Afghanistan

by A. Hamilton

... The necessity for closer intercourse has so increased that it is impossible longer to observe the conditions of the 1873 Agreement. The Russian Government have notified England that the effort of two years ago to enter into direct relations with Afghanistan continues. We cannot, therefore, consider ourselves bound by any obligations whatsoever on the question of having direct relations with Afghanistan on any subject that might interest us. By virtue of the proximity of the two countries, the development of intercourse between the local populations which goes on every year will undoubtedly call for the adoption of measures for the establishment of normal relations with Afghanistan as being the only ones possible with a neighbouring state. Upon the progress of events generally and the civilising effects over the local populations of Russian influence will depend alone the time when such measures will be adopted....

Four days later, on September 4, the St. Petersburg Bourse Gazette, a paper in close relation with the Finance Ministry, said:

... The question which is ripe for settlement and will not brook delay is the question of Russian diplomatic representation at Kabul. Now that the Russian outposts have been pushed to the Afghan frontier, it is unreasonable that Kabul should remain inaccessible....

A message from the governor of Russian Turkestan to the governor of Afghan Turkestan, requesting that direct commercial intercourse might be established across the Oxus, had already been delivered when the initiatory efforts of the Novoe Vremya and the St. Petersburg Bourse Gazette were seconded by the Viedomosti and the Moscow Bourse Gazette. While the Russian press debated the character of their obligations to us in respect of Afghanistan, the emissary of the Russian Government, Sikandur Khan, a Turcoman from Ali Yurt, proceeded to Kabul. Nearly two months elapsed before tidings of the arrival of Sikandur Khan at Kabul on September 4, reached India. Proof of Russia’s proceedings was then incontestable since, on September 5, at a State Durbar which had been specially summoned, Habib Ullah read a letter from the Russian Government to the following effect:

... In the opinion of the Russian Government the time has now come for closer commercial relationship between Afghanistan and Russia. The Afghans have nothing to fear from Russian aggression, since the friendliness existing between England and Russia would be endangered if further annexations were made by the Government of the Tsar in the direction of Badakshan and Wakhan. This fact in itself becomes a permanent guarantee of peace. In these circumstances it is an act of folly to continue the attitude of suspicion and concealed hostility that now exists between the Afghan and Russian commanders of frontier posts. The Russian Government, therefore, invites the Amir to throw open to Russian caravans the trade routes between Khushk and Herat and Khushk and Kabul. The Russian Government in return will allow Afghan traders to enter freely and traverse without restrictions Russian territory. The matter has already been laid before the British Government, but this letter is addressed personally to the Amir of Afghanistan because a favourable answer from the Afghan Government would greatly strengthen the Russian case....

When the reading of this document was finished the Amir asked for the opinion of the Durbar, the temper of its members being illustrated by Ali Yar Khan, who said:

“Let this Turki dog who carries messages for infidels be beaten on the head with shoes till his hair falls off. That ought to be our answer to the Russians.”

The Amir, greatly displeased at this remark, observed that, if there were any shoebeating, it would be for him who suggested the maltreatment of the messenger. Subsequently fifty rupees were given to the Russian courier. After some public discussion the Durbar dispersed, the Amir ordering the State Secretary to acknowledge receipt of the Russian communication, and to say that, while he was willing to discuss the matter, the interchange of views must in future be made through the Government of India in accordance with the precedent established by his father, the Amir Abdur Rahman. The Russian proceedings not unnaturally attracted the attention of Parliament; and on October 21, Lord George Hamilton acquainted the British public for the first time with the receipt of the proposal which had been transmitted by the Russian Embassy to the Foreign Office nearly three years before. The correctness of the Amir’s reply was in striking contrast with the impropriety of the Russian communication, the despatch of which had transgressed the limits of diplomatic etiquette. As far back as 1868-69, Prince Gortchakoff had assured Lord Clarendon that the Russian Government regarded Afghanistan as completely outside her sphere of influence. That engagement had been re-affirmed in 1875; extended, according to the statement made by M. de Giers to Mr. Kennedy on October 2, 1883, to include abstention from the transmission of letters of ceremony, and constantly renewed in personal conversation upon a variety of occasions since the original was enacted.

This action of Russia on the waters of the Oxus had drawn attention to the vague, uncertain state of the relations subsisting between Kabul and Calcutta. As matters stood all former agreements between India and Afghanistan had automatically terminated with the death of Abdur Rahman; and it remained for the succeeding Amir to adjust the situation by calling upon the Government of India to renew the arrangements by which Afghanistan had become a subsidised and protected state of India. Although twelve months had passed since the decease of the late Amir and many opportunities had been accorded him, Habib Ullah had given no indication of any desire to enter into any undertaking with the Government of India. Nevertheless he credited himself quite wrongfully each month with the accretions of his subsidy and the balance of his father’s monies which were lying, by the particular arrangement of the late Amir, at the Treasury in India. There is, to the onlooker, the greater piquancy in this regular remittance to India of debit cheques against the Treasury, since Habib Ullah, from the outset of his reign, had exhibited a most imperfect loyalty. The patronage which he extended to the Hadda Mullah had already brought one rebuke upon him; its continuation, in the face of such remonstrance, disclosed no sense of responsibility to the Government of India. Again his procrastination in dealing with the Viceroy’s invitation to a conference obviously qualified those amiable expressions of regard for Lord Curzon which Habib Ullah was at such pains to profess.