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Beyond the Khyber Pass: The Road to British Disaster in the First Afghan War
An analysis of the struggle for nineteenth-century Afghanistan profiles the military leaders, rebels, politicians, and others whose decisions culminated in the tragic massacre of sixteen thousand British soldiers and their families at Kabul
- GenresHistoryMilitary Fiction
329 pages, Paperback
First published June 12, 1905
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 20, 2017
The subtitle pretty much says it all “The Road to British Disaster in the First Afghan War”
There is some background of how the British came to control India and especially with what we know now, it is easy to see how the imperial conceit grew to epic hubris. There is good background of the mindset of the British and how it led to the disaster we learn about.
There were some who foresaw the folly of replacing the ruler of Kabul with someone more amenable to British interests, such as “old Mountstuart Elphinstone”, who said about restoring Shah Shuja to power said…
If you send 27,000 men up the Bolan Pass to Candahar and can feed them, I have no doubt tou will take Candahar and Caubul; but for maintaining him in a poor, strong and remote country among a turbulent people like the Afghans, I own it seems to me to be hopeless pg 128
In a sense it is by now a cliched story, but I want to focus on one ancillary observation. Mainly in reading this story we are reminded how freaking scary and horrible the world can be. Consider the centuries old tribal and violent ways Afghanistan and neighboring places constructed their lives.
As Sir John Malcom summed up the Persian royal attitude based on impressions gained during his two missions in Tehran:“Instructed to believe themselves born to rule, the conceived that they have only to enjoy the power which they inherit...listen to the flatterers by whom they are surrounded til, enervated and subdued by a life of indolence and vice, they fall before a popular native chief or foreign invader” pg 59
and this...
Pottinger remembered with revulsion that on the day after Christmas Shah Kamran had sent off all Persian prisoners to Turkoman slavers, while Mohammed Shah retaliated by having his Afghan captives ripped open and forced to bury their heads in their own entrails before dying of shock or suffocation” pg 113-114
Hold those bits in your brain, and say a prayer of thanks that we don’t live in such a violent and unfair world. To be fair there are mentions of traditional examples of Afghan hospitality, and individual moments of true heroism toward some besieged British. But of course those were all the more courageous compared to the angry hordes slaughtering the British interlopers. Granted the British felt they could march with military force into any land and take over, so they should never have been there. But still...
Moving into pointless opining not directly related to this book… THAT unpredictable world is what millionaires and billionaires should think about before crying about being taxed and it's thievery and akin to slavery.
“Taxation of earnings from labor is on par with forced labor.” Robert Nozick
“The Tom Perkins system is: You don’t get to vote unless you pay a dollar of taxes,” Perkins said. “But what I really think is, it should be like a corporation. You pay a million dollars in taxes, you get a million votes. How’s that?”
Anyway, the idea that the cost of civilization is free and if you are a “job creator” people should be singing your praises is ever more prevalent, at least on those conservative talking head show. IF we don’t consider the true cost of a peaceful land we may be tempted to cut corners. And the regular infighting of the "leaders" of Afghan tribes must have made life difficult for the merchants and average people of the land.
Well, I’m sure there is a better way to explain what I am trying to get across. Maybe I will be able to flesh it out later. But for now, a good book, well written and insightful. Although you can argue that it is mostly from the Bristish viewpoint, even when critical. So very good and very readable.
There is some background of how the British came to control India and especially with what we know now, it is easy to see how the imperial conceit grew to epic hubris. There is good background of the mindset of the British and how it led to the disaster we learn about.
There were some who foresaw the folly of replacing the ruler of Kabul with someone more amenable to British interests, such as “old Mountstuart Elphinstone”, who said about restoring Shah Shuja to power said…
If you send 27,000 men up the Bolan Pass to Candahar and can feed them, I have no doubt tou will take Candahar and Caubul; but for maintaining him in a poor, strong and remote country among a turbulent people like the Afghans, I own it seems to me to be hopeless pg 128
In a sense it is by now a cliched story, but I want to focus on one ancillary observation. Mainly in reading this story we are reminded how freaking scary and horrible the world can be. Consider the centuries old tribal and violent ways Afghanistan and neighboring places constructed their lives.
As Sir John Malcom summed up the Persian royal attitude based on impressions gained during his two missions in Tehran:“Instructed to believe themselves born to rule, the conceived that they have only to enjoy the power which they inherit...listen to the flatterers by whom they are surrounded til, enervated and subdued by a life of indolence and vice, they fall before a popular native chief or foreign invader” pg 59
and this...
Pottinger remembered with revulsion that on the day after Christmas Shah Kamran had sent off all Persian prisoners to Turkoman slavers, while Mohammed Shah retaliated by having his Afghan captives ripped open and forced to bury their heads in their own entrails before dying of shock or suffocation” pg 113-114
Hold those bits in your brain, and say a prayer of thanks that we don’t live in such a violent and unfair world. To be fair there are mentions of traditional examples of Afghan hospitality, and individual moments of true heroism toward some besieged British. But of course those were all the more courageous compared to the angry hordes slaughtering the British interlopers. Granted the British felt they could march with military force into any land and take over, so they should never have been there. But still...
Moving into pointless opining not directly related to this book… THAT unpredictable world is what millionaires and billionaires should think about before crying about being taxed and it's thievery and akin to slavery.
“Taxation of earnings from labor is on par with forced labor.” Robert Nozick
“The Tom Perkins system is: You don’t get to vote unless you pay a dollar of taxes,” Perkins said. “But what I really think is, it should be like a corporation. You pay a million dollars in taxes, you get a million votes. How’s that?”
Anyway, the idea that the cost of civilization is free and if you are a “job creator” people should be singing your praises is ever more prevalent, at least on those conservative talking head show. IF we don’t consider the true cost of a peaceful land we may be tempted to cut corners. And the regular infighting of the "leaders" of Afghan tribes must have made life difficult for the merchants and average people of the land.
Well, I’m sure there is a better way to explain what I am trying to get across. Maybe I will be able to flesh it out later. But for now, a good book, well written and insightful. Although you can argue that it is mostly from the Bristish viewpoint, even when critical. So very good and very readable.
November 1, 2016
Entertaining and readable synopsis of Britain's early involvement in Afghanistan, focused on the ill-considered invasion, and later disastrous retreat, of 1845.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews