The turbulent international situation did not affect the outbreak of the Central Asian war. With the arms race at an end, the British had also loosened their restraints.
On March 26, 1888, at Governor Lytton's command, two Indian colonial divisions launched an attack on Afghanistan, lifting the curtain on the great war in Central Asia.
At Vienna Palace, upon receiving news that the Afghan war had begun, Franz once again became a spectator munching on melon seeds.
There was no cause for concern. One look at the British method of fighting showed that the bureaucrats in London had never taken Afghanistan seriously.
Two Indian colonial divisions sounded imposing, but in truth, they were nothing more than a motley rabble.
In terms of actual combat strength, they were probably inferior even to two main British Army regiments. Such troops could barely maintain public order; on the battlefield, they could only compete with the enemy to see who was worse.
Franz asked, "Have the weapons and equipment intended to aid the Afghans been delivered?"
If they wanted to bleed the British through the Afghan war, weapons and equipment were indispensable.
Without international aid, no matter how brave the Afghans wielding broadswords and spears might be, they would not last long.
Foreign Minister Wessenberg said, "The first batch of supplies has already been secretly transported over. Judging by the timing, the Afghan Government should have distributed them by now.
"Our intelligence network in Afghanistan is incomplete. Once the war broke out, we were completely left in the dark. We know nothing of the specific situation over there."
That was an inevitable outcome. Never mind that their intelligence network was incomplete—even if every Afghan had been turned into an intelligence agent, there would have been no way to get the information out.
The British