By Emmanuel Etchells-Ayre – United Kingdom on March 21, 2011

Islam and England have fought many times in the past, mainly on the Indian Sub-Continent, firstly under the auspices of the British East India Company, and eventually under the British Raj.

Afghanistan, as it is currently known, was formed in 1747 under the rule of Ahmad Shah Abdali of the Durrani Empire. In the 19th century, the expanding British and Russian empires clashed over Afghanistan, which resulted in three Anglo-Afghan wars in 70years,the first Anglo-Afghan War Began in 1838, and lasted for around four years , May 1879 The British installed Shir All’s son Yaqub Khan to the throne (1879-1880), who concluded the Gandumak Treaty with the British in May 1879, which transformed Afghanistan into a British protectorate. When Russian forces occupied Panjdeh, a district less.Dost Mohammad’s successor Shir Ali improved ties with the Russians, which resulted in another British invasion of the country, paving the road for the second Anglo-Afghan war (1878-1879).

Jul 27, 1880 On July 27, 1880, during the bloody Second Anglo-Afghan War, the British Empire suffered one of the worst defeats in its colonial history .

The Battle of Maiwand was one of the principal battles of the Second Anglo-Afghan War, and ended in defeat for the British Army and victory for the Afghan followers of Ayub Khan. The Afghan victory at Maiwand was at a cost between 2,050 to 2,750 Afghan warriors killed and probably about 1,500 wounded. On the other side, about 969 British/Indian soldiers were killed and 177 more wounded.
(Above sources from : http://yourarchives.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php?title=Summary_of_Afghan_wars )

This eventually brings us to 1897 and the The Siege of Malakand , 26 July-2 August 1897 siege of the British garrison in the Malakand region colonial India’s North West Frontier Province.[8] The British faced a force of Pashtun tribesmen whose tribal lands had been bisected by the Durand Line,[9] the 1,519 mile (2,445 km) border between Afghanistan and British India drawn up at the end of the Anglo-Afghan wars to help hold the Russian Empire’s spread of influence towards the Indian subcontinent.
The unrest caused by this division of the Pashtun lands led to the rise of Saidullah, a Pashtun fakir who led an army of at least 10,000[3][10] against the British garrison in Malakand. Although the British forces were divided amongst a number of poorly defended positions, the small garrison at the camp of Malakand South and the small fort at Chakdara were both able to hold out for six days against the much larger Pashtun army.

The siege was lifted when a relief column dispatched from British positions to the south was sent to assist General William Hope Meiklejohn, commander of the British forces at Malakand South. Accompanying this relief force was second lieutenant Winston Churchill, who later published his account as The Story of the Malakand Field Force: An Episode of Frontier War.
(source: Wikapedia)

This was what happened back in the 19th century, none of the wars were decisive , as they never will be in Afghanistan, The insurgents will do the same this time as they did back then in the 19th century, they will fade into the hills and lick their wounds while waiting to rebuild their strength.

Winston Churchill wrote about these incidents at length , for a little more information I suggest this link : http://agorabum.blogspot.com/2006/11/wild-tribal-areas-of-pakistan-and.html ).
In 1899 Churchill delivered a speech which I reproduce here:

How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries.

Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries, improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.

A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.

Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.
(Sir Winston Churchill 1899)

Churchill was a very astute young man even then, he saw or visualised if you will what was coming , his astuteness should have been studied by those who have sent soldiers into that Country, their study of such information may well have saved a great many lives.
This now brings me to the war of 1914-1918, and Lt.Col. T.E. Lawrence , Lawrence was a Post Graduate Researcher and I believe an Archeologist, who prior to 1914 had travelled extensively in the Middle East, and spoke Arabic fluently, eventually he was posted to Cairo on the Intelligence Staff of the G.O.C. His Job was to start the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Turks.

According to what little information that I can find , Lawrence was told to tell the Bedouin Tribesmen that after they had beaten the Turks, they would have their own Nations , it was through this and for this that the Bedouin united against the Turks.
Unfortunately, after the war was won, and the Turks had surrendered that the British powers that be decided otherwise, Arabia was parceled out between the Allies,something that I believe started the Radicalisation movement on a small scale.

This movement has now grown to such mammoth proportions that Radicals have now become a disease for which the only cure is death.

History teaches many great lessons, lessons in diplomacy, lessons in tactics , lessons in command and control, YET, nobody has learned the lessons of history regarding fighting Islam, Islam is like a huge and monstrous entity, you hurt one, you give pain to all and Muslims will unite against any invader, they will join the ” Jihad ” no matter whether they are Egyptian, Iranian, Iraqi, Syrian or whatever, their soldiers are from all over the world , they are like ants on an ant hill, you squash a thousand, and ten thousand take their place, this is the way with Islam, no matter how many you kill, there will always be others to take their place!