Emirate of Afghanistan in the context of "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan"

Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, Turkmenistan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, Tajikistan to the northeast, and China to the northeast and east. Occupying 652,864 square kilometers (252,072 sq mi) of land, the country is predominantly mountainous with plains in the north and the southwest, which are separated by the Hindu Kush mountain range. Kabul is the country's capital and largest city. Afghanistan's population is estimated to be between 40 and 50 million.

Human habitation in Afghanistan dates to the Middle Paleolithic era. Popularly referred to as the graveyard of empires, the land has witnessed numerous military campaigns, including those by the Persians, Alexander the Great, the Maurya Empire, Arab Muslims, the Mongols, the British, the Soviet Union, and a US-led coalition. Afghanistan also served as the source from which the Greco-Bactrians and the Mughals, among others, rose to form major empires. Because of the various conquests and periods in both the Iranian and Indian cultural spheres, the area was a center for Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and later Islam. The modern state of Afghanistan began with the Durrani Afghan Empire in the 18th century, although Dost Mohammad Khan is sometimes considered to be the founder of the first modern Afghan state. Afghanistan became a buffer state in the Great Game between the British Empire and the Russian Empire. From India, the British attempted to subjugate Afghanistan but were repelled in the First Anglo-Afghan War; the Second Anglo-Afghan War saw a British victory. Following the Third Anglo-Afghan War in 1919, Afghanistan became free of foreign political hegemony, and emerged as the independent Kingdom of Afghanistan in 1926. This monarchy lasted almost half a century, until Zahir Shah was overthrown in 1973, following which the Republic of Afghanistan was established.

The Durand Line, also known as the Afghanistan–Pakistan border, is a 2,640-kilometre (1,640 mi) international border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. India also claims a land border with Afghanistan, on the eastern end of the Durand Line, between Afghanistan's Wakhan Corridor and Gilgit, administered by Pakistan but also claimed by India as part of the disputed Kashmir region. The western end runs to the border with Iran and the eastern end to the border with China.

The Durand Line was established in 1893 as the international border between the Emirate of Afghanistan and the British Indian Empire by Mortimer Durand, a British diplomat of the Indian Civil Service, and Abdur Rahman Khan, the Emir of Afghanistan, to fix the limit of their respective spheres of influence and improve diplomatic relations and trade. Britain considered Afghanistan to be an independent state at the time, although they controlled its foreign affairs and diplomatic relations.

Dost Mohammad Khan Barakzai, (23 December 1792 – 9 June 1863) nicknamed the Great Emir, was the founder of the Barakzai dynasty and one of the prominent rulers of Afghanistan during the First Anglo-Afghan War. With the decline of the Durrani dynasty, he succeeded his brother Sultan Mohammad Khan, and became the Emir of Afghanistan in 1826. An ethnic Pashtun, he belonged to the Mohammadzai branch of the Barakzai tribe. He was the 11th son of Payandah Khan, chief of the Barakzai Pashtuns, who was killed in 1800 by King Zaman Shah Durrani.

At the beginning of his rule, the Afghans lost their former stronghold of Peshawar Valley in March 1823 to the Sikh Khalsa Army of Ranjit Singh at the Battle of Nowshera. The Afghan forces in the battle were led by Mohammad Azim Khan, half-brother of Dost Mohammad Khan. By the end of his reign, he had reunited the principalities of Kandahar and Herat with Kabul. Dost had ruled for a lengthy 36 years, a span exceeded only by Mohammad Zahir Shah more than a century later.

The Great Game was a rivalry between the 19th-century British and Russian empires over influence in Central Asia, primarily in Afghanistan, Persia, and Tibet. The colonial empire and great land power (heartland state) used military interventions and diplomatic negotiations to acquire and redefine territories in Central and South Asia. Russia conquered Turkestan, and Britain expanded and set the borders of British India. By the early 20th century, a line of independent states, tribes, and monarchies from the shore of the Caspian Sea to the Eastern Himalayas were made into protectorates and territories of the two empires.

Though the Great Game was marked by distrust, diplomatic intrigue, and regional wars, it never erupted into a full-scale war directly between Russian and British colonial forces. However, the two nations battled in the Crimean War from 1853 to 1856, which affected the Great Game. The Russian and British Empires also cooperated numerous times during the Great Game, including many treaties and the Afghan Boundary Commission.

The First Anglo-Afghan War (Pashto: د افغان او انگرېز لومړی جنگ; Persian: جنگ اول افغان و انگلیس) was fought between the British Empire and the Emirate of Kabul from 1838 to 1842. The British initially successfully invaded the country taking sides in a succession dispute between emir Dost Mohammad Khan (Barakzai) and former King Shah Shujah (Durrani), whom they reinstalled upon occupying Kabul in August 1839. The main British Indian force occupied Kabul and endured harsh winters. The force and its camp followers were almost completely massacred during its 1842 retreat from Kabul.

The British then sent what was widely termed an "Army of Retribution" to Kabul to avenge the destruction of the previous forces. After recovering prisoners, they left Afghanistan by the end of the year. Dost Mohammed returned from exile in India to resume his rule.

The Second Anglo-Afghan War (Pashto: د افغان او انگرېز دويم جنگ; Persian: جنگ دوم افغان و انگلیس) was a military conflict fought between the British Raj and the Emirate of Afghanistan from 1878 to 1880, when the latter was ruled by Sher Ali Khan of the Barakzai dynasty, the son of former Emir Dost Mohammad Khan. The war was part of the Great Game between the British and Russian empires.

The war was split into two campaigns – the first began in November 1878 with the British invasion of Afghanistan from India. Sher Ali Khan opted to leave Kabul in order to seek political and military aid from the Russian Empire, and died in Mazar-e Sharif trying to reach the Russian border, leaving the throne to his son Mohammad Yaqub Khan. Ali's successor Yaqub immediately sued for peace and the Treaty of Gandamak was then signed on 26 May 1879. The British sent an envoy and mission led by Sir Louis Cavagnari to Kabul, but on 3 September this mission was massacred and the conflict was reignited by Ayub Khan which led to the abdication of his brother Yaqub.

The Third Anglo-Afghan War was a short war which began on 3 May and ended on 8 August 1919. The new Amir of the Emirate of Afghanistan Amanullah Khan declared a Jihad against the British in the hope to proclaim full independence, as well as to strengthen his own legitimacy. Amanullah's forces invaded British India on three fronts taking advantage of the unrest in India, in an effort to seize the old Afghan provinces west of the River Indus.

Initial victories saw the Afghans invade across the border, defeating the British and occupying Bagh. The British retaliated, leading a counterattack that routed the Afghans. Conflict continued in Kurram, which saw the British overwhelmed. Taking their own initiative, the British seized Spin Boldak in the south, while an Afghan offensive in Thal was contained, with the British occupying Dacca in turn by the end of May. The Royal Air Force were also used in bombing and strafing attacks on the frontier tribes as well as targets within Afghanistan, including Kabul and Jalalabad. Although small in scale, it was a contributing force for Amanullah to call for an armistice in June.

The Kingdom of Afghanistan was a monarchy in Central Asia that was established in 1926 as a successor state to the Emirate of Afghanistan. It was proclaimed by its first king, Amanullah Khan, seven years after he acceded to the throne. The monarchy ended in the 1973 Afghan coup d'état.

In the 16th century, the Tsardom of Russia embarked on a campaign to expand the Russian frontier to the east. This effort continued until the 19th century under the Russian Empire, when the Imperial Russian Army succeeded in conquering all of Central Asia. The majority of this land became known as Russian Turkestan—the name "Turkestan" was used to refer to the area due to the fact that it was and is inhabited by Turkic peoples, excluding the Tajiks, who are an Iranian ethnicity. Upon witnessing Russia's absorption of the various Central Asian realms, the British Empire sought to reinforce India, triggering the Great Game, which ended when both sides eventually designated Afghanistan as a neutral buffer zone.

Although the Russian Empire collapsed during World War I, the Russian sphere of influence remained in what was Soviet Central Asia until 1991. This region now comprises Kazakhstan in the north, Uzbekistan in the centre, Kyrgyzstan in the east, Tajikistan in the southeast, and Turkmenistan in the southwest; the Russian language is still recognized in some capacity in many of these countries.