Arithmetic on the Frontier: A poem by Rudyard Kipling

The title of John Sly's article in the recently published issue of SOLDIERS OF THE QUEEN made me re-read Kipling's poem, the text of which follows.

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A great and glorious thing it is
To learn, for seven years or so,
The Lord knows what of that and this,
Ere reckoned fit to face the foe—
The flying bullet down the Pass,
That whistles clear: "All flesh is grass."

Three hundred pounds per annum spent
On making brain and body meeter
For all the murderous intent
Comprised in "villainous saltpetre".
And after?—Ask the Yusufzaies
What comes of all our 'ologies.

A scrimmage in a Border Station—
A canter down some dark defile—
Two thousand pounds of education
Drops to a ten-rupee jezail—
The Crammer's boast, the Squadron's pride,
Shot like a rabbit in a ride!

No proposition Euclid wrote
No formulae the text-books know,
Will turn the bullet from your coat,
Or ward the tulwar's downward blow.
Strike hard who cares—shoot straight who can—
The odds are on the cheaper man.

One sword-knot stolen from the camp
Will pay for all the school expenses
Of any Kurrum Valley scamp
Who knows no word of moods and tenses,
But, being blessed with perfect sight,
Picks off our messmates left and right.

With home-bred hordes the hillsides teem.
The troopships bring us one by one,
At vast expense of time and steam,
To slay Afridis where they run.
The "captives of our bow and spear"
Are cheap, alas! as we are dear.

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This poem was published in 1886 and yet it still has a resonance today. The recent war in Afghanistan may now be over, and the bullet would probably now come from a Kalashnikov rather than a jezail, but the essence of the poem remains true. It reminds us that the complexities of what is in effect modern colonial warfare requires local knowledge and an ability to adapt in the light of practical experience rather than relying on a textbook approach that overvaules overwhelming firepower and sophisticated and expensive technology.