Under the absolute Amir

by Frank A. Martin

If it was intended that the Afghans should be used as a means of checking Russian aggression, it would no doubt be better that they were well supplied with the best modern arms; but on the other hand, there is always the chance of such arms being used against the English, for the Afghans look upon all who are not of their own country and religion as enemies, and it is unlikely that any existing treaty would be considered or have the effect of making them hesitate to take advantage of an occasion which gave them an opportunity for extending their country, or of benefiting themselves otherwise. When the border tribes rose and necessitated the Tirah campaign, the late Amir had some thousands of transport animals collected near Kabul, at the back of the mountains, and though a rising on his frontier no doubt necessitated precautionary measures in case his own interests were menaced, yet, had the British been driven beyond the Indus as was expected, and which was reported in the bazars as accomplished shortly after the rising started, the temptation to retake the Peshawar district would perhaps have been a powerful one, for that district is always claimed as part of the Afghan territory which was stolen from them by the British.

Generally the sympathies of the people lie towards the justice and equality of the British rule, and this is due mostly to the stories related of the freedom of life in India by the people who have lived there; but the authorities deal severely with those who show a liking for the English, and as they fear to let any information of their doings reach the British Government, a spy truly or falsely convicted of reporting to the English is an offender, who is summarily and finally dealt with.

The British agent in Kabul, and those with him, are little better than prisoners, for they see no one, and cannot themselves mix with the people, and have to confine their peregrinations to the boundaries of Kabul. All who are found visiting the British agent are imprisoned, and many hundreds have been killed merely on suspicion of giving him reports of the doings of the Government; and an Afghan spy, ostensibly doing a trade as a tea-seller, is stationed on the road opposite the gate of the agent’s house (the house lies a little back from the road) for the purpose of noting those who go there, and if any man passes even within a few yards of the gate, he is reported to the Kotwal; but the fear of the people of being seen anywhere near the house is now such that all give it a wide berth in passing by, and no man who values his life would dare to be seen talking to any of the agent’s men whom he met in the bazar.

All this would seem to point to a good deal happening which is detrimental to the interests of the British Government which the Afghan ruler fears may come to their knowledge, but from what I saw and heard in the country, it is only occasionally that anything happens which would interest the Indian Government, and then only mildly. It may be, however, to prevent news of these occasional happenings leaking out that the Afghan rulers consider it necessary to make the people afraid of giving news of any sort to the enemies of their country; for so they look upon all those who are not of themselves.

They certainly have occasion to fear their prison system becoming known publicly, for cruelty of all sorts is common in the way of torture. Imagine a prison where the limbs which have been hacked off men are left lying about, together with the dismembered bodies of those dead, of the suffering inflicted on them, until the whole place reeks of decomposing flesh, and then consider the frame of mind of hundreds who are imprisoned without trial, unknowing of what their own punishment is to be, who daily live in the midst of these horrors. If the truth about the Kabul prisons were generally known, other countries would probably unite in insisting on such barbarity being stopped.

The common people, who have their own way of looking at everything, attribute the large numbers of men killed in prison without any generally known reason for their execution to the British Government, and say that as the British were unable to conquer them by fighting, they now pay the Amir large sums of money monthly (the subsidy) to kill them in other ways. The people also say of the Bala Hisar (high fort) in Kabul, which Lord Roberts rased to the ground in 1880 after the massacre of Cavagnari and his men, and which still remains in ruins, that the Amir has been ordered by the British Government not to rebuild it, as one of the conditions of his occupying the throne. The opinion of these people, however fallacious, is still the opinion of those who comprise the bulk of the population, and although they are ignorant and uninformed their opinion ought not to be altogether neglected.

Amir Abdur Rahman, on one of the occasions when he favoured me with remarks on political affairs, told me he had received a letter from one of his spies in Russia, and he would read it to me. His object in doing so, of course, was not that he wished me to keep the information to myself, but I was leaving for India the following day, and it was a matter the Amir could not very well make the occasion of a letter to the Indian Government. The spy wrote that he had it from a Russian official in high authority that his Government intended, so long as Amir Abdur Rahman lived, to leave Afghanistan untouched, but that after his death they would seize it; and when the Amir had read this to me he remarked that if it was true that such was their intention, although he would be dead when they endeavoured to take his country, it was, nevertheless, a matter of importance to him, for he had for many years been striving to unite and raise his country to such position that it could hold its own among the nations and remain always an independent kingdom, and if at the time of his death his object might not be altogether accomplished, still, what he had done would form a foundation on which it was his greatest desire that his sons and their descendants would build the wall which was to keep the country intact and prevent foreign aggression.

On all occasions when Amir Abdur Rahman spoke to me on such matters he showed that he had the good of his country at heart, and at times he even shed tears when he reflected on his failure to imbue the whole of his people with his ambitions, and that all his efforts, even punishing and killing to the extent he had done, failed to induce them to forego those habits which prevented the union and strength he prayed for.

On the occasion mentioned above, the Amir threw some light on his aversion to having railways in Afghanistan. He said he had powerful neighbours on both sides of him. Each power was anxious to extend their railways into his country, and, failing that, they were always trying to persuade him to construct them himself for the benefit and improvement of his people. But supposing he did as they wanted and laid railways over his country, then they would point out that unless his system communicated with theirs they would be of little advantage to him, and he himself could see that too. And then if he joined up his railways with one power, the other power would claim a like concession and he would have to give it to risk friction and war, and yet England as his ally would expect to be the only one so favoured. Therefore, he said, it is better that the country should go without railways, however much it loses in its trade and development by so doing.