[4] In 1832, the First Reform Bill lowering the franchise requirements to vote and hold office in Britain was passed, which the ultra-conservative Emperor Nicholas I of Russia openly disapproved of, setting the stage for an Anglo-Russian "cold war", with many believing that Russian autocracy and British democracy were bound to clash.

[6] The British tended to misunderstand the foreign policy of the Emperor Nicholas I as anti-British and intent upon an expansionary policy in Asia; whereas in fact though Nicholas disliked Britain as a liberal democratic state that he considered to be rather "strange", he always believed it was possible to reach an understanding with Britain on spheres of influence in Asia, believing that the essentially conservative nature of British society would retard the advent of liberalism.

[10][11] Dost Mohammad had recently lost Afghanistan's second capital of Peshawar to the Sikh Empire and was willing to form an alliance with Britain if they gave support to retake it, but the British were unwilling.

[12] The Dal Khalsa was an enormous force that had been trained by French officers, was equipped with modern weapons and was widely considered to be one of the most powerful armies on the entire Indian subcontinent.

[13] Burnes described Witkiewicz: "He was a gentlemanly and agreeable man, of about thirty years of age, spoke French, Turkish and Persian fluently, and wore the uniform of an officer of the Cossacks".

[15] Burnes himself had complained that Lord Auckland's letter was "so dictatorial and supercilious as to indicate the writer's intention that it should give offense", and tried to avoid delivering it for long as possible.

[16] Dost Mohammad was indeed offended by the letter, but in order to avoid a war, he had his special military advisor, the American adventurer Josiah Harlan engage in talks with Burnes to see if some compromise could be arranged.

Lord Auckland's plan was to drive away the besiegers and replace Dost Mohammad with Shuja Shah Durrani, who had once ruled Afghanistan and who was willing to ally himself with anyone who might restore him to the Afghan throne.

[12] The British denied that they were invading Afghanistan, claiming they were merely supporting its "legitimate" Shuja government "against foreign interference and factious opposition".

Auckland went on to declare that Suja Shah was "popular throughout Afghanistan" and would enter his former realm "surrounded by his own troops and [...] supported against foreign interference and factious opposition by the British Army".

[20] As the Persians had broken off the siege of Herat and the Emperor Nicholas I of Russia had ordered Count Vitkevich home (he would commit suicide upon reaching St. Petersburg), the reasons for attempting to put Shuja Shah back on the Afghan throne had vanished.

[3] The British historian Sir John William Kaye wrote that the failure of the Persians to take Herat "cut from under the feet of Lord Auckland all ground of justification and rendered the expedition across the Indus at once a folly and a crime".

[21] Lord Auckland declared that the "Grand Army of the Indus" would now start the march on Kabul to depose Dost Mohammed and put Shuja Shah back on the Afghan throne, ostensibly because the latter was the rightful emir, but in reality to place Afghanistan into the British sphere of influence.

He predicted that the Anglo-Indian force would rout the Afghan tribal levy, but then find themselves struggling to hold on due to the terrain of the Hindu Kush mountains and the fact that Afghanistan had no modern roads.

The main British Indian and Sikh force occupying Kabul along with their camp followers, having endured harsh winters as well, was almost completely annihilated while retreating in January 1842.

The British then sent an Army of Retribution to Kabul to avenge their defeat, and having demolished parts of the capital and recovered prisoners they left Afghanistan altogether by the end of the year.

In 1857 an addendum to the 1855 treaty permitted a British military mission to become a presence in Kandahar (but not Kabul) during a conflict with the Persians, who had attacked Herat in 1856.

In the years immediately following the First Anglo-Afghan War, and especially after the Indian rebellion of 1857 against the British in India, Liberal Party governments in London took a political view of Afghanistan as a buffer state.

The previous year the British had signed an agreement with the Russians in which the latter agreed to respect the northern boundaries of Afghanistan and to view the territories of the Afghan emir as outside their sphere of influence.

[29][31] Through continual prevarication, he resisted numerous requests for assistance from the Central Powers, but failed to keep in check troublesome tribal leaders, intent on undermining British rule in India, as Turkish agents attempted to foment trouble along the frontier.

Needing a way of cementing his power, upon seizing the throne in April 1919 Amanullah posed as a man of democratic ideals, promising reforms in the system of government.

[37][38][39][40][41] The war resulted in the Afghans winning back control of foreign affairs from Britain, and the British recognizing Afghanistan as an independent nation.

Rebelling, and subsequently governing Saqqawist forces under Habibullāh Kalakāni fought against various opposing tribes and rival monarchs in the Kingdom of Afghanistan, among whom Mohammed Nādir Khān eventually achieved a preponderant role.

"[50] Many commentators in Afghanistan and elsewhere hold the belief that Britain played a part in the fall of Amanullah in January 1929, and this is supported by Soviet Historiography.

[51] According to Encyclopædia Iranica, "While it can not be dismissed out of hand, the fact remains that no evidence to support it can be found in the copious British Indian archives pertaining to this period.

There can be no doubt, however, that behind the stance of official neutrality which the British maintained throughout the crisis of 1929 lay an unwillingness to help Amān-Allāh to reconquer his throne and a benevolence toward the moves of Nāder Khan.

[52] In 2001–2014, British combat forces served with NATO in Afghanistan when Tony Blair followed George Bush into that country in the wake of the attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center and damaged the Pentagon.

It was at this event that the framework of the next decade of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was settled by the Afghan president Hamid Karzai and his successor Ashraf Ghani.

As seen at right, Gordon Brown, Hillary Clinton, Catherine Ashton, Hermann van Rompuy and Anders Fogh Rasmussen amongst other Western leaders were in attendance.