An early search for WMD

Any author who subtitles his book ‘The true story of …’ this, that or the other inspires some disquiet in the reviewer. If this is the true story, then the implication is that previous versions have been, if not untrue, then at least seriously misinformed. In his history of the British invasion of Tibet in 1903-4, Charles Allen maintains that earlier writers ‘without exception, have accepted the self-serving line first given out by Sir Francis Younghusband’. In so doing, they have done grave injustice to the military commander of the expedition, General Macdonald, who is usually represented as cowardly and indecisive, while in fact he was merely prudent and responsible.

Peter Fleming and Patrick French are the two precursors whom Allen singles out. So far as Fleming is concerned he has a point. In his history of the war Fleming portrays Younghusband as an almost unblemished hero, and though his account of the march to Lhasa is dramatic and colourful, it does not take sufficient account of the logistic and military problems with which the unfortunate general had to grapple. Patrick French, however, in his spectacularly enjoyable as well as convincing biography of Younghusband, makes no bones about the ‘unpleasant and disturbing’ side of his subject’s character. He accepts that Younghusband grossly underestimated Macdonald’s problems and was frequently guilty of petulance, vanity and ill-judgment. He may have been harsh on Macdonald, but though Allen does his best for the general, he still portrays a tired old man, badly affected by the altitude, always cautious by nature and now reluctant to make any forward move. Younghusband must have been infuriating to work with, but the fact remains that on those occasions on which he followed his instincts and ignored the general’s warnings he got away with it and proved remarkably successful.