History of civilizations of Central Asia, v. 6 ... - unesdoc - Unesco

ISBN 92-3-103985-7 Kashgharia
part of Afghanistan or interfere in its internal affairs, and that Russia would consult Britain
on anything relating to Russo-Afghan relations. This finally laid the basis for Afghan sta-
bility within the British sphere of influence. Significantly, the new amir, Habibullah Khan
(1901–19), refused to recognize this convention since he had had no hand in it.
But such stability was to last less than a decade. During the First World War, Habibullah
negotiated with German and Ottoman officials while resisting attempts to draw him into a
war against the British. His main objective was to gain full sovereignty and independence
from Britain, which his son Amanullah (1919–29) finally achieved. In addition, there were
schemes aplenty by Indian nationalists and Afghan hawks for coordinated risings by the
populations of India and Central Asia under colonial rule, the liberation of German pris-
oners of war in Tashkent, and an Afghan invasion of India. Nothing came of all this, of
course, as Habibullah was too shrewd and the British intelligence service too efficient.
But they pointed to the future, when Britain would have to accept the independence of
Afghanistan, work for its neutrality on that basis, and be prepared to hold off revolutionary
and German intrigues in the country. The course had been set for the next half-century until
decolonization.
Kashgharia
Beyond Afghanistan and Iran, the British did make certain moves in Kashgharia in Chi-
nese Turkistan between the 1860s and the 1880s. Kashgharia was the southern portion of
Chinese Turkistan, or Xinjiang, while Dzungaria was its northern segment. It became an
arena of Anglo-Russian rivalry largely owing to the temporary eclipse of Chinese power
with the risings of the Taranchis (Uighurs) in 1856 and of the Dungans in 1864. The Dun-
gan revolt provided the opening for Ya‘qub Khan to establish his kingdom in Kashgharia
from 1865 until his sudden death in 1876.
Ya‘qub had been in Kokand when it was annexed by Russia and he was hostile to the
Russian presence. The British at once sniffed an opportunity in Kashgharia, and they were
egged on by the accounts of travellers like John Shaw, a tea planter, who visited the region
in 1868 and 1869 and pronounced that Ya‘qub and the Kashghari people were ‘just like
Englishmen, if they were not such liars’. Lawrence, the governor-general of India, devoted
as ever to ‘masterly inactivity’, poured cold water on such excessive enthusiasm; but his
successor, Mayo, spotted his chance to add to the ring of friendly states around India.
Kashghar was to become another Afghanistan, not another Iran.
In 1870 Mayo sent a civil servant, Douglas Forsyth, along with Shaw to Ya‘qub,c
while Thomas Wade, the British minister in Peking ( Beijing), urged the Tsungli Yamen
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