Bilateral relations of Afghanistan and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland span a long and eventful history, dating back to the United Kingdom's Company rule in India, the British-Russian rivalry in Central Asia, and the border between modern Afghanistan and British India. There was an Afghan embassy in London from 1922 until 2024, though there was no accredited Afghan ambassador from 1981 to 2001.
History
The Great Game (1800–1839) The 19th century was a period of diplomatic competition between the British and Russian empires for spheres of influence in Asia known as the "Great Game" to the British and the "Tournament of Shadows" to the Russians.Perry, James Arrogant Armies, Edison: CastleBooks, 2005 p. 110. With the exception of Emperor Paul who ordered an invasion of India in 1800 (which was cancelled after his assassination in 1801), no Russian tsar ever seriously considered invading India, but for most of the 19th century, Russia was viewed as "the enemy" in Britain; and any Russian advancement into Central Asia was always assumed (in London) to be directed towards the conquest of India, as the American historian David Fromkin observed, "no matter how far-fetched" such an interpretation might be.Fromkin, David "The Great Game in Asia" pp. 936–51 from Foreign Affairs, Volume 58, Issue 4, Spring 1980 pp. 937–38
In 1832, the First Reform Bill lowering the franchise requirements to vote and hold office in Britain was passed, which the ultra-conservative Emperor Nicholas I of Russia openly disapproved of, setting the stage for an Anglo-Russian "cold war", with many believing that Russian autocracy and British democracy were bound to clash.Fromkin, David "The Great Game in Asia" pp. 936–51 from Foreign Affairs, Volume 58, Issue 4, Spring 1980 p. 938 In 1837, Lord Palmerston and John Hobhouse, fearing the instability of Afghanistan, the Sindh, and the increasing power of the Sikh kingdom to the northwest, raised the spectre of a possible Russian invasion of British India through Afghanistan. The Russian Empire was slowly extending its domain into Central Asia, and this was seen by the East India Company as a possible threat to their interests in India. In 19th century Russia, there was the ideology of Russia's "special mission in the East", namely Russia had the "duty" to conquer much of Asia, though this was more directed against the nations of Central Asia and the alleged "Yellow Peril" of China than India.Eskridge-Kosmach, Alena "The Russian Press and the Ideas of Russia's ‘Special Mission in the East’ and ‘Yellow Peril’" pp. 661–75 from Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Volume 27, November 2014 pp. 661–62. The British tended to misunderstand the foreign policy of the Emperor Nicholas I as anti-British and intent upon an expansionary policy in Asia; whereas in fact though Nicholas disliked Britain as a liberal democratic state that he considered to be rather "strange", he always believed it was possible to reach an understanding with Britain on spheres of influence in Asia, believing that the essentially conservative nature of British society would retard the advent of liberalism.Riasanovsky, Nicholas Nicholas I and Official Nationality in Russia, 1825–1855, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1959 p. 255. The main goal of Nicholas's foreign policy was not the conquest of Asia, but rather upholding the status quo in Europe, especially by co-operating with Prussia and Austria, and in isolating France, as Louis Philippe I, the King of the French was a man who Nicholas hated as an "usurper".Nicholas Riasanovsky, Nicholas I and Official Nationality in Russia, 1825–1855, (1959) pp. 257–58. The duc d'Orleans had once been Nicholas's friend, but when he assumed the throne of France after the revolution of 1830, Nicholas was consumed with hatred for his former friend who, as he saw it, had gone over to what he perceived as the dark side of liberalism.Riasanovsky, p. 258.
The Company sent an envoy to Kabul to form an alliance with Afghanistan's emir, Dost Mohammad Khan, against Russia.L. W. Adamec/J. A. Norris, Anglo-Afghan Wars, in Encyclopædia Iranica, online ed., 2010J.A. Norris, Anglo-Afghan Relations , in Encyclopædia Iranica, online ed., 2010 Dost Mohammad had recently lost Afghanistan's second capital of Peshawar to the Sikh Empire and was willing to form an alliance with Britain if they gave support to retake it, but the British were unwilling. Instead, the British feared the French-trained Dal Khalsa, and they considered the Sikh army to be a far more formidable threat than the Afghans who did not have an army at all, instead having only a tribal levy where under the banner of jihad tribesmen would come out to fight for the emir.Perry, James Arrogant Armies, Edison: CastleBooks, 2005 p. 111. The Dal Khalsa was an enormous force that had been trained by French officers, was equipped with modern weapons and was widely considered to be one of the most powerful armies on the entire Indian subcontinent. For this reason, Lord Auckland preferred an alliance with the Punjab over an alliance with Afghanistan, which had nothing equivalent to the Dal Khalsa. The British could have had an alliance with the Punjab or Afghanistan, but not both at the same time. When Governor-General of India Lord Auckland heard about the arrival of Russian envoy Count Jan Prosper Witkiewicz (better known by the Russian version of his name, Yan Vitkevich) in Kabul and the possibility that Dost Mohammad might turn to Russia for support, his political advisers exaggerated the threat. Burnes described Witkiewicz: "He was a gentlemanly and agreeable man, of about thirty years of age, spoke French, Turkish and Persian fluently, and wore the uniform of an officer of the Cossacks".Macintyre, Ben The Man Who Would Be King, New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002 p. 205 The presence of Witkiewicz had thrown Burnes into a state of despair, leading one contemporary to note that he "abandoned himself to despair, bound his head with wet towels and handkerchiefs and took to the smelling bottle". Dost Mohammad had in fact invited Count Witkiewicz to Kabul as a way to frighten the British into making an alliance with him against his archenemy Ranjit Singh, the Maharaja of the Punjab, not because he really wanted an alliance with Russia. The British had the power to compel Singh to return the former Afghan territories he had conquered whereas the Russians did not, which explains why Dost Mohammad Khan wanted an alliance with the British.
Alexander Burnes, the Scotsman who served as the East India Company's chief political officer in Afghanistan wrote home after having dinner with Count Witkiewicz and Dost Mohammad in late December 1837: "We are in a mess home. The emperor of Russia has sent an envoy to Kabul to offer...money [to the Afghans] to fight Rajeet Singh!!! I could not believe my own eyes or ears." On 20 January 1838, Lord Auckland sent an ultimatum to Dost Mohammad telling him: "You must desist from all correspondence with Russia. You must never receive agents from them, or have aught to do with them without our sanction; you must dismiss Captain Viktevitch [Witkiewicz] with courtesy; you must surrender all claims to Peshawar".Macintyre, Ben The Man Who Would Be King, New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002 pp. 205–06 Burnes himself had complained that Lord Auckland's letter was "so dictatorial and supercilious as to indicate the writer's intention that it should give offense", and tried to avoid delivering it for long as possible.Macintyre, Ben The Man Who Would Be King, New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002 p. 206 Dost Mohammad was indeed offended by the letter, but in order to avoid a war, he had his special military advisor, the American adventurer Josiah Harlan engage in talks with Burnes to see if some compromise could be arranged.Macintyre, Ben The Man Who Would Be King, New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002 pp. 206–07 Burnes in fact had no power to negotiate anything, and Harlan complained that Burnes was just stalling, which led to Dost Mohammad expelling the British diplomatic mission on 26 April 1838.
British fears of a Russian invasion of India took one step closer to becoming a reality when negotiations between the Afghans and Russians broke down in 1838. The Qajar dynasty of Persia, with Russian support, attempted the Siege of Herat. Herat is a city that had historically belonged to Persia that the Qajar shahs had long desired to take back. It is located in a plain so fertile that is known as the "Granary of Central Asia"—whoever controls Herat and the surrounding countryside also controls the largest source of grain in all of Central Asia.Perry, James Arrogant Armies, Edison: CastleBooks, 2005 pp. 110–11. Russia, wanting to increase its presence in Central Asia, had formed an alliance with Qajar Persia, which had territorial disputes with Afghanistan as Herat had been part of the Safavid Persia before 1709. Lord Auckland's plan was to drive away the besiegers and replace Dost Mohammad with Shuja Shah Durrani, who had once ruled Afghanistan and who was willing to ally himself with anyone who might restore him to the Afghan throne. At one point, Shuja had hired an American adventurer named Josiah Harlan to overthrow Dost Mohammad Khan, despite the fact Harlan's military experience comprised only working as a surgeon with the East India Company's troops in First Burma War.Macintyre, Ben The Man Who Would Be King, New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2002 p. 32 Shuja Shah had been deposed in 1809 and been living in exile in British India since 1818, collecting a pension from the East India Company because they believed that he might be useful one day. The British denied that they were invading Afghanistan, claiming they were merely supporting its "legitimate" Shuja government "against foreign interference and factious opposition". Shuja Shah was barely remembered by most of his former subjects by 1838, and those that did remember viewed him as a cruel, tyrannical ruler who, as the British were soon to learn, had almost no popular support in Afghanistan.Perry, James Arrogant Armies, Edison: CastleBooks, 2005 p. 112.
On 1 October 1838, Lord Auckland issued the Simla Declaration, attacking Dost Mohammed Khan for making "an unprovoked attack" on the empire of "our ancient ally, Maharaja Ranjeet Singh". Auckland went on to declare that Suja Shah was "popular throughout Afghanistan" and would enter his former realm "surrounded by his own troops and [...] supported against foreign interference and factious opposition by the British Army". As the Persians had broken off the siege of Herat and the Emperor Nicholas I of Russia had ordered Count Vitkevich home (he would commit suicide upon reaching St. Petersburg), the reasons for attempting to put Shuja Shah back on the Afghan throne had vanished. The British historian Sir John William Kaye wrote that the failure of the Persians to take Herat "cut from under the feet of Lord Auckland all ground of justification and rendered the expedition across the Indus at once a folly and a crime". Still, at this point Auckland was committed to putting Afghanistan into the British sphere of influence, and nothing would stop him from going ahead with the invasion.