User blog comment:GunsnadGlory/The Mughals Stay/@comment-32656-20120705221430/@comment-4621372-20120709024325

Is you being for real? (O.Brother Where art thou reference)

My point with the Romans was more about Teutoburg forest and all, but having done more research, I'll drop that.

The Marathas were not really united or even close before Shivaji- actually, hell, during his 'reign'. They were (unlike Golconda or Bijapur) essentially vassals of the Mughals. Agreed, they did all that, but why?

Shivaji. And part of the reason SHivaji hated Aurangzeb was that he was only given a rank of 5000, not 7000, which is what he expected, and as a vassal of the Emperor should have accepted.

Not at all. If it weren't for Aurangzeb, they wouldn't have expanded much, because, note, he was an idiot. He did not understand the people. He focused on taking their forts, their territory- they didn't give a rats assets about that. What they cared about- even under Shivaji and after- was plunder. Their 'lands' was really more like the zones they plundered.

Shivaji often said that he had three circles- Circle one he would not plunder, because those were his people. Circle two he demanded tax from but not to rule them like he did circle one. Circle three was his plunder zones. He pretty much united the people. Aurangzeb helped him by giving him the title 'raja'. All those maps- they show all three circles. He did not raid beyond the Deccan because he could not face a full Mughal army, without knowing the land. They did this later, venturing out of the Deccan, but only because the Mughals then were too weak.

Aurangzeb may have added some land, but he strained the Empires ressources doing so. Dara WAS an able admistrator- where the hell did you get that he wasn't?- and his eldest son, Sikandir Shukoh, was extremely intelligent and strong. Even if I conceded that Aurangzeb was an amazing Emperor - I bloody do not- his sons rebelled several times and, frankly, clearly did a bad job governing after his death. Would Sikander? I thinkest not.

The Europeans were not important, ok. Helps my point.

I'll argue about the Franco-Prussian war later.

Shah Jahan was the Tarjan to Akbar's Caesar. The Empire was greatest during the reign of Shah Jahan, but Akbar was the real force of Expansion. Moot point, anyways.

Aurangzeb was like a successful Richard I. He spent his entire life campaigning, straing the Empires resources to get- frankly- useless territories. The Deccan barely made any profit because while Aurangzeb was busy conquering Maratha forts, the Marathas were busy sacking their cities and stealing revenue. The way to deal with the Marathas was diplomacy, tact, not warfare, and Aurangzeb was no diplomat. Both Sikiandir and his father Dara, however, were- and immesely popular with the Muslims as well as the Hindus- the man basically said in his book The Mingling of Two Oceans that the Hindus were as good as the Muslims.

Aurangzeb: Pissed off the Rajputs with his anti Hindu laws and that whole affair with the succession of Raja Jaswant Singh- who, by the way, was not one of Aurangzeb's best friends, though he had no problem with Dara- thus causing them to resent him; Pissed off the Persians with anti Shia laws and general rudeness, which actaully caused the Persian ruler to go and say that he might just come to India and teach Aurangzeb to handle upstarts. This threat was acted upon by Nadir Shah in 1730. What he did in Delhi... some 30,000 people were slaughtered. The word nadirshahi in Persian still means holocaust. I am quite aware that the Persians weren't friends before, but perhaps a little more tact might have led to friendlier relations.

Exactly my bloody point LG. Aurangzeb drained the treasury with his campaigning. Dara was no where close to as warlike. Under him, Golconda, Bijapur, these might have been independant but the Mughals would had a treasury.

To hell with the non.-muslims. The very Muslim Amirs revolted too. I'm not suggesting that would not have occurred. I'm just suggesting that this kind of death or glory Rajput/Akbar (Aurangzebs son, not his great grandfather) rebellion would not have occured.

Yes, wars of succession occurred. I don't see how that affects my point.

I'm not suggesting that the Mughal empire would be as strong as it was in 1690. I'm suggesting that it might not have fractured into billions of pieces. In A Mughal Destiny, in fact, it is the Mughal Empire in name only- it is democratic (pretty much has to be). Besides, above all, this is NOT biased. That I object to. I'm not saying that it would be better or worse. I'm suggesting that a simple event could have changed lots.