To exclude or eject such influence the Government of India has frequently subsidized and otherwise assisted the Amirs of Kabul.

It has also, more than once, taken up arms against them.

But it has never interfered, for any other purpose, in the affairs of their kingdom.

Regulating on this principle and limiting to this object the conduct of our relations with the rulers of Kabul, it was our long-continued endeavour to find in their friendship and their strength the requisite guarantees for the security of our own frontier.

Failing in that endeavour, we were compelled to seek the attainment of the object to which our Afghan policy was, and is still, exclusively directed, by rendering the permanent security of our frontier as much as possible independent of such conditions.
This obligation was not accepted without reluctance.