimately responsible for those incompetent leaders). ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2021, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/90 "2021-04-06T03:09:34Z")
> [@am77494](#): > > They did this by forcing farmers to grow Indigo and Opium, where they would have grown sustenance crops. I will need a cite for this. WW2 period. Not Victorian. ---
**Author:** ![am77494](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d2c977/32.png) [@am77494](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/am77494)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2021, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/91 "2021-04-06T12:10:22Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I will need a cite for this. WW2 period. Not Victorian So the burden of proof falls on the exploited ? While the pukka-sahibs keep enjoying their loots and privileges? Anyways : here’s a start “ Agricultural performance in the interwar period (1918–1939) was dismal. From 1891 to 1946, the annual growth rate of all crop output was 0.4 %, and food-grain output was practically stagnant. There were significant regional and intercrop differences, however, nonfood crops doing better than food crops.” And “ The crisis was most acute in Bengal, where food output declined at an annual rate of about 0.7 % from 1921 to 1946, when population grew at an annual rate of about 1 %.” From : [History of agriculture in the Indian subcontinent - Wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_agriculture_in_the_Indian_subcontinent) ---
**Author:** ![FigNorton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fignorton/32/5619_2.png) [@FigNorton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FigNorton)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2021, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/92 "2021-04-06T16:37:18Z")
That link also says “Bengal had below-average growth rates in both food and nonfood crop output,” so it doesn’t really go towards proving they were forced to grow opium instead of rice. I wouldn’t be surprised but I don’t see that mentioned. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2021, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607/93 "2021-04-06T18:58:51Z")
That doesnt show:_They did this by forcing farmers to grow Indigo and Opium_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/churchill-was-a-genocidaire/795607.md?page=4)