Michni Checkpoint-Centcom chief visited Michni checkpoint, I will like to highlight the significance to history of this checkpoint. These are ignored anomalies of squandered and devastating, violent legends of centuries, these are aching ingredients of generations who have known nothing but bloodshed and war as part of their reputation, the areas that modern times forgot, today they are being disinfested and hopefully made a part of a new accommodative world ..Who said that democracy and freedom is painless option...
13th Jan,1842 - On this day, a British army doctor Dr Brydon reached the British sentry post at Jalalabad, Afghanistan, the lone survivor of a 16,000-strong Anglo-Indian expeditionary force that was massacred in its retreat from Kabul. He told of a terrible massacre in the Khyber Pass, in which the Afghans gave the defeated Anglo-Indian force and their camp followers no quarter.
In the 19th century, Britain, with a goal of protecting its Indian colonial holdings from Russia, tried to establish authority in neighbouring Afghanistan by replacing Emir Dost Mohammad with a former emir known to be sympathetic to the British. This blatant British interference in Afghanistan's internal affairs triggered the outbreak of the first Anglo-Afghan War in 1838.
In 1839, the Anglo-Indian army captured Kabul and deposed Dost Mohammad. However, after an Afghan revolt in Kabul in 1840, he was restored, and the British had no choice but to withdraw. The withdrawal began on 6 January, but bad weather delayed the army's progress. The column was attacked by swarms of Afghans led by Mohammad's son, and those who were not killed outright in the attack were later massacred by the Afghan soldiers. A total of 4,500 soldiers and 12,000 camp followers were killed. Only one man, who called himself Dr. Bryden, escaped to recount the details of the military disaster.
In retaliation, another British force invaded Kabul, burning a portion of the city. In the same year, the war came to an end, and in 1857 Emir Dost Muhammad signed an alliance with the British. In 1878, the Second Anglo-Afghan War began, which ended two years later with Britain winning control of Afghanistan's foreign affairs. |
