سجل قصاصات مقتبسة من صحف عن أفغانستان [ظ‎‎٥‎٢] (٣١٢/١٠٧)

deadly suspicions of the Princes. This Government is like an
inferior musician, who values a composition not for its thought
or for its melody, but for the rubbishy Jioriture, the pretty
ornaments he can contrive to introduce. Instead of quietly
limiting the force of each noble, or if possible, coercing them
in detail, the Government has flourished magnificently about
" our policy," has warned all the world through the Times
that the feudatory armies are doomed, and has even specified
those which it thinks most dangerous. If there is a disaster, the
Princes will try whether their honour and their armies cannot
■alike be saved. The evidence taken after the Mutiny also revealed
the strength of the sympathy which exists between the Mahom-
medans of Bengal Proper, shown by Sir G. Campbell to number
twenty millions, and the rulers of Afghanistan, or the pious
brigands of the Hills, and they hear now of every event day
by day. We must advance, therefore, with every Prince
listening in full armour, with the Mahratta people boiling with
excitement, and with every Mussulman in Bengal craning to
catch the signal. All that is no matter, for we have
faced it all before; but all that makes it indispens
able that we should win, and a war in which we
must win will be a great and expensive war. The numbers
must be ample, the reserves profuse. There must be no defi
ciency of commissariat or cartage, no risk run of a break in
communications for ten days, no hesitation in guarding rail
ways, no forgetting that along the Nerbudda and on the
Deccan plateau we must be ready to strike, and strike
hard. It must be remembered that the army, when its
work is done, will not return, but must garrison
the "Douranee Empire" against a disaffected people, and
against possible assault from the petty empire, Persia, which
will then be feverish with suspicion, and from the great
empire, Eussia, which will be then feverish with delight that
Great Britain has voluntarily ceased to be impregnable and
inaccessible. Eussia thenceforward can strike home at will,
can drag our armies, when she chooses, 8,000 miles, to fight
amid roadless hills, with two hundred millions of possible rebels
watching them behind. It is useless to warn, for this Govern
ment is " fey," and ridiculous to croak, for England can survive
all things—even Lord Beaconsfield—but was ever such folly
known! Fifteen millions to be spent, and all policy dis
organised, because Lord Lytton, like the Premier, must show
that he is great.
THE LATEST ACCOUNTS FEOM SIMLA.
IT is the duty of a journalist to say what he thinks,' even if
he stands alone, or if inconsiderate men deem his saying
unpatriotic, and we think there is serious danger of a disaster
in Afghanistan. In the preceding article we have endeavoured
to show both the folly and the danger of our recent policy,
but that article was written while we still disbelieved the
telegrams announcing that Lord Lytton, impatient of a diplo
matic affront, had resolved on a course of action which is
foolhardy, rather than courageous. It seemed to us in
credible that a Government which professed to believe that
Russia was behind Shere Ali, which at all events believed in
the necessity of either ruling or annexing the Douranee Empire,
and which had pointed out to the world the strength of the
Feudatory armies in the Peninsula, should resolve on an invasion
of Afghanistan without adequate preparations, before it had
disarmed its distrusted allies, and at a moment only six weeks
before the snow will render the Passes on which its communi
cations will depend, impassable to carts. So, however, it is. It
is impossible to resist the evidence of the telegrams raining
on all the journals ; and if they are true, which, we repeat,
we have still an extreme difficulty in believing. Lord Lytton,
eager for prestige, and Lord Beaconsfield, eager to distract
attention from our failure in Turkey, have resolved upon a
great and venturesome dramatic coup. The insult offered
by the Ameer of Afghanistan is to be avenged at once.
Afghanistan is to be entered at three points by three separate
and small corps (Tarmee, and the Ameer, if not struck frOm
his throne at a blow, is to be convinced that the only alterna
tives are submission to the British demand—that is, that he
become a subordinate ally—or the loss of all his possessions.
One corps, stated to be 8,000 strong, but we judge, ex
aggerated through a telegraphic blunder, will thread the
Bolan to Quettah, and thence march to Candahar, where it
will either await orders, or march forward upon Ghuznee. A
second, 6,000 strong, will press through the Koorum, or as it
is now spelt, " Karam," direct upon Cabul; while a third,
4 ,000 strong, will occupy the Khyber, and ultimately sup
port the second. The belief at Simla evidently is that
the Ameer will yield, or be paralysed by insurrection,—an idea
carefully and constantly conveyed in the telegrams; but if he ;J
does not, he will either be destroyed at once by the capture of * |
his capital, or " points " will be occupied to facilitate a more |
complete conquest in the spring.
The entire arrangement meets, we are told, with the approval
of competent experts, and it must have been sanctioned by ■ I
the extremely able officers on whom the Government of India |
relies for counsel in military emergencies, men, some of them, of [
first-class ability, and thirty years of experience in warfare. It ^'
seems, therefore, mere foolishness and presumption for any civilian
journalist, writing at this distance, even to criticise plans so i
authoritative, and it may be, so long matured, and we hardly
wonder at the irritation which all such criticisms raise in ■
military circles. Nevertheless, our duty is to say what is in us |
to say, and it is this,—that in this plan, if correctly reported, ;
there is every mark of rashness, and of some overruling poli- H
tical idea, under which considerations of the highest moment \\
have been overlooked. We do not believe that the Indian i |
Administrators have provided adequate means, have calculated [|
time with sufficient accuracy, or have allowed for that margin
of unfavourable accident which is always possible in such a !
war. With a Viceroy determined on a campaign, with Indian i
opinion at blood-heat, and with the prospect before them of ^
exchanging unendurable monotony for wild excitement, the [;
Indian military administrators are not to be implicitly relied j ■
on. They will not dissuade from action. It is their ||
worst defect, ais it is also their highest merit, that they can- .
not see danger, that they believe absolutely in audacity, and [j
that they would receive orders to take Tobolsk or Lhassa with :
a thrill of delight. They have, as we believe, studied Pollock's i.
campaign till they under-estimate the enemy. So urgent is l i
the necessity for speed, that they have clutched at the nearest [
garrisons ; and the columns, strong enough if they were com
posed of Englishmen, will be two-thirds composed of natives M
with a traditionary awe of Afghanistan, with no capacity to t
bear cold, and with many points of sympathy with the people
they invade. The columns will be separated for weeks by |j
hundreds of miles. No one column is strong enough in I
Europeans to be sure of success, and a check to any one column ;
will rouse throughout India the belief that English Destiny is ;
bounded by the Suleiman ; that a second disaster has occurred |
in Afghanistan, and that now is the time, if ever, for insur
rection. The motion of the columns, which ought, on the I
plans reported, to be as rapid as that of Germans in pursuit,
must necessarily be slow. The Indian Government, though •:
essentially a military monarchy, resting on the sword and '
permanently prepared for war, controls a territory so vast and f
arsenals so separated that it takes time—six weeks, at least—to
get the splendid machine into its speed. The Commissariat diffi- [
culties are great, the difficulties of cartage, when we have once
quitted the regions within which we can enforce the military |!
corvee, almost insuperable. The Bolan Corps alone will require f
sixteen miles of carts, allowing two miles per thousand fight
ing men; and making no provision, though that will be indis- :
pensable, for the carriage of water. Unless India is strangely ; i
changed, or unless Lord Lytton has designed this war for |
months, the requisite supply of shells will not be in Quettah i
till the Pass is closed behind us by the snow ; and a full supply ?
of food will not be there at all. We dread the locking-up of [ j
a column- under circumstances which will encourage all |l
Afghanistan to precipitate itself upon it as a separate army, [
and reduce it to rely for safety on the determination and skill I
of 1,500 hungry Europeans. The idea that Shere Ali will be
impressed by mere invasion to the point of yielding is a j !
dream. He knows perfectly well that if he yields his sove- I
reignty is at an end, and that he had much better die sword ;
in hand battling against the Infidel, than die under the '
dagger of some successful and rebellious Sirdar. He [
will fight to the bitter end, and so will his kinsmen, j
the Afghans ; and if he has money stored up or remitted from f
St. Petersburg, so will the Kuzzilbashes, all the more [
strongly because of one of our habitual English blunders, f
We do not blame Lord Lytton, for any Viceroy would have
done the same, but can folly be worse than this of telegraphing [
the numbers and constitution of each of these three invading
columns? On Wednesday, the facts were at Orenberg, and as
we write couriers are riding hard to Cabul bearing to General !
Abramoff every detail of the composition of the invading ?
columns, including the point of highest moment, the number
of Europeans they contain. It is the Europeans, the White. ;
men, not the Sepoys, whom the Afghans dread, and of Europeans f
they will know that we are sending only regiments.
We are croaking ? It is quite true, and tlie croaker is
always and quite justly unpopular if lie croaks in the midst of
action. But it will be four weeks before this paper reaches
India, and we are croaking with a full understanding that
the invasion is to come, and with a very definite purpose.
Lord Oranbrook, so fiery in debate, is still a solid
statesman, and it is on him that the responsibility of
providing against his subordinate's possible errors must
now lie. He knows as nobody else does how it stands
with the Mahrattas, how far details like cartage have
been provided in advance, whether the Eussians can or cannot
give Shere Ali any aid other than advice. If matters stand as
we believe them to stand, his duty is to insist in the Cabinet
on the despatch of 5,000 men to Bombay, ready for the hard
': nucleus of an army on the Nerbudda, in the Deccan or behind
the Bolan; on stopping all drafts on India, so that Lord
| Lytton should not starve the expeditions to save money ; and
on placing the Madras Army at once in the fullest readiness to
| move. Lord Lytton's daring dash may seem to him all right,
and his policy at once sound and strong ; but his own responsi-
| bility for providing means of instantly repairing a disaster, or
v instantly crushing an insurgent, is none the less complete.
Audacity is much, perhaps all, in Indian war, but it never can
be right to leave the peace of two hundred millions of men
i exposed to any chance or any risk which science, or energy,
; or money can prevent. If Lord Oranbrook will not recall his
S?: colleague, let him stand ready to support him with all the force
at his command, and that force as ready as if disaster were a
certainty. If we are not miscalculating utterly, hours may be
precious before this adventure is over, and the rush of two
regiments through a Pass a day before the snow falls be a
turning-point in the destiny of India. He has been, thank
Heaven, Secretary at War, he knows exactly where the weak
place is—the way in which distance will impede concerted
action—and he may, perhaps, perceive, what no Anglo-
Indian will perceive in the excitement, that no war under such
conditions can be a little war. We may win at a blow, as in
Abyssinia; but we may sustain a reverse, and if we sustain a
reverse, the whole strength of the Empire will not be too
great to avert the immediate results. He has Sir Richard
Temple in Bombay, to do all that mortal energy can achieve in
organising reserves ; he has Sir Henry Norman, with his end
less experience of the Frontier, close at his elbow; he is re
sponsible for his department if Lord Beaconsfield were fifty
times as absolute, and it is to him that the country will look
j to see that this reckless policy of adventure cost us nothing
but lives and gold. It could bring us nothing if Lord Lytton
were Napoleon, but at least it can be carried through without
j our having, for the second time in twenty-one years, to re-
I conquer India. It is by making England an appanage of
India that this Q-overnment has lived, and in India that its
! peril will arise.
M. GAMBETTA AND THE PRIESTHOOD.
IT^s very difficult even for Protestants to comprehend the
influence which induced M. Gambetta to maJj^T his recent
attackVpon the Oatholic priesthood of Fra^e, an attack
which encouraged Louis Blanc to a still more decided
declaratio^of hostility. iThe leader of the Rrench Republicans,
though a passionate as yell as a brilliant orator, very seldom
allows himsel^to be caaried away by/his prejudices, and is
quite able to calWlate toe precise effect of his own burning
periods. He has power, he lipfs led a great party, he has
selected Cabinet Ministers! and he has long since passed the
stage in which a greatWalor still considers himself irresponsi
ble for his utterances. \Ee /must be thoroughly well aware
that the Chur ch is still aV /i in ■g-ml
only Hi'"liliji lniiTi'iir H 7 i"~i il lliTil 1 1 be a French statesman's^ e
must " be of the opinion/of ffVaSce, and not of that of a school."
This utterance, moreover, ia consistent with the whole of his
recent career, which Kas been inteno^d to prove to France that
a man may be ihe/most fervtl of sp^kers and the least con
ventional of dictators in an emergency, and yet be a calm and
safe guide for ar nation in ordinary politi^L It is difficult to
believe, therefore, that M. GaLbetta attacked the Church in
mere fury^r that he brought Ion himself such^a storm with-
i out even an effort at calculation. It is, at all e^nts, much
more probable that he was speVking on calculatioSk and it is
worth while to see for a momenV what that calculation was.
We doubt if he was speaking to the ultras of the towns,
whom he does not want to inflame, and who he knows will, in
the end, follow other men. We believe he was speaking to
the peasantry of the South, and that he believed his address