3.2 Learning to lose

[date:-327|magadha,x]

Even King Puruṣottama – foremost of Kṣatriyas, at one hundred and twenty six two-third-inches in height, mightiest and most knowledgeable, unmatched in his righteousness and in his commitment to the protection of his kingdom and the Vedic way – was outshined by the sharp eyes of his honoured guest whom he had bowed before.

“It is true that defensive wars are easier to fight than offensive ones, in general,” said the young Professor in a conciliatory voice, “Yet my attack on the Persians was at an opportune moment – for us. Alexander’s attack will be in an opportune moment – for him. Either one must wait for an opportune moment, or train to make a moment opportune – but we do not have the same information about Alexander’s army or strategy that he may have about us.”

The famed scholar who sat across from the king – who had already accrued great repute by causing the Persians to retreat from the borders of the civilized world – who had for a long time now occupied the king’s utmost respects, with the latter honouring, even defending from and disciplining his sons who had referred to the young man as a wicked Gandhāra and an upstart from a distant Southern country of little repute – was attempting, in effect, to persuade Puruṣottama to surrender to the barbarian Greeks who were soon expected to stage an invasion of his prosperous country.

“An opportune moment?” the king pressed. “Like Takṣaśilā, that bent for the Persians for one hundred and eighty-eight years before deciding to strike back? Must I also live another one hundred and eighty-eight years to see my kingdom freed again, under your counsel?”

Generations prior, on the orders from the Heir of Saṃkarṣaṇa, several ancient lines of Vṛṣṇis had fled Mathura to settle and cultivate new tracts should their homeland fall to Magadhi imperialism (as it did) – among these lines were the Abhisaras who conquered the mountainous regions in and around Kaśmīra – the Satvatas and the Andhakas who ruled as Southern viceroys of the imperium at Ujjain – a house of the Ārjunāyanas in their republic in Indraprastha – the line of Samba (not to be confused with Samba, the last and traitorous Heir of Saṃkarṣaṇa) who conquered the rugged Western Sindh (as opposed to less rugged Eastern Sindh ruled by the Mūṣikas of Southern origin), and finally the line of the two feuding cousins settled on the two banks of the Candrabhāga rivers.

King Puruṣottama, who belonged to that latter dynasty, had, wielding in battle the banner of Vāsudeva, conquered the Uśīnara country (the region between the Vitástā and                Candrabhāga rivers) and built a prosperous country in that tract, and he had single-handedly fended off Persian incursions, preventing them from crossing the Vitástā river and seizing so much as two thirds of an inch of his land. He could not fathom – indeed, he was quite enraged at the suggestion – why that very Professor Cāṇakya who had overthrown Persian rule in Gandhāra and elsewhere, was apparently of the belief that these barbarians were somehow different.

Cāṇakya ignored the comment, as if offended that the king had not listened more closely to something. “You do realize,” he continued, “That your territory is in a precarious state, trapped between two enemies?”

This was for what Puruṣottama had cast off all historical enmities with the Gandhāras – the traitorous, unrighteous Gandhāras – the descendants of the wicked Śakuni – placing his best faith in the wisdom of Professor Cāṇakya? To hear these traitorous words?!

There was a rumour, that King Puruṣottama had heard from his wife – that years prior, Cāṇakya had developed affections for a Greek studentess at Takṣaśilā, even admitting her to his gurukula without the necessary qualifications and having his lectures specially transcribed to her in writing – and that her words of affection for him, in the Greek language, were repeated to this day by a parrot on the premises of the university.

Puruṣottama had chastised her for contributing to the proliferation of such foolish and irrelevant gossip.

“One of these enemies is your king,” Puruṣottama shot back. “Is this what this meeting is, Professor? A veiled threat? Is that all that Takṣaśilā’s foreign policy is – to surrender to any barbarian who wishes to seize it?”

“And the same is true of the entire region of Punjab and Sindh,” Cāṇakya continued, “Trapped between the Magadhas and the Persians, now the Greeks – and were these two powers to ally, we would be faced by war on both fronts, should we not seek the protection of one of these empires. Our disunity is only an impediment to co-ordination.”

Puruṣottama froze.

The consideration the interests of the civilized world as a whole, rather than merely his kingdom; the thought of a unified empire to rule the Punjab and Sindh – these were daydreams that had often occupied Puruṣottama, daydreams that he had dismissed as being precisely such. It was jarring to hear Professor Cāṇakya – a man he revered, despite their current differences – speak of (or hint to) such ideas, even if not explicitly or coherently; it touched the king’s mind on some deep level.

He shook it off, recalling what his minister Viśālākṣa had warned him about, based on his experience debating with Professor Cāṇakya: the Professor was incredibly persuasive, not necessarily because he was true, but because he would infer – from your intellect, personality, actions, conversations – your truest and most unspoken thoughts and desires, and make arguments that he knew you could not reject without feeling disappointment in yourself.

“The same was true when faced against the Persians,” the king pointed out, “And yet you defeated them, and yet Magadha has not made any Westward incursions. So what if their army outnumbers ours, Professor? So be it, each one of our soldiers will slay ten of theirs!”

Cāṇakya’s brief subsequent silence caused Puruṣottama to briefly wonder – then shed off the absurd and wishful thought – if he had finally defeated the invincible Cāṇakya in debate, but then he spoke:

“Great King – hope is not a strategy. Merely a slogan used by fools to manipulate other fools. Everything you suggest – fighting on two fronts, fighting armies larger than one’s own – requires strategy. Especially when Alexander himself is no ordinary commander. He is creative.”

The Persians had fielded far larger forces against his one, and yet he had won, time and again, through superior strategy and a more courageous army. To hear the Professor speak in such high terms of the Greeks – like a traitor might to demoralize – incited fury in him, and he said so in as many words.

“If you truly believed your own arguments,” the king said bitterly, “You would not be urging me to surrender, but rather offering me your advice in military strategy against the Greeks.”

“And that is precisely what I am doing,” Cāṇakya responded evenly. “You can defeat the Greeks, with my advice – I believe this. The important condition in that sentence being – with my advice. A frontal immediate war, on the Greeks’ terms, is not my advice. You must learn to lose a battle to win a war; this is my advice. Send me a pigeon if you wish to hear more of it.”

“Oh great conqueror,” the Iranian girl pleaded, “You are unmatched in your strategic acumen and your conquests, but do believe me when I say that I understand the pulse of my people.”

“Why should I spare my enemies in victory, Roxana? It would be foolish of me to even ask – would they have done me the same favour, had I been defeated? – for such a scenario would never have manifested in the first place.”

“They are mercenaries, my lord – they are loyal to whoever pays them, and for a sufficient price they will swear not to consider any competing offer. To execute them would be akin to executing the craftsmen who made your enemies’ swords.”

“Loyalty?” asked the young man. “Their leader deserted them as soon as my victory became obvious to him!”

“Śaśigupta is not of my country, my Lord – he is an Indian. But he alone is capable of leading this corporation, and all its other members have all the noble qualities of us Iranians, which you so admire.”

“In truth, I do not know why I bother to entertain you in my quarters. This is not your place—”

“Please, my lord, my word is true—”

“—What are your motives for protecting them? What is your stake in this?”

Rukhsana was nervous. It would not do at all to have her husband know that she was being blackmailed by her former lover, and that that was whom she was pleading him to spare.

“I am a princess of Bāhlīka, and do not wish that harm be done to my people. But I am also your wife, and thus I would never lie to you, my Lord. Thus, I have made no attempt to protect those members of my family who I believed may conspire against you – I even used my connections with them to extort that information for you, so you could be certain. I care not for Śaśigupta himself, only his followers – when I tell you to spare him, it is out of my concern for you, that I believe he will serve you well.”

In truth, Alexander was not sure why he had been considering a mass-execution at all – it was as if it had been dropped in drunken conversation and he had taken it as fact. It had always been his practice to execute only the leaders of his enemies, rather than massacre every peasant who had taken arms against him.

“Śaśigupta has offered to show me the hidden treasures of Bāhlīka, if I promise to spare him,” the Greek king said at last. “Those which the members of your family took poison to avoid divulging. If he does follow through on this, that shall demonstrate both his competence, in uncovering such secrets, and his future loyalty to me, for he will not have taken these treasures for himself. If he does not, then I will execute him. That is my word.”