Designation applied to the frontier of British India, as established in 1849, bordering the chain of mountains separating the provinces of Punjab and Sind from Afghanistan. Until 1901 the northern part of the region came under the authority of the Punjab government and was divided into four trans-Indus districts (Peshawar, Kohat, Bannu, and Dera Ismail Khan) and one district (Hazara) on the east of the Indus and into five tribal agencies (Malakand, Khyber, Kurram, and north and south Waziristan). In 1901 the whole was formed into a new province, the North-West Frontier Province under a chief commissioner. The logic behind the scheme was to introduce a dedicated regime to accommodate the mainly Pathan population of the frontier, to deal with the special problems caused by the activities of the independent tribes of the mountains, and to allow the supreme government in Delhi direct control over the frontier region with its international problems.
The historical problem of the North-West frontier incorporated two elements: the first the question of stopping or at least controlling tribal raiding from the mountains into the more peaceful settled lowland districts; and the second the question of strategy, namely how to prevent an overland invasion of India from the north-west and how to insulate British India from disturbances originating in regions beyond the frontier. There was a close connection between the frontier and the maintenance of British power in India, a link summed up in the word ‘prestige’. It was thought that Britain could not afford to be flouted by frontier tribes; British prestige must be vindicated, the power of British arms demonstrated. Therefore costly expeditions must be sent out, even when it was believed that little or no direct purpose would be served, in order that the people of India in general should continue to believe in the overwhelming power and will of the British Raj.
At different times the border or strategic elements predominated: broadly speaking from 1849 to 1876 the border element was to the fore but from 1876 to 1919 the strategic question was often uppermost in the minds of policy makers. In the first period it was thought most convenient to have as little to do with the tribal regions as possible, to manage the tribes, and to punish them by expeditions when they offended. This system, favoured by the Punjab government, was usually designated the Close Border system or, by its critics, the ‘Butcher and Bolt’ policy. It was contrasted with a policy developed on the Upper Sind frontier which involved more active intervention in tribal affairs and which led into what was called the Forward policy and eventually, under the direction of Sir Robert Sandeman, contributed to the advance to Quetta and the assumption of control over Baluchistan. During the 1890s a systematic attempt with very mixed results was made under Richard Bruce to introduce the same policy on the Punjab frontier in Waziristan. This new Forward policy was justified both in relation to border policy as giving greater control over the tribes and in relation to the strategic question as giving Britain control over the heads of the passes leading to British India and enabling the British forces the better to anticipate any hostile movement against British India. In this strategic view the advance was connected with the doctrine of the scientific frontier, a term much vaguer than it sounds but which was usually used to denote the Kabul-Ghazni-Kandahar line towards which it was thought British forces should move in the event of an attack on British India. The opponents of the Forward school argued that such a move would mean that British forces would have to rely on vulnerable lines of communication through the Suleiman mountains and that it was far better to wait on the line of the Indus and allow the enemy to struggle with the problem of passing through the mountains with their wild inhabitants. And they believed that tribal management could be more cheaply accomplished by reliance on the old Close Border policy and by distant friendship with Afghanistan. The ultimate solution of the strategic problem, they argued, lay with the government in London: either to fight Russia elsewhere or to make an agreement with Russia as was indeed done in 1907, partly because of the escalating costs of the Forward policy. Russia was always the chief enemy to be feared: only briefly in the two world wars were Ottoman and German activities the cause of frontier concern.
So much for broader questions; to most readers the phrase ‘North-West frontier’ stands for all the romance and adventure of frontier fighting as celebrated in many novels, short stories, and poems as well as in numerous memoirs and regimental histories. Before considering some of the principal expeditions, it should be noted that military expeditions were regarded as a last resort only to be employed when other methods failed. These other methods included the use of constabulary forces and militias such as the Tochi Scouts and the Khyber Rifles, blockades and reverse blockades, fines, seizures of goods, and suspensions of allowances paid allegedly to guard passes. Nearly all these methods were employed during the first disastrous British involvement in the Khyber Pass during the first Anglo-Afghan war in 1839-42, but they were greatly refined in later years and did, apparently, reduce the perceived necessity for expeditions.
During the first ten years after 1849 there were seventeen larger military operations but only five or six a decade during the following three decades (leaving aside the special operations linked to the second Afghan war in 1878-80). The typical expedition during these years consisted of 2, 000-5, 000 men mainly drawn from the Punjab Frontier Force and local levies supplemented as thought necessary by British troops and Gurkhas. The forces were predominantly infantry with some cavalry, mountain guns, and light field artillery. Their objectives were usually the destruction of crops, forts, and villages so as to compel the tribe concerned to surrender criminals or make redress for crimes. The adoption of the Forward policy led to an escalation of violence during the 1890s culminating in the great frontier uprising of 1897 when almost all tribes rose and there were major military expeditions in Waziristan, the Swat valley, against the Mohmands, and especially against the Afridis in their stronghold of Tirah, an expedition which involved 34, 500 troops.
The character of frontier warfare underwent a change in the 1890s. Hitherto the tribesmen had been armed with matchlocks, daggers, and swords and had relied especially on the sudden charge from ambush and on cold steel. From about 1890 they acquired modern rifles and modified their tactics to include long-range sniping which caused British forces to alter their own system of fighting. In the years which followed, technical innovation also improved the British capability with the increased use of machine guns (Maxim and, later, Lewis guns), improved mountain guns and smokeless powder, better signals, and eventually air power, first used in 1917 in support of land operations but from 1925 employed on its own to bomb villages and destroy crops. Some flexibility was lost with the decision to amalgamate the Punjab Frontier Force with the regular Indian army under the Kitchener reorganization of the early 1900s, a scheme which gave priority to defence against invasion rather than control of the frontier.
WW I led to increased violence on the frontier, partly as a result of German and Turkish propaganda and partly because of the withdrawal of British forces. In 1919 the third Afghan war led to a general outbreak on the frontier, the evacuation of posts, the collapse of some of the frontier militia forces—notably the Khyber Rifles which was disbanded—and to several expeditions. The largest problems were concentrated in Waziristan which from 1914 onwards became the major frontier problem. Apart from the Afridi expedition of 1930-1 and the Mohmand expedition of 1935 all the major expeditions were sent against the Wazirs and especially the Mahsuds of south Waziristan.
The situation in Waziristan was the result of several factors including the Forward policy of the 1890s and the influence of two remarkable religious leaders, the Mulla Powindah (d. 1913) and the Fakir of Ipi (d. 1960) who contrived to organize opposition to British authority on a much larger scale. During the 1920s it was determined to try to assert close control over Waziristan and in particular, after the extensive campaigns of 1921-2, to establish a permanent regular army base at Razmak from which to dominate the country. The long lines of communication through difficult country became a target for tribal attacks and there were more or less continuous kidnappings, murders, and fighting, punctuated by major expeditions such as that of 1936-7. The number of troops involved constituted a very serious drain on resources. To maintain the Razmak position and other garrisons required on average twelve battalions in Waziristan and four extra infantry brigades were introduced in 1936-7. In September 1947 the new Pakistan government resolved on a complete change of policy and evacuated all regular army units from Waziristan.
Bibliography
- Caroe, Olaf, The Pathans (London, 1958).
- Davies, C. Collin, The Problem of the North-West Frontier (Cambridge, 1932).
- Elliott, Maj Gen J. G., The Frontier, 1839-1947 (London, 1968)
— Malcolm E. Yapp
