Between Mars and Mammon

by Douglas M. Peers

"While popular images of the British Raj are saturated with images and memories of military campaigns, remarkably few scholarly studies have considered the direct impact that the army exerted on the day-to-day operations of the British in India. Douglas Peer's book demonstrates not only how important the army was to the establishment of British domination but also to its subsequent form and operation. Soldiers and civilians, with rare exception, were united by the truism that British rule could only be retained by the sword. A rationale and a programme for the Raj emerged that emphasized the precariousness of British rule and showed that its security could only be assured by constant preparedness for war. Consequently, military imperatives and the army's demands for resources were given priority in peacetime as well as wartime. This accounts for the origin of the Burma War (1824-26) and the capture of Bhartpur (1825-26), neither of which would appear at first glance to be strategically