Afghanistan: The Most Incompetent General Ever

 

Major General William Elphinstone is considered by some military historians to be “the most incompetent soldier who ever became a general”, possessed of “the leadership qualities of a sheep.”  Elphinstone’s road to disaster, however, was well paved and made broad by others.

 In 1838, Afghanistan was a buffer state between British India and the expanding Russian Empire.  Energized by real or imagined Russian plots in the country, the British rallied support behind a prince favorable to British interests, marched into the country, and after a short campaign installed a puppet king in Kabul on August 6, 1839.

 Many in British India now felt that the mission had been accomplished.  It was time to bring the troops home.  Most of the victorious army marched home, but a permanent British garrison was established in Kabul to prop up the new regime.  It needed propping up.  The British had replaced a relatively popular ruler with a weak puppet. Scattered fighting erupted in the surrounding countryside.

 Increasingly frustrated with the costs of maintaining a large garrison in Kabul, the British government eliminated the subsidies being paid to the various tribes in the area around Kabul to keep the peace. Once the subsidies ended, hostile activity increased even more. 

 Into this rapidly deteriorating situation stepped Major General William Elphinstone, who was assured by all, “You will have nothing to do here; all is peace.”

 When Elphinstone arrived in Kabul his command consisted of some 4,500 troops (British troops and Indian sepoys).  Additionally, there were 12,000 army dependents such as wives, children, and servants, living in the British cantonment just outside of Kabul.

 The military situation on the ground when Elphinstone arrived was a tragedy waiting to happen.  The British had abandoned the city’s fortified citadel, the Bala Hissar, to the puppet king and built the British cantonment some 1.5 miles outside of the city in a low area surrounded by Afghan forts occupying the high ground.  These forts had been neither occupied nor destroyed. 

 The cantonment itself was indefensible. According to contemporary witnesses there had been, “a pretense of rendering the cantonments defensible by surrounding the great parallelogram with the caricature of an obstacle in the shape of a shallow ditch and feeble earthwork over which an active cow could scramble.”

 Elphinstone now nearly sixty was racked by gout and rheumatism. He was soon unable to mount his horse un-aided. He was incapable of reaching clear cut decisions and vacillated depending on the opinion of the latest person with whom he spoke.  One officer wrote, that Elphinstone was “fit only for the invalid establishment on the day of his arrival.” 

 On 2 November 1841 a revolt broke out in Kabul.  A mob of insurgents stormed the house of one of the senior British civilian officers and murdered him and his staff.  Elphinstone took no action, which encouraged the insurgents to press the British further.  The Afghans next stormed the poorly defended supply fort where the British garrison’s provisions were housed. 

 After furious fighting around the small fort and repeated calls for help, Elphinstone finally realized that he should do something.  The relief force was surprised, however, to find the survivors of the supply fort, having abandoned all hope of relief, making a hasty retreat toward the cantonment.  Elphinstone’s inaction had resulted in the loss of most of the army’s food and supplies.

 A council of war proposed, as the winter was coming on, either to retreat to the British stronghold of Jalalabad some ninety miles away, or to move to the Bala Hissar, Kabul’s strong bastion.  Elphinstone overruled the move to the Bala Hissar and settled on retreat. 

 On the Afghan promise of a safe retreat, Elphinstone capitulated on January 1, 1842, handing over the army’s gunpowder reserves, most of the cannon, and all of the newest muskets. 

 The troops and twelve thousand civilians began the march to Jalalabad on January 6.  The sick and wounded were left behind with a guarantee of their safety.  They were murdered as soon as the last of Elphinstone’s soldiers left the cantonment. 

 The retreat of the column was an unmitigated horror.  Weather conditions were extreme, and the column was continually harassed by the fire of Afghan tribesmen.  The first night, the column halted six miles from the city.  The road was already strewn with the dead and dying. 

 By the evening of January 9, some 3,000 of Elphinstone's column had died due to enemy action, the freezing weather, or even suicide.  Elphinstone had ceased giving any orders.

 On the evening of January 11th, the wives of the British officers accepted being taken hostage by the Afghans who anticipated a large ransom for their release.  The wives and children of the Indian troops were all to die since they would not bring a ransom.

 Elphinstone and his second in command also allowed themselves to become hostages, while the column struggled on against certain death.  Elphinstone died of dysentery on April 23, 1842, while in captivity.

Only one British officer managed to reach Jalalabad.  On 13 January, Assistant Surgeon William Brydonrode through the gates of Jalalabad on an exhausted horse. Part of his skull was sheared off by a sword. When asked what happened to the army, he answered “I am the army.”