Battle of Maiwand
The Rousing Battle-Cry of Malalai
Ridgeline
Four weeks after envoy Cavagnari was killed, a Highland Regiment had fought its way to the top of that ridgeline and the next
day General Roberts had seized Kabul.
He came here to this citadel where he saw the blood-spattered walls and the mangled corpse of the envoy and his comrades. Enraged,
General Roberts set up the gallows on the wall. He hanged 100 Afghans, demolished the palaces of the Afghan nobility and at that point,
with honour satisfied, many suggested he should withdraw. But the Afghan king had been deposed, the country was unstable, Britain had
taken responsibility for Afghanistan and leaving no longer seemed an option.
While General Roberts sat in Kabul the countryside was now in revolt. Suddenly, a jihad had been called against them and when they looked
out on a winter evening from their small camp in Kabul, they could see right along this ridgeline, 60,000 watch fires burning from Afghans
bent on their destruction.
It must have seemed as though history was repeating itself exactly, and the one lesson that Britain should be taking away was never to
invade Afghanistan.
This time, unlike his predecessor, General Roberts decided to stay and fight and he was able, just, to withstand the siege of his compound in Kabul.
But in Helmand province, the Afghans completely defeated and wiped out another British unit, this time in the Battle of Maiwand. It’s one
of Afghanistan’s most famous victories and I met Abbie Aryan, an Afghan living in London, at this British Memorial to Maiwand. History has
it that the Afghans won because of the rousing battle cry of a young woman called Malalai.
Abbie Aryan
Maiwand Memorial
Abbie Aryan “She’s an ordinary Afghan girl. As she’s standing in the battle, she can see that the Afghans are losing and she stood there, took
her veil off and said, ‘If you love your country and if you’re a real Pashtun, and if you don’t want to be ashamed, you have to go and fight
the British.’ Remember when Elizabeth stood in front of the Spanish Armada… Gave this speech to the British Army? To us, that was
equivalent to that.”
And by revealing her face, actually, in some ways, it’s the kind of shame for her and her family, everybody sees her face. But she’s
going to die so it doesn’t matter?
Abbie Aryan “Absolutely. And she, in fact, she dies in the battle as well, but the encouragement she gave to the Afghans there was immense.”
Unlike the massacre of the British Army in the retreat from Kabul, Maiwand was not covered in a serialisation in The Times. So although a
thousand British soldiers were killed, this memorial in Reading is almost all that remains, and its meaning is now largely forgotten.But ask
an Afghan and you get a very different response. This battle, like the retreat from Kabul, is still the stuff of legend.
Reading Memorial
Abbie Aryan “As an Afghan child, as you learn how to walk, you know about the battles we had with the British. It is part of our DNA.
It’s part of our life. Maiwand is like a legend in Afghanistan. I think, anyway, the British try to justify it, saying, ‘Oh it was really
sunny hot day. We didn’t have as much as… Afghans had superior firepower.’ How can Afghan army have a superior firepower than the British?”
Under Siege
British troops fighting Helmand today are often warned by local Afghans that they will meet the same fate as befell their predecessors
in Helmand at Maiwand.
Abbie Aryan “We say that all doors are always open for invaders. Look from Alexander the Great, all the way to the British and today.
It’s really easy to get into Afghanistan. It’s just the getting-out part that’s very difficult. We always don’t mind the foreign invaders
getting in there, relaxing and feeling comfortable, then we start our fight. This is our traditional way of doing things.”
What you think an Afghan villager feels they are fighting for?
Abbie Aryan “For their home and country. For their independence. They don’t like foreign invading army to come through their villages.
To do it with your mighty force and say, ‘Look, I’m here, I’m going to provide you peace and security.’ This is a joke, honestly is,
because nobody believe that. Afghans wouldn’t accept that – as how can somebody bring peace with a gun and weapons? You can’t
do that.”
General Roberts Statue
A thousand British soldiers had been massacred at the Battle of Maiwand, the war was coming against Britain, but the response this time
was immediate. There followed one of the most celebrated marches of the entire Victorian era, General Roberts, with an elite band of Gurkhas
and Highlanders, set off from Kabul through unknown territory with no support. 320 miles, in 20 days, in hundred degree heat, arrived safe
at Kandahar, and won a decisive victory that brought the second Anglo-Afghan war to a close.
Having won a victory, the question was, what would Britain do next? All the fears, all the pride that had dragged them into Afghanistan
was still there. They’d spent blood and treasure. There were so many reasons to try to continue an occupation and yet they decided to
declare a victory and get out.
And this is because, despite all these fears, the British Empire had a lot of people who knew the region well, who spoke the languages
well, who understood their limits, who understood that it couldn’t be done. And nobody summed it up better than Gen Roberts himself.
He said, “We have nothing to fear from Afghanistan and, offensive though it may be to our pride, the less they see of us, the less
they will dislike us.”
