That's an interesting article. But too long to read patiently.. But i did read those parts belonging to southindia and ceylon.
One thing i found is that, these were essentially written by the christian travellers, where in this article, they refer to them as idoloators. There is possibility of one sided view of the european travellers. (their mentioning of cowards!!!...)
Any way, this cannot be rejected on the whole.
Secondly, I could not get how this story fits our case.
But, there is lot of information from these discussions. The new info, made me to again revisit my old opinions.
Ultimately, the main difference i found b/w wars of our kings, and that of the invaders is that, while it was a raja dharma, and widely accepted one, of one country invading another.. But, the societal setup was not disturbed by these wars, although, the warring class suffered heavily.. (that too was an widely accepted, as the characteristics of the kshatriyas.. )
The main reference i bank on these is dharampal's books.
For example, Even during the worst period of mughals, the social setup of ours were largely intact, with our pre-british educational institutions, the various settlements all across the land, the typical social setup, the educational process, where each village had basic educational facilities etc.
The common people were largely indifferent to the political happenings. That's why, even when mughals dominated, our people relented in and co-existed.
As swamy vivekananda says, the only time, there was mass rebellion is that, whenever there is large interference in the religious beliefs of the common people.
as i said in our earlier mails, the kingdom were conglomeration of small rulers, who accepted a particular kings authority. The king largely operate from his chosen bases like capital city and other forts that he built. The daily affairs were mostly taken care of the small kings.
When another king invades and defeats the present king, then the small rulers tend to accept the new king's authority, and pays tribute to him.
When the mughals invaded, this is what exactly happened. They initially set out for destruction of kafirs, but on seeing such vast settlements of people, and the enormous wealth, coming as tribute from numerous such small rulers, they retained the political setup, with some customization on their part.
They disloged many of the big kings.
But, again, whenever, there is any anti-people policies, the local rulers were sensitive to those, and they took side, to displace the present king. This happened during the moovendar eras also.. when pandiyan king is not fair, the local rulers switched side to chola to dislodge him. Because, they were directly accountable to the people then.
It is this background, that when aurangazeb started large scale demolition and conversion, the local rulers, joined together, and fought back, and since the great sivaji was scoring at that time, they rallied behind him.
Its the same reason, that many of the tamil kings, rallied behind vijayanagara empire, to fight against the muslim invaders.
But, the greatest havoc is wrought by the britishers, who managed to collapse the entire social order. They took over numerous endowments to our indigneous educational institutions, temples, and other institutions of arts, medicine etc. They replaced our political setup, with their own. OUr local rulers were made dummy, and subvertient to collectors.
The absense of the local kings to enforce dharma, and association with non-dharmic based britishers, led to degradation of many of the local rulers. This is where, you have pointed numerous leisure, and palace kings, who doesnot cared about people. Because, there was no one to punish them, for going against the people. For the britishers, they were fine as long as they receive the agreed tribute. But, it was not the case with indian rulers. The scholars in the society took the issue to the king, and ensured that either the local chief is punished or warned.
This is what, i so far understood about our pre-british society, from dharampal's book.
So, i could confidently say, that the wars of the west, mostly based on semitic religion, which believed in believers and non-believers, is entirely different from the wars of india, which was purely a conflict of kingdoms.
There were virutes, like not attacking the unarmed, children, women, etc. It was a moral code followed by almost all the kings.. And how such virutes developed among all kingdoms is researchable.
institutions, and as they grow, they were taught to follow dharma.
Its imperative, that we had our own treasure of administrative policies, and there were scholars, who were proficient in it. Even in wars, there were numerous tactics followed, which unfortunately were undocumented and lost after britishers banned all forms of martial practices in india.