A flag-waving albeit panaoramic official retelling

Best feature of this book -- leads to *other* books to read on sub-sections of the vast period and places this book covers!

Added after writing this: Part II is much better, as if a different book entirely -- one in which the author has plentiful facts to draw upon..thus, I rate the two books differently, part II being superior. I recommend skipping part I and finding other sources.

General -- Not literature, not a reference book, not a war story, nor adventure, so is it history? A *textbook* of history maybe. Keep in mind I am a big supporter of India (at least vis-a-vis Pakistan) but I found the black and white presentation hard to believe: Pakistan evil, India good. If the facts of history present the same picture, I apologize. But, the biggest drawback for my appreciating the content was that I found the narrator very unsympathetic. So, this book was as a big disappointment. I have listened to 18 chapters, skipping a few chapters at 14-17. The book just never got me hooked. I am going to try Audible's other book on the modern wars of India to see if it is as boring. Maybe I am just a poor candidate for pure military history as my background in real life is in religion and travel. So it's a bad fit.

Narration: 3/5 -- Agreeable deep male voice but he just never relaxes, he is so bombastic in tone, like a macho actor. For me, the literal sound is 80% of whether I like a book -- an appealing voice (both physically and emotionally) reading the telephone book is preferable to the greatest work of literature read by someone whose voice grates on me. I find it difficult to get beyond it.

Writing: 2/5 -- Extremely formal, and not just in the British sense, but true British Indian! He doesn't create images in my head by descriptions of war. He doesn't personalize except to bring in quotes from famous *officers*. When he does mention individuals, they are no one I know (and the author has't developed them in the work) so I don't care about them. And I find it strange that he hasn't made one direct criticism of the Indian military establishment. So, the author comes off as an insider who has many things he can't say or doesn't know or more likely cannot say. Julian Desange he is not. However, what I liked was that unlike Australian and Canadian authors he 'speaks directly from his perspective. He doesn't mince words about 'races' (he means ethnicities and social groups clearly), class and the obvious risk to world peace by political Islam, Naxalites (Maoists) etc. I suspect his sympathies are with the BJP, possibly Congress. But he is not a leftist author, the big challenge I have with the wearing of politics on their sleeve' western authors.

Content: 3/5 -- Dry facts in between '.. and they were brave'. More a publicity political book than military history. The biggest disappointment is that I wanted to learn about the diplomacy leading up to the failures that led to war and especially the nitty-gritty details of the border battles. How many men, what parallels, what equipment used, why certain strategies succeeded or failed, the number of casualties, typical wounds, what happened to prisoners, how many days did a siege last, who surrendered and why, etc. Now part of this problem is because the book covers such a broad period he can't go deep. Then why not have focused on say one border war with China? Instead the author is always hovering above the subject in detached generalities. His restraint is the hardest to take. I get the impression (also based on a comment he makes early on about slow declassification of documentation in India) that he has been muzzled by Indian censors within or without the military. I have made very few bookmarks. There's just nothing there of substance for me.

On the plus side he extends the history back to British Indian troops, and provides the 'big picture'.

I will listen to a few more random chapters and see if I change my mind and want to keep this one. It is very unlikely unless content and his writing style changes elsewhere in book. I am updating this as I go -- here are a few of the very few facts I learned that I found interesting...

1. The state of Gujarat contributes the fewest members of the Indian military. But he doesn't state the obvious to anyone familiar with demographics - doesn't it have the highest percentage of members of the pacifist religion, Jainism? Or is it an economic reasons, Jains have the reputation as being merchant class. And businessmen don;t want their kids in uniform?

2. In true jihadi bloody tradition. in the summer of 1948 the Gilgid Scouts and Frontier Rifles massacred the monks of an important monastery (which the author names along with the names of the religious leaders). Then it was desecrated and razed.

3. "You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist" -- Indira Gandhi

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