New-York tribune., 1919-07-13

III ~
A eastern frontier of India
This time i; Is not mere
cattle raid by some mountain tribe,
but a regulation colonial war be-
tween the imperial forces and the
powerful Ameer of Afghanistan,
whose predecessors have 30 often
n1enaced the safety Of the border.
Thus 1t happens that the Khyber
Pass, the famous northwestern gate
Of India, Is again in prominence in
the English newspapers. Writes
Arthur w. Hewlett In "The Man.
chester Guardian":
"The Khyber Pass is one Of the his
toric spots Of the world, one Of those
unhappy places which, like Belgium,
has had too much history. From the
beginning Of mans era upon earth it
has been the main avenue Of thrush
upon India; It has seen so much Of
slaughter that the very stones which
speckle it's arid hillsides might be the
bones Of dead men. There are many
men to whom India has meant just the
Khyber, the Khyber and all its puzzling
perplexities, and there are men, ser
wants Of the empire, living hard and
perilous lives, to whom it is so even
yet
zone Of the problems of India has
that Is to say, a frontier consistent
with all the complexities of strategy,
ethnography and polity. In part it has
solved itself along natural lines; in
part 1t has evolved itself along the
lines Of a definite policy. 1t is best,
perhaps, that 1t should always retain
some degree of elasticity, for, natural
ly, the demands made upon it vary very
considerably. Akbar the Great was no
more free from it than is the British
years Of his bloodiest fighting before
he could reduce it to senblance of
order. When one speaks of the Indian
frontier one has to understand that it
is not everywhere a clearly defined line.
There is boundary where British ter
ritory begins or ends, but beyond that
it is not Immediately Afghanistan.
There intervenes a belt Of neutral ter
ritory inhabited by wild tribes who own
absolute allegiance neither to the
Ameer nor to Great Britain. Having
been subsidized by the latter now for
many years these tribesmen have
learned on which side their bread is
buttered, and are to all intents our
allies; also from their ranks we have
drawn recruits to filter into some Of
the finest Indian regiments, where their
martial proclivities can find an outlet
Others are converted into 'levies,' re-
ceiving a monthly allowance and a gift
Of arms and ammunition. These still
dwell in their own country but under
take to keep open the roads, protect
telegraphs, arrest marauders, and,
what is perhaps most to the point, re-
frain from marauding them selves. This
neutral belt may be as much as 100
miles broad
ut will be seen, then, that when the
Afghan leaves his own territory he is
not necessarily at once invading Brit
ish territory, though he may be said
to be encroaching on our preserves. 1t
is difficult to carry the lines of the So
called frontier in the head. for
few casual glances at the map leave
cne with a vague idea of a confused
tumble of mountains. And if it is so
in the map it is no less so to the
traveller. I have touched at many diff
ferent parts of the 'fronter,' but have
always had confused notion of my
exact topography. One can, however,
reduce the tangle to fairly simple ele-
ments by dsartculatng the less sail
ent details. The great River Indus
hereabouts runs almost due north and
south, and the Kabul River, coming
from the west out of Afghanistan, cuts
into it at right angles. The latter runs
close to and in line with the Khyber
Pass itself, and Peshawar stands hard
by it. Then, the huge masses of the
Hindu Koosh turn abruptly south,
leaving a sort of reentrant angle on a
projecting tongue of low ground whose
tip Is in the Khyber Pass itself. There