English Independent (Newspaper) - April 3, 1879, London, Middlesex THE ENGLISH INDEPENDENT COMBINING THE AND BRITISH APRIL at the General Office M a J Price THE GROWING DANGERS OF THE gravest news which has reached England since the disaster of is the telegram which informs us that the negotiations with the Ameer of AFGHANISTAN have quite and that orders have been issued to march upon the In other we are to have a long and costly war upon our Have the two our reverses in South Africa and the defiant atti tude of YAKOOB only an accidental or we beginning to reap the fruit of the insane policy which has involved us at the same moment in serious or in disputes which may easily issue in in three out of the four Continents through which our Empire and in which we are compelled constantly to be in arms and on guard We strongly suspect that there is a very close relation between the attitude of the Afghan ruler and the difficulty in which we imagine that our Zulu war has involved News travels fast in these It as known in India that troops have been embarked in Ceylon for Natal and the AMEER may well believe that with a troublesome war on our hands in and heavy liabilities to face in Europe in consequence of our dull and dogged persistence in the endeavour to save ail that we of the wreck of an Empire which is more manifestly doomed to with a declining and a falling we are not likely to have or or to spare for any serious opera tions against It was supposed but a few days ago that all serious operations on our Indian frontier were over Lord BEACONSFIELD evidently believed that he had got his scientific frontier and in occupation by our and that peace might be made on the basis of our occupation of the passes without any need of further military operations in But in a moment all is The for some time has been studiously making light of the Afghan and the country had certainly settled down to the belief that the worst was and that we should soon have news that the war was at an The Daily News finding nothing or likely to betook himself to aw sent us those remarkable letters on which we commented last But he will have to hurry back for the war is but and a march on Cabul is to open the We are still without detailed informa tion us to the reason and the nature of the changed atti tude of the AMEER but we may venture a shrewd guess tbat our many troubles and embarrassments have some thing to do with and that it is but the first instalment of the difficulties and dangers in which the miserably shortsighted policy of our Government will involve from which it will be a fortunate thing if we emerge with the loss only of money and From heavy loss of money and there is no hope of our escaping for when and High Commissioners befool Achivi But it will be hard for us to emerge with tho disaster of and the whole policy of the have already put us to and have inflicted a stain on our honour as a Christian which a generation of righ teous and considerate dealing with the jealous and sus tribes on our borders will hardly An anxious outlook is opened in the far East by the tidings that the Burmese are looking for help from China iu the event of which the strong concentration of troops on their frontier seems to It is pre the position of Burmah with relation to China which constitutes the danger of a Burmese The Burmese themselves could not offer any serious opposi and they probably know Their country is splendidly but thinly and miserably Iis annexation would probably pro veto bean unspeakable boon to the wretched and its revenues would more than pay the But behind Burmah is and the present aggressive attitude of the martially and all round the is one of the signs of the times of which wise politicians take There is trouble in store for Russia from this source before and for ourselves in Any step which would bring us on to the Chinese especially a border on which they cherish a fanatical hatred to the would be about as insane an enterprise in the present state of our Empire as can well be But we have in a measure cast down our challenge and the idea that we are in sore straits may penetrate the mind of the young savage who rules the destinies of and may lead him to assume an attitude which may force on us another Burmese The tidings from Mandalay lately have been but so were the tidings which at the same time reached us from The last tele which is decidedly perhaps indicates how the news of the renewal of hostilities in Cabul has acted on the counsels of the curious conclave to which FOBBES was introduced with so much on the tameless young maniac who holds in his own hands without check or limit the policy of and of how much beside The impression is spreading through the world that we are and and when that is the case with a man or with an troubles spring up like mushrooms and what was but an imagi nary danger into a real and pressing It cion of weakness in a bank a panic is and a run upon its deposits which the strongest concern would find it impossible at a moments notice to We shall find that our and we have plenty of alas all round our will think that the set time to trouble us has and that they may venture to assume an attitude and to employ a language which they would know perfectly well in ordinary times would be simply courting their We shall triumph in the end all no for it is in such times of trial that the spirit of England is stirred and her strength is But the effort is and those whose blind and reckless policy makes it inevitable will be recognised by at any as among tho most dangerous enemies of their country in And it is distinctly as the result of a policy deliberately adopted and loudly vaunted that all these things have befallen It is the inevitable result of the spirited Imperialistic ideas which the Tory Government has openly and even boastfully announced as the guiding stars of its foreign Its agents all round our Empire have caught the keynote only too and each one has busied himself in making an Imperial demonstration in his own particular The result is that universal distrust has been created among our who ought to dwell securely by us and the knowledge that we are in trouble in these continents encourages each one of oar enemies to arrogant insistence on demands which honour seems to bind us to resist even to the extremity of And all this complication has been suffered to entangle and hamper us just when we need the whole strength of the Empire to sustain our European Russia now sees an opportunity of repaying for at any of the humiliation and impoverishment which she has had to The expedition to whatever may prove to be its meaning and its is one of the bitter fruits of the arrogant policy of Lord LYTTON and Sir BARTLE The Berlin as far as Eastern is cannot be Russia and Euglund are by no means at one as to the measures by which the breach may be Lord BEACONSFIELD still clings to the hope that the wreck of the
