AMANULLAH TALKS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 233, 1 October 1932, Page 9 (Supplement)

AMANULLAH TALKS.

CAUSTIC REPLIES TO CRITICS. THE EXILED KING'S REFORMS. STILL A FIGHTING AFGHAN. Amanullah of Afghanistan, the young King who attempted the impossible while all the world laughed, is not living luxuriously in exile on the interest of £10,000,000 which he was reported to have brought with- him out of his mountain kingdom in Central Asia, "leaving his country bared to the bone of all easily portable wealth." Far from it. Instead he is modestly supporting his large household by ■conducting a real estate business in Rome. The vicissitudes of kings in this postwar era has been such ae to leave few and far between the heads that still wear crowns. And yet almost without exception, although in exile, the dethroned monarchs still are living in royal luxury. The latest of these, Alfonso of Spain, is numbered among the world's richest men. The first postwar exile, William Hohenzollern, is hardly as rich, but still he enjoys the royal necessities. The outstanding exception is Amanullah of Afghanistan. Moreover, Amanullah has yet another distinction. As a rule kings have been dethroned because of their despotiem or injustice, or at least because they have been considered too reactionary. But Amanullah was said to be too progressive. And because of this he was, perhaps, more maligned or more ridiculed than any other ruler of recent times.

I wae in Afghanistan with Amanullah in 1928, during the eventful time which followed the King's triumphal tour of Europe. Italy had hailed him as "the jVhissolini of Asia"; France had entertained him and his queen in the old apartment once occupied by Napoleon and Josephine; England had staged a naval battle in his honour; Germany a land battle directed by President von Hindenburg , , and even Soviet Russia had'hailed him as a comrade. It seemed a question whether any other royal traveller had eveV so excited the curiosity and hospitality of the Western World, writes Jackson Fleming in the "New York Herald Tribune." The glorious welcome accorded him by his upstanding mountain, tribesmen was a sight to repay me for my long journey to Central Asia. A few weeks later, however, I was appalled to witness the beginning of that rising tide of troubles which were soon to break into open rebellion. And eventually AmaDullah was forced into exile while the world chuckled with amusement over the most grotesque fabrications that have ever hounded a heroic figure to his doom. That Fabulous Fortune. Following his exile, I longed to hear Amanullah talk freely about these tales of his enemies. For this purpose I recently travelled from Geneva to Rome. The address given me by the Afghan legation proved to be not in the fashionable diplomatic quarter of Rome, but in a quiet side street. Amanullah received me in his study, a large office-like room with very few Afghan features among its furnishings, a'heavy Afghan rug, some mountain goats in light metal—little else. My first impression of the man himself, after three cruel years, was that he drunk deep at the well of bitterness and that his strong physique was in danger. His frank and fearless eyes, large and somewhat protruding, seemed unable to conceal his habitual state of mind. His thick black hair was already flecked with gray. His powerful hands were nervous. "Perhaps you wont mind replying to some of 'these fables concocted about you," I said. ."For instance, there is the charge that you brought with you out of Afghanistan a fabulous fortune —£10,000,000. It was said that you stripped your country as bare as a bone of all easily portable wealth; and that if Afghanistan makes little or no progress for years, to come it may be attributed to your having impoverished your people." Amanullah glanced about the room at his modest possessions. "The fact of the matter is that I have felt obliged to become a business man in a small way in order to support my large household. 1 now own two apartment houses here in Rome; one of them I bought and the other I built. "As to my robbing my country"—he left blank the unspeakable. "Moreover, when I started for Kandahar I fully expected to return shortly to the capital and serve under my brother, Inayatullah. He urged me to take a considerable quantity of gold, but I would take only enough to cover the expense of the journey." " I went back to those fabulous riches. I reminded him that he had been accused of bringing away all the crown jewels. "I must explain much to you," he said. "My country has no crown jewels in the sense that they are spoken of here in Europe. In Afghanistan we have only personal jewels. For example, my father's jewele were divided among his family. My share of these I sold by lottery for the benefit of the national treasury shortly after I became king, and this whole transaction is shown plainly in the treasury records. During my reign ' my household naturally acquired more jewels, mainly in the form of gifts. It was these personal jewels which came with us to Europe. And in starting- my business activities those jewels were my only capital." A Hot Coal. I recalled another eto'ry: "And was there nothing in the report of your very profitable friendship with Sir Basil Zaharoff V "Just who is this gentleman?" countered the royal exile. I related the reports that this Greek Croesus with a British title, said to be the richest mari in Europe, had developed a strong friendship for Amanullah and had enabled him to make a huge fortune in the stock market, and also had presented him with a palatial villa at San Remo. Amanullah laughed loud. "How unfortunate for me that I have never met this man," he said, "that our great friendship ia all a mythi" I changed the subject. "Suppose we forget your vast fortune. But do you mind telling me if there is anything in the report that the Afghanis would be willing to join their fellow Moslems of India in a new protectorate under the British, %vhich would be separated from the rest of India?" The ex-ruler of the fighting Afghans stiffened in his chair. "The man who would dare to make that suggestion in Afghanistan would be killed where he stood. If he were the king himself he would die in his bed before morning." So that was that. I had picked up a hot coal, but with the tongs of innocence. And I was fortunately not then standing i in Afghanyitan. His reference fcq -'the

king himself" was not lost on me, as I was aware of the pro-British accusations made in Afghanistan against the present ruler, Nadir Khan. "Do you consider that Nadir Khan is carrying forward your progressive measures?" I now asked, with my tongue in my cheek. "Nadir Khan made a show of doing so when he first entered Kabul. He knew then that the people really believed in me and already wished for my return. He publicly professed his friendship for me. But secretly he began to undermine my policies and my reputation. I expected this. Since then he has publicly admitted that, he accepted from the British £180,000, together with 10,000 rifles, when he entered Afghanistan from India. He failed to mention the Wazirietan militia who entered with him. Those Waziri soldiers were Afghans by blood, true enough, but they were from British territory, not Afghan territory, and they were British, trained. 'My Programme of "Mad Haste."' "It has been plain from the first that in order to discredit me Nadir Khan was determined to discredit my whole programme. And this applies even to certain measures which he himself had approved years ago when he was in my Cabinet. "He has continued to echo the criticisms of my old enemies. They called my whole programme 'mad haste,' spreading abroad the impression that it was only after my journey to Europe that I started to modernise my country. But the fact is—and they knew it well — that I had been steadily , applying these ideas for nine years, since I came to the throne in 1919. "Even before that time I had begun to apply some of these ideas in a humble measure. For example, they have mentioned the advancement of women. Since my grandfather's time, the women of certain tribes had been regarded as legitimate slaves because those tribes had rebelled against my grandfather. He crushed thai rebellion and declared those people slaves on the very day that I was born. "When I grew up the whole practice seemed horrible to me. I used to spend my money buying the freedom of slaves. When I became King I immediately declared all of them free. I continued to work steadily but slowly for the advancement of women. The first school for girls I established at Kabul in 1924. It was the main excuse for the Mangal rebellion against me that year. That rebellion was put down, and the school continued to flourish. But there was no 'mad haste' about it. "Nor did I ever decrees that veil or polygamy bo abolished. I did seek to encourage these steps by the example of my own household and by discussion and persuasion. And finally I decided that the time had come to choose as my councillors only men who had accepted the principle of monogamy. But was this 'mad haste'? "The same may be said of my reforms in our methods of justice. These also I began very soon after I became King. Not until the leaders seemed very eager for the reforms did I consent to apply them." Another Sore Spot. My next question touched a very sor© spot in my host. No other feature of his programme had been given such widespread and unsympathetic notoriety outside his country. It was hee-hawed by provincial editors and punsters from Kalamazoo to Capetown. I refer to Amanullah's dress reform. His chief critics, he said, who controlled the news about Afghanistan, had used this subject' to belittle his whole programme for modernisation. His only decree as to modern dress (aside from the uniforms of soldiers and students) was that Government officials should wear Western clothes, especially during the hours of their official duties. "The clothes problem had its practical and economic consideration for me and my poor country. Industry in Afghanistan is very backward, but we are already able to produce the materials for Western clothes —woollen cloth and felt for hats. Also, we possess the raw materials —the flocks and the herds of our mountainsides. But we produce no cotton. And yet our present costumes are made almost entirely of cotton material. We must import it all. Do you know how many yards of cloth is considered necessary for a fashionable turban? Imagine how much is fequired for thq entire baggy costume, with its endless windings. Our Afghan dancer considers himself in full style only when he has enveloped himself in a whole bolt —forty-five yards, is it not?—of cotton nateriaL Now is that either sensible or economic for my poor country?"