Proceed to Peshawar. George J. Hill
to write about. Engert’s telegrams from September 1942 to November 1942 include several exchanges with Donovan and Charles Thayer. This correspondence shows that Engert’s communications with Donovan were intact, and Thayer later worked for the OSS, but neither man mentioned the NWFP trip specifically.60
Completely out of context, but of interest because it involves the NLO in Karachi, on 2 December 1942 the NLO in Karachi requested permission to send a U.S. Navy lieutenant on a special mission to Kabul. Engert wrote a long response in which he did not actually refuse the request, but gave many reasons to show that it would not be a good idea, and he actively discouraged it. That was apparently the end of the matter, but the question is, Why did the NLO in Karachi request it, and what was the “special mission” the NLO had in mind? It is very likely that Enders had by this time become acquainted with the CO of the NLO in Karachi. However, there is no indication of why Smith or Enders would have initiated this request.61
The letters from Engert to Enders and others in India show his knowledge of the people involved in intelligence, if not the actual events of the trip. In a letter of 13 January 1943, Engert mentions Brigadier General (later Lieutenant General) Raymond Albert Wheeler, then commander, U.S. Forces Services of Supply in the China-Burma-India (CBI) theater; and Major General Clayton Bissell, G-2. Bissell later became head of G-2 in Washington in February 1944; he continued in that position until January 1946.
MAJOR GORDON B. ENDERS, U.S. ARMY, HQ REAR ECHELON, U.S. FORCES, CBI, NEW DELHI.
Dear Major,
We are all looking forward to your return to Kabul. . . .
P.S. Please give my best regards to Generals Wheeler and Bissell, Colonel Ferris, and my old friend from Peking, Colonel Wyman. Also my salaams to everybody at the Diplomatic Mission.62
It is clear that Engert saw Afghanistan as a linchpin in the war effort. He commented to the State Department on 27 January 1943, “Any weakening of the present regime [here] would react unfavorably upon the Allied war effort in the Middle East and in India.” And on 14 February, he said that when the Axis attacked Russia, “it looked as if the traditional menace from the north were eliminated or at least postponed.”63
A mysterious visit was proposed in April 1943 at a very high level by an “officer of the United States Army handling Afghan matters.” It was then just as mysteriously dropped. It was understood that this officer would “enter Afghanistan openly as an Army officer and would travel in uniform” for about two weeks. It was probably General Patrick Hurley, who was then circulating in the Middle East as a personal representative of the president. The request was from Secretary of State Cordell Hull to Engert on 28 April. Two days later, Engert replied coolly, “I would suggest that a high ranking officer, nothing less than a brigadier or major general be sent out or perhaps detailed from India. . . . Quite frankly, I do not believe he could possibly collect any information which the Military Attaché or I could not obtain.” Engert is territorial enough to be on the defensive; regardless of how he felt about Enders, he protected Enders, too. Hurley was determined to get to Afghanistan, however, and he finally got there in 1944, following the trip to the NWFP that is the subject of this book.64
On 29 April 1943 Engert stated more explicitly the Russian threat, as the Afghans perceived it: “The Afghans are convinced that when the war is over Russia will demand substantial territorial concessions of her neighbors and that neither the US nor Great Britain will be able to stop her.”65 This led to a remarkable series of meetings in Kabul, that Engert reported on 16 May 1943, of Cunningham, governor of the NWFP; Sir Olaf Caroe, secretary to the government of India (only the second foreign secretary of India to visit Kabul); Sir Denys Pilditch, director of intelligence, Delhi; the political agent at Khyber; and the director of IB Quetta. They were in Kabul “entirely unofficially [but were] very much interested in ascertaining Afghanistan’s attitude toward India but more especially in her attitude toward Russia.”66
Presumably because he met Pilditch at this time, Engert wrote a letter to him the next day, 17 May 1943. It is a most interesting letter because Engert introduces the word “Pakistan” into the dialogue, yet the existence of Pakistan was more than four years away. The letter was sent to Pilditch, a shadowy figure if ever there was one:
I have for some time been trying to collect a little information regarding “Pakistan,” but not had much success. I am therefore wondering if you could help me, either by referring me to some published material, or perhaps by lending me some Memoranda or Reports which I could return to you. . . .
The reason I want to study the question a little is that the Afghans are—albeit cautiously and quietly—following its development and trying to figure out just how it may ultimately affect them. . . . Quite a number of officials, including the Prime Minister, have already asked me what I thought of Pakistan, but I have always answered evasively. . . . However it occurs to me that I could perhaps be helpful to you and Caroe if I expressed myself in a sense that would be in harmony with the views and hopes of the Government of India and with the interest of a post-war world such as you and we are fighting for.67
On 20 July 1943, at the end of his first year in Afghanistan, Engert submitted a report noting that “there is little room for doubt left in the minds of the majority of thinking Afghans that the Axis is losing the war.”68 The “hinge of fate,” as Churchill put it, had turned.
In the summer of 1943 Engert was in India, where his daughter had typhoid; his wife was taking care of her, and he was sick, too. Thayer was in charge of the American mission in Kabul. Thayer transmitted a memo to the secretary of state on 31 August 1943 regarding the safe conduct via Karachi of the members of the Axis legations who were returning to Europe. Within a month the situation had changed, and Hull sent messages to Thayer on 14 and 16 September, encouraging him to establish contact with the Italians on an informal basis—Italy having surrendered on 8 September. Enrico Anzillotti, secretary of the Italian legation, and Pietro Quaroni, the Italian minister, remained in Kabul. Thayer said that, with regard to the tribes, “Quaroni said Axis operations have been very much hampered by inept German management. Less than a million Afghanis (80,000 dollars) have been delivered to the Faqir of Ipi. He himself succeeded in sending the Faquir only one Lewis gun and several thousand rounds of ammunition.” He continued, “Military Attache requests pertinent portions of above be communicated to G-2.”69
Engert got back to Kabul on 1 October 1943 and sent a telegram at 4:00 p.m. to the State Department: “Returned and resumed charge today. Owing to the serious illness of my daughter in Simla I was unable to fix any definite date for my return until a few days ago. I myself was ill between August 8 and 24.”70 On his return to Kabul, he immediately was involved in the events of the day, including brigands on the border, and the desire of Sir Aurel Stein to visit Afghanistan. He wired the State Department via Peshawar:
OCTOBER 9, 1943
Secret. I learn indirectly from the Prime Minister that four widely separated bands of robbers have during the past week held up and killed a number of Afghan travelers. One of these bands operating this side of the Khyber area had already held up several trucks when I passed through there last week; some bandits are operating near the Shibar Pass, and two bands are reported active in the provinces of the North.71
Stein had a long relationship with Engert, which had begun with correspondence in June 1922. He was attempting to complete his travels to the highlands of Asia with a visit to Afghanistan in 1943, but because he was English he was having trouble getting a visa. Stein wrote to Cunningham in Peshawar on 5 April 1943, and to Caroe on 16 July, but it was apparently from Engert’s help, not the British, that he finally got permission to enter Afghanistan. Engert wrote to the State Department: “October 9, 1943, 8 p.m. I suggest the Department inform Harvard University that Sir Aurel Stein, the distinguished archeologist, has just received permission from the Afghan Government to make a reconnaissance trip to Afghanistan.”72
Stein wrote to Engert four days later, just before he left in a U.S. legation car for Kabul:
OCTOBER 13, 1943
GOVERNMENT HOUSE, PESHAWAR, N.W.F.P.