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The Soviet Threat to Afghanistan and India 1938–1940

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Milan Hauner
Milan Hauner
Affiliation:
German Historical Institute, London
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Extract

From an Asian angle Afghanistan could easily be selected as the centre of the extra-European world. It lies at the crossroads of three different geographic regions, the Middle East, Central Asia and South Asia, as much as it borders on three different cultural zones, the Islamic world, the Hindu culture, and the Chinese influence. From a political standpoint, until the Second World War, Afghanistan appeared as buffer state par excellence, sandwiched between two Great Powers, the Russian Empire protruding from the North-west of Central Asia, and the British Empire guarding the Indian glacis in the South-east.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , April 1981 , pp. 287 - 309
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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References

1 Werner Otto von Hentig led in 1915–16 with Oskar von Niedermayer the famous expedition to Kabul with the purpose of winning Amir Habibullah for the Central Powers. The ultimate aim of the Hentig/Niedermayer Mission was to direct from Afghanistan anti-British and Panislamic propaganda into India to help floment disorder and sedition among Indian troops. German strategists also hoped that by the involvement of Afghan tribes substantial numbers of British and Indian troops could be tied up on the NWF and thus prevented from reinforcing the European war theatre. Hentig, W. O. v., Mein Leben eine Dienstreise (Göttingen, 1962), pp. 91–199;Google ScholarNiedermayer, O. v., Im Weltkrieg vor Indiens Toren (Hamburg, 1942);Google ScholarVogel, R., Die Persien- und Afghanistan expedition Oskar Ritter v.Niedermayers 1915/16 (Osnabrück 1976).Google Scholar See also Hentig's private papers (Aufzeichnungen 1934–1969, 3 vols., Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Munich).

2 Compiled from: Prasad, B. (ed.), Defence of India. Policy and Plans. Official History of the Indian Armed Forces in the Second World War 1939–1945 (Delhi 1963);Google ScholarGibbs, N. H., Grand Strategy, vol. I: Rearmament Policy (London: HMSO, 1976);Google ScholarHoward, M., The Continental Commitment. The Dilemma of British Defence Policy in the Era of Two World Wars (London, 1974).Google Scholar

3 Hart, B. H. Liddel, The Remaking of Modern Armies (London, 1927), pp. 31–2.Google Scholar

4 WO 208/24: M.I.2. Collation file on Afghanistan; further WO 208/773, IOR R/12/I/57.

5 CAB 84/10: COS(40) 229 and WP(G) (40) 23; Prasad, Defence of India, p. 65.

6 Compiled from: IOR L/P & S/12/3192–3, 3217–19, 3236–7, 3249; WO 106/5446, WO 208/773; Peshawar Weekly Intelligence Summaries 1936–39, Baluchistan Weekly Intelligence Summaries 1937–39. See my article ‘One Man Against the Empire’, Journal of Contemporary History, 1 (1981).Google Scholar

7 Fraser-Tytler: Afghanistan-Annual Report 1938, FO 371/23630; Diary of Mil. Attaché Kabul, FO 371/22248; IOR L/P & S/12/3255–3258.

8 Fraser-Tytler, W. K., Afganistan. A Study of Political Developments in Central and Southern Asia (Oxford, 1953), pp. 266–7;Google Scholar see also Adamec, L. W., Afghanistan's Foreign Affairs to the Mid-Twentieth Century. Relations with the USSR, Germany, and Britain (Tucson, 1974), pp. 227–32.Google Scholar

9 Katodon 23 of 16/3/1939, IOR L/P & S/12/1758.

10 Cf. Gibbs, Grand Strategy, p. 825.

11 See note 1 above.

12 Cf. Prasad, Defence of India, p. 15. See also Roy, M. N., Memoirs (Bombay, 1964), pp. 320.Google Scholar

13 Prasad, Defence of India, pp. 22–8.

14 Ibid., pp. 28–33.

15 Gibbs, Grand Strategy, p. 828.

16 Prasad, Defence of India, pp. 35–6.

17 E.g. Forminka 82 of 17/10/1932, FO 371/22257; Forminka 97 of 18/10/1937, FO 402/19; IOR L/P & S/12/1558.

18 Katodon 143 of 18/10/1938, FO 402/19; Katodon 151 of 16/11/1938, FO 371/22257.

19 Ibid.

20 Afganistan-Annual Report 1938, para. 5; Katodon 34 of 7/5/1938, FO 402/20.

21 Katodon 59 of 7/7//1939, IOR R/12/I/113.

22 Ibid., GOI to IO, No 1086 of 6/8/1939.

23 FO 371/23631.

24 Forminka 72 of 21/8/1939, IOR R/12/I/113.

25 Weekly Letter MI2, No. 44 of 6/9/1939, to Army HQ India, IOR L/WS/I/69.

26 N. 4740, 29/8/1939, FO 371/23631.

27 CAB 67: WP(G) (39) 4.

28 CAB 65: WM(39) 12; Forminka 96 of 14/9/1939 in reply to Katodon 83 of 8/9/1939, IOR R/12/1/113.

29 Katodon 106 of 24/9/1939, Ibid.

30 Katodon 127 of 17/10/1939, FO 371/23631.

31 Kabul Economic Report for the quarter ending 30/9/1939, FO 371/23630.

32 Katodon 104 of 17/11/1939, IOR R/12/I/113.

33 CAB 66: WP(39) 55; CAB 84/7:JP (39)38.

34 CAB 84/8:JP(39)45.

35 Notes by MI2., 29/9/1939, WO 106/5189.

36 CAB 66: WP(39)59.

37 CAB 65: WM(39)34.

38 CAB 84: COS(39)66 JP.

39 MI(R): Report of the Possibilities of Para-Military Action in Russian Central Asia, 28/9/1939, IOR L/WS/I/117.

40 Ibid., Katodon 128 of 20/10/1939.

41 Samra, C. S., India and Anglo-Soviet Relations 1917–1947 (Bombay, 1959), pp. 138–143.Google Scholar

42 E.g. The New York Times of 31/12/1939; Rushbrook-Williams, L. F., ‘Russia and India—Fancies and Facts’, in: Great Britain and the East 54 (1940), p. 14; CAB 68:WP(R) (40)28.Google Scholar

43 N.7118, FO 371/23631.

44 Maclean's journey to Afganistan via Soviet Central Asia in: FO 371/22257 and 23629. Reprinted verbatim in: Maclean, F., Eastern Approaches (London, 1949), Pt one, ch. xi.Google Scholar

45 FO371/23631: Maclean's comments on N.7118, 27/11/1939.

46 Katodon 130 of 23/10/1939, FO 371/24766; see also IOR L/P & S/12/1762.

47 Katodon 185 of 31/12/1939, IOR L/P & /12/3249; see also CAB 68:WP(R) (39)85.

48 No. 1325(E) of 17/11/1939, IOR R/12/I/114.

49 Katodon 166 of 5/12/1939.

50 N.6237, FO 371/23630; Katodon 113 of 22/12/1939; Molesworth, G. N., Curfew on Olympus (London, 1965), p. 149.Google Scholar

51 N.2066, FO 371/24769.

52 Katodon 113 of 22/12/1939, Forminka of 30/12/1939, in: FO 371/24769 and IOR R/12/I/114.

53 Ibid., Katodon 24 of 4/2/1940.

54 Ibid., FO comments, 6/2/1940.

55 E.g. Correspondence between GOI, IO, and Kabul from January to March 1940: FO 371/24766, 24767, 24768, IOR L/WS/I/114.

56 WP(G) (40)94. Approved by the War Cabinet on 5/4 and communicated to New Delhi on 10/4/1940 (see FO 371/24768, IOR L/WS/I/530).

57 Kabul to Delhi, No. 444 of 26/4/1940, IOR R/12/1/114.

58 Cunningham to Caroe, 24/4/1940, Ibid.

59 Linlithgow to Amery, No. 2156 of 22/6/1940, Ibid.

60 Katodon 115 of 22/5/1940, FO 371/24769.

61 Ibid., Forminka 98 of 19/5/1940.

62 Ibid., Katodon 119, 121 and 140 of 26, 31/5 and 15/5/1940. See also CAB 68:WP(R) (40), 137, 138.

63 GOI to IO, No. 2369 of 4/7/1940 and reply N.5216 of 11/7/1940, FO 371/24766.

64 CAB 66:WP(40)91, COS(40)252 of 8/3/1940. Nazi-Soviet co-operation in arranging exchange of military technical missions described in: Bialer, S. (ed.), Stalin and His Generals. Soviet Military Memoirs of World War II (New York, 1969), pp. 115–29.Google Scholar

65 Ibid. India's air defence consisted at the time of one single anti-aircraft battery and two bomber squadrons which were supplied with fighter conversion sets.

66 As in n. 64 above. See also CAB 65:WM(40)66.

67 Afghanistan-Political Review of 1940, in FO 371/27032; see also Fraser-Tytler's unofficial letter No. 5 of 1/7/1940, FO 371/24766.

68 Ibid.

69 Fraser-Tytler's unofficial letter No. 5 of 1/7/1940.

70 Katodon 140 and Forminka 141, 2/7/1940, IOR R/12/I/114.

71 For the text of the Soviet-Afghan Trade Agreement of 23/7/1940 see: Teplinsky, L. B., 50 let sovetsko-afganskikh otnosheniy (Moscow, 1971), p. 105;Google Scholar see also CAB 68/7: WP(R) (40)181, 186.

72 See n.1 above. Further detailed references to German sources in my book cited p. 287.

73 N. 4285, 9/9/1939, FO 371/23631.

74 GOI to IO, No. 1616 of 23/9/1939, and Nos 550 and 971 of 24 and 28/9/1939, IOR L/P & S/12/1695. See also the Baluchistan Weekly Intelligence Summary, No. 3 of 19/1/1940.

75 The highly secretive IO department, Indian Political Intelligence (IPI), was set up shortly after the First World War to watch over political malcontents and other subversive elements who presented a potential threat to the Raj.

76 IPI, Afghan Affairs, No. 77 of 4/11/1939, IOR L/P & S/12/1656.

77 Ibid., No. 79 of 30/12/1939.

78 Ibid., See also DDMI (India) to MI2 (WO), No. 42162 of 18/1/1940, IOR L/WS/I/194.

79 Ibid.

80 As in n. 1 above and in my book cited p. 287. Seraphim, H. G.(ed.), Das politische Tagebuch Alfred Rosenbergs (München, 1964), pp. 155, 163, 195.Google Scholar