1/5 Imperial apologists put discrete acts of racialized violence such as Amritsar in the "bad" column of their absurd moral balance sheet of the British Empire, but they consistently disavow the reality that its everyday administration was conditioned by a) racist assumptions

2/5 and b) the threat of violence. One quirky example of a), everyday racism: James Longden, governor of Ceylon 1879 wrote that its "natives" could be trusted to care for insignificant lighthouses only. More important and isolated lighthouses could be trusted to Chinese keepers

3/5 but a "European or Eurasian" would be required for the most vital ones. As for b), the everyday backstop of violence, Thomas Elliot, senior Colonial Office official, conducted an audit of what British military forces were required in which colonies in 1860.

4/5 Their racial composition was critical to his calculation: Colonies are "exposed … some more and others less to perils from Natives … in certain Colonies, [the] population is British, in others foreign; in part of them it is wholly white, in part almost wholly coloured ..."

5/5 "... is it surprising ... that … their demands for military assistance should be different?” I don't know what makes imperial apologists assume that the majority of subjects of colour were grateful for British rule, and moralise accordingly, but this does suggest otherwise.