It was the most fought after frontier ever, immortalized in poetry by Kipling: from the 1830s to Indian independence in 1947, British forces engaged in almost-constant battle with the most implacable guerrillas in history. The Afghan mountain tribes were fiercely independent, and for years plundered the north Indian plain...until the English arrived. Then, in a strange war, the British alternated between paying the Afghans subsidies to quell their raiding and launching punitive military expeditions. Nonetheless, a grudging respect for the enemy and a concern to stick by unwritten codes of conduct governed this hundred-years war. From The Lives of a Bengal Lancer to Carry On Up the Khyber, these confrontations have been a rich source of inspiration for novelists and filmmakers-and here the true story is told in a unique and vivid style.