The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1885-05-28
TIE RUsso-AFeHAN AFFAIR.


most reasonable point of consideration
a necessity. 1t is said that the Gar
has now between the Caspian Sea and
Herat 10000 soldiers, fully prepared
for active work IN the field, and the
troops in Asia and at home are anx-
ious for war. So are the Russian
masses and the nobility, only the
Car and his immediate fam
lily have appeared disposed
to avoid hostilities. Three army
cjrps. of 10000 men each, hang upon
the Afghan border, and it is said coli
umns of $4,000 Cossacks are prepared
to sweep over Afghan territory. 1t
is further stated that Russia stands
ready to declare Ayoub Khan, now in
exile in Persia, the rightful Amer
The anxiety of officers and troops to
advance and meet the English army
is intense. Besides this army of 10000
men, ready to advance on telegraphic,
oCice, there is an army of reserves on
The shores Of the Caspian Sea number
ing 10000 men. Peady to advance on
Te6erap Should the Shah OF Persia
gtT5> the least moral or active support
to Russia's enemies. The English ar
my OF India has never moved upon
Afghanistan, without being badly
worsted, and it is not at all probable
it would advance now without know
ing every inch of the advance was so
strengthened as to make disaster from
behind impossible. The defeat at
Cabul has not been forgotten, and the
English commanders have the fate Of
others to warn them of what may be
In store for them. The flying Co.'S
sacks could not possibly take with
them means of subsistence, and they
would depend, therefore, solely upon
conquest and plumber for sustenance.
Whether Ayoub Khan could collect
about him a very large num-
Der of followers is to be
doubted. His presence, however.
would divide Afghanistan, and make
war there not only a struggle be-
tween contending English and Rus
sian armies, but deadly civil strife,
to be taken advantage of in the end,
by the victorious power. India, it is
true, can contribute to England's
cause vast force of splendid cavalry,
but may not the Indian troops be
biased 10y race prejudices TO such
a degree as to make them unreliable,
But what about Persia? It lies be-
tween the Caspian Sea and Afghanis-
tan, and over its territory must march
the Russian troops to engagement.
Evidently Persia stands in danger of
being crushed between the h1ther
and the neither millstone5.
She is powerless to oppose
Russia unless England should
become her devoted ally,
and then her cities and her
villages would fall before the merci-
less advance of bloody Cossacks. Were
England to go to the aid of Persia
it il very difficult to see where she
could strike Russia in Asia except
from the borders of the Black Sea.
Unless Afghanistan were again threat
en- d, which it would not be, English
troops would not be welcome In that
country, and the Gar would be at
liberty to turn the 10000 men
now beyond the Captain Sea,
against the Ghilan and Mazan-
deran districts of Persia which bound
the Caspian on the South. An adj
vance through Azerbijan would be
made from Russia proper. and before
many months had passed the Cossacks
could water their horses at the mouth
of the Euphrates on the head of the
Persian gulf. One Persia Is at present
worth a hundred Afghsnistans to
Russia, and the former is the easiest
fruit OF the two to pluck. Persian
territory extends southwark to the
Persian gulf, while TO make conquests
in AfghanIstan would, as
stated, require its territory
as a basis of operation
The seat of permanent Russian pow
er in Asia would seem to be from the
Caspian sea to the Persian gull, which
empties into the Indian ocean; and
with Persia subjugated, Russia would
then be more able to oppose England
Russia is at present more anxious to
secure seaports in S-uthern Asiatit
waters than to extend her territory
eastward, and the most natural course
for her to take would he the over
throw and absorption of Persia
She is now the neighboI
of the latter country on two sides
and part of the third, and it alone
lies between her and splendid sea.
board of hundreds of miles. With
Persia in her hands, she is consolida.
ted from the Black Sea to the borders
of Atghanistan and Beloochistan, and
from the Arctic to the Indian Ocean
Moreover, in the conquest she
would have little trouble, as far, at
least, as land operations in Asia are
concerned, for there would be no pow.
er to interfere with her. Her recent
actions in Central Asia are even
more consonant with a conquest of
Persia than one of Afghanistan. She
is bound to make herself strong at the
extremity of her northeastern line
and the possession of Merv, Herat and
perhaps Murshed, in Persia territory
would make her so. But the Shah
of Persia, so the latest
dispatches tell us, has granted the
Car right to send troops from the Cas-
plan Sea, where they disembark from
the Voiga steamers to the Afghan
border. Yet other reasons may lead