FOR fifty years or more, we have been warned that one day we must encounter Russia, and for fifty years Muscovite armies, conquering their way step by step, have been advancing southward, till we find England and Russia now all-but face to face in Central Asia.
Steadily the Russians are advancing. Their circular of 1864, in which they declared that they had reached their wished-for frontier, has been altogether forgotten, and all Kokand, and portions of Bokhara, have been swallowed up, while our spies in St. Petersburg tell the Indian Council that Persia herself is doomed. Although, however, the distance of the Russian from the English frontiers has been greatly reduced of late, it is still far more considerable than is supposed. Instead of the Russian outposts being 100 miles from Peshawur, as one alarmist has said, they are still 400; and Samarcand, their nearest city, is 450 miles in a straight line over the summit of the Hindoo Koosh, and 750 by road from our frontier at the Khyber. At the same time, we must, in our calculations of the future, assume that a few years will see Russia at the northern base of the Hindoo Koosh, and in a position to overrun Persia and take Herat.
It has been proposed that we should declare to Russia our intention to preserve Afghanistan as neutral ground; but there arises this difficulty, that, having agreed to this plan, Russia would immediately proceed to set about ruling Afghanistan through Persia. On the other hand, it is impossible, as we have already found, to treat with Afghanistan, as there is no Afghanistan with which to treat; nor can we enter into friendly relations with any Afghan chief, lest his neighbor and enemy should hold us responsible for his acts. If we are to have any dealings with the Afghans, we shall soon be forced to take a side, and necessarily to fight and conquer, but at a great cost in men and money. It might be possible to make friends of some of the frontier tribes by giving them lands within our borders on condition of their performing military service and respecting the lives and property of our merchants; but the policy would be costly, and its results uncertain, while we should probably soon find ourselves embroiled in Afghan politics. Moreover, meddling in Afghanistan, long since proved to be a foolish and a dangerous course, can hardly be made a wise one by the fact of the Russians being at the gate.
Many would have us advance to Herat, on the ground that it is in Afghanistan, and not on the plains of India, that Russia must be met; but such is the fierceness of the Afghans, such the poverty of their country, that its occupation would be at once a source of weakness and a military trap to the invader. Were we to occupy Herat, we should have Persians and Afghans alike against us; were the Russians to annex Afghanistan, they could never descend into the plains of India without a little diplomacy, or a little money from us, bringing the Afghan fanatics upon their rear. When, indeed, we look carefully into the meaning of those Anglo-Indians who would have us repeat our attempt to thrash the Afghans into loving us, we find that the pith of their complaint seems to be that battles and conquests mean promotion, and that we have no one left in India upon whom we can wage war. Civilians look for new appointments, military men for employment, missionaries for fresh fields, and all see their opening in annexation, while the newspapers echo the cry of their readers, and call on the Viceroy to annex Afghanistan “at the cost of impeachment.”
Were our frontier at Peshawur a good one for defense, there could be but little reason shown for an occupation of any part of Afghanistan; but, as it is, the question of the desirability of an advance is complicated by the lamentable weakness of our present frontier. Were Russia to move down upon India, we should have to meet her either in Afghanistan or upon the Indus: to meet her at Peshawur, at the foot of the mountains and with the Indus behind us, would be a military suicide. Of the two courses that would be open to us, a retreat to the Indus would be a terrible blow to the confidence of our troops, and an advance to Cabool or Herat would be an advance out of reach of our railroad communications, and through a dangerous defile. To maintain our frontier force at Peshawur, as we now do, is to maintain in a pestilential valley a force which, if attacked, could not fight where it is stationed, but would be forced to advance into Afghanistan or retreat to the Indus. The best policy would probably be to withdraw the Europeans from Peshawur and Rawul Pindee, and place them upon the Indus in the hills near Attock, completing our railroad from Attock to Lahore and from Attock to the hill station, and to leave the native force to defend the Khyber and Peshawur against the mountain tribes. We should also encourage European settlement in the valley of Cashmere. On the other hand, we should push a short railroad from the Indus to the Bholan Pass, and there concentrate a second powerful European force, with a view to resisting invasion at that point, and of taking in flank and rear any invader who might advance upon the Khyber. The Bholan Pass is, moreover, on the road to Candahar and Herat; and, although it would be a mistake to occupy those cities except by the wish of the Afghans, still the advance of the Russians will probably one day force the Afghans to ally themselves to us and solicit the occupation of their cities. The fact that the present ruler of Herat is a mere tool of the Persians or feudatory of the Czar will have no effect whatever on his country, for if he once threw himself openly into Russian hands his people would immediately desert him. So much for the means of defense against the Russians, but there is some chance that we may have to defend India against another Mohammedan invasion, secretly countenanced, but not openly aided, by Russia. While on my way to England, I had a conversation on this matter with a well-informed Syrian Pacha, but notorious Russian-hater. He had been telling me that Russian policy had not changed, but was now, as ever, a policy of gradual annexation; that she envied our position in India, and hated us because our gentle treatment of Asiatics is continually held up to her as an example. “Russia has attacked you twice in India, and will attack you there again,” he said. Admitting her interference in the Afghan war, I denied that it was proved that she had any influence in Hindostan, or any hand in the rebellion of 1857. My friend made me no spoken answer, but took four caskets that stood upon the table, and, setting them in a row, with an interval between them, pushed the first so that it struck the second, the second the third, and the third the fourth. Then, looking up, he said, “There you have the manner of the Russian move on India. I push No. 1, but you see No. 4 moves. 1 influences 2, 2 influences 3, and 3 influences 4; but 1 doesn‘t influence 4. Oh, dear me, no! Very likely even 1 and 3 are enemies, and hate each other; and if 3 thought that she was doing 1’s work, she would kick over the traces at once. Nevertheless, she is doing it. In 1857, Russia certainly struck at you through Egypt, and probably through Central Asia also. Lord Palmerston was afraid to send troops through Egypt, though, if that could have been largely done, the mutiny could have been put down in half the time, and with a quarter the cost; and Nana Sahib, in his proclamation, stated, not without reason, that Egypt was on his side. The way you are being now attacked is this:—Russia and Egypt are for the moment hand and glove, though their ultimate objects are conflicting. Egypt is playing for the leadership of all Islam, even of Moslems in Central Asia and India. Russia sees that this game is for the time her game, as through Egypt she can excite the Turcomans, Afghans, and other Moslems of Central Asia to invade India in the name of religion and the Prophet, but, in fact, in the hope of plunder, and can also at the same time raise your Mohammedan population in Hindostan—a population over which you admit you have absolutely no hold. Of course you will defeat these hordes whenever you meet them in the field; but their numbers are incalculable, and their bravery great. India has twice before been conquered from the north, from Central Asia, and you must remember that behind these hordes comes Russia herself. Mohammedanism is weak here, on the Mediterranean, I grant you; but it is very strong in Central Asia—as strong as it ever was. Can you trust your Sikhs, too? I doubt it.”
When I asked the Pacha how Egypt was to put herself at the head of Islam, he answered:—“Thus. We Egyptians are already supporting the Turkish empire. Our tribute is a million (francs), but we pay five millions, of which four go into the Sultan‘s privy purse. We have all the leading men of Turkey in our pay: 30,000 of the best troops serving in Crete, and the whole of the fleet, are contributed by Egypt. Now, Egypt had no small share in getting up the Cretan insurrection, and yet, you see, she does, or pretends to do, her best to put it down. The Sultan, therefore, is at the Viceroy‘s mercy, if you don‘t interfere. No one else will if you do not. The Viceroy aims at being nominally, as he is really, ‘the Grand Turk.’ Once Sultan, with Crete and the other islands handed over to Greece or Russia, the present Viceroy commands the allegiance of every Moslem people—thirty millions of your Indian subjects included: that is, practically Russia commands that allegiance—Russia practically, though not nominally, at Constantinople wields the power of Islam, instead of being hated by every true believer, as she would be if she annexed Turkey in Europe. Her real game is a far grander one than that with which she is credited.” “Turkey is your vassal,” the Pacha went on to say; “she owes her existence entirely to you. Why not use her, then? Why not put pressure on the Sultan to exert his influence over the Asian tribes—which is far greater than you believe—for your benefit? Why not insist on your Euphrates route? Why not insist on Egypt ceasing to intrigue against you, and annex the country if she continues in her present course? If you wish to bring matters to a crisis, make Abdul Aziz insist on Egypt being better governed, or on the slave-trade being put down. You have made your name a laughing-stock here. You let Egypt half bribe, half force Turkey into throwing such obstacles in the way of your Euphrates route that it is no nearer completion now than it ever was. You force Egypt to pass a law abolishing the slave-trade and slavery itself, and you have taken no notice of the fact that this law has never been enforced in so much as a single instance. You think that you are all right now that you have managed to force our government into allowing your troops to pass to and fro through Egypt, thus making your road through the territory of your most dangerous enemy. Where would you be in case of a war with Russia?”
When I pleaded that, if we were refused passage, we should occupy the country, the Pacha replied: “Of course you would; but you need not imagine that you will ever be refused passage. What will happen will be that, just at the time of your greatest need, the floods will come down from the mountains and wash away ten miles of the line, and all the engines will go out of repair. You will complain: we shall offer to lay the stick about the feet of all the employés of the line. What more would you have? Can we prevent the floods? When our government wished to keep your Euphrates scheme from coming to anything, did they say: ‘Do this thing, and we will raise Islam against you’? Oh no! they just bribed your surveyors to be attacked by the Bedouin, or they bribed a pacha to tell you that the water was alkaline and poisonous for the next hundred miles, and so on, till your company was ruined, and the plan at an end for some years. Your home government does not understand us Easterns. Why don‘t you put your Eastern affairs into the hands of your Indian government? You have two routes to India—Egypt and Euphrates valley, and both are practically in the hands of your only great enemy—Russia.”
In all that my Syrian friend said of the danger of our relying too much upon our route across Egypt, and on the importance to us of the immediate construction of the Euphrates Valley Railway line, there is nothing but truth; but, in his fears of a fresh invasion of India by the Mohammedans, he forgot that for fighting purposes the Mohammedans are no longer one, but two peoples; for the Moslem races are divided into Sonnites and Shiites, or orthodox and dissenting Mohammedans, who hate each other far more fiercely than they hate us. Our Indian Moslems are orthodox, the Afghans and Persians are dissenters, the Turks are orthodox. If Egypt and Persia play Russia‘s game, we may count upon the support of the Turks of Syria, of the Euphrates valley, and of India. To unite Irish Catholics and Orangemen in a religious crusade against the English would be an easy task by the side of that of uniting Sonnite and Shiite against India. A merely Shiite invasion is always possible, but could probably be met with ease, by opposition at the Khyber, and resistance upon the Indus, followed by a rapid advance from the Bholan. Russia herself is not without her difficulties with the strictest and most fanatical Mohammedans. Now that she has conquered Bokhara, their most sacred land, they hate her as fiercely as they hate us. The crusade, if she provokes it, may be upon our side, and British commanders in green turbans may yet summon the Faithful to arms, and invoke the Prophet.
It is to be remarked that men who have lived long in India think that our policy in the East has overwhelming claims on the attention of our home authorities. Not only is Eastern business to be performed, and Eastern intrigues watched carefully, but, according to these Indian flies, who think that their Eastern cart-wheel is the world, Oriental policy is to guide home policy, to dictate our European friendships, to cause our wars.
No Englishman in England can sympathize with the ridiculous inability to comprehend our real position in India which leads many Anglo-Indians to cry out that we must go to war with Russia to “keep up our prestige;” and, on the other hand, it need hardly be shown that, apart from the extension of trade and the improvement of communication, we need not trouble ourselves with alliances to strengthen us in the East. Supported by the native population, we can maintain ourselves in India against the world; unsupported by them, our rule is morally indefensible, and therefore not long to be retained by force of arms.