Rice Wars: The 1943 Bengal Famine and Its Impact on the US–UK Wartime Alliance

Sandwiched between the sweeping tides of the Second World War and the tragedy of Partition, the Bengal Famine of 1943 has been largely neglected by scholarship. Much of the existing literature on the famine focuses on its local character: the culpability of landowners, the ineffective provincial response, and the endemic history of famine in Bengal stretching back to 1770. In fact, the event was not a simple market failure or even a product of regional policy, but a pivotal moment in international history. The famine was the first relatively large-scale, government-backed humanitarian intervention by the United States. The intervention is even more anomalous because it took place in territory under the hegemony of the United Kingdom, and directly challenged British authority in the region. Using both British and American primary-source archival material, I chart the course of the American intervention, and the subsequent British response. The United States was able to use its intricate intelligence networks in India, and its ties to the diaspora community to assert itself as a strong contender for regional influence, and in turn, as an ally to the Indian Nationalist Movement. As the United Kingdom felt its global hegemony under threat, this development became a critical point of friction in the “Special Relationship,” and partially sabotaged the early stages of the reconquest of Burma. Ultimately, the famine and its aftermath had a lasting impact on the way in which these two great powers perceived one another, and how they imagined themselves in the post-war world.

The poster will display the main research questions, methodology, and findings of research carried out over the course of three years. The center of the poster will feature an illustrated timeline of the famine, including major decision-points on both the British and American sides. The left-hand side of the poster will include major historiographical debates and perspectives. The right side of the poster will lay out my intervention, methodology, and main conclusions. I will end my presentation with themes and questions for future consideration and a brief overview of my current research endeavors.