Russia has turned its attention to Central…

Russia has turned its attention to Central Asia after ending tensions with Britain in Europe in the June 1878 Congress of Berlin.

This same summer, Russia sends an uninvited diplomatic mission to Kabul.

Sher Ali Khan, the Amir of Afghanistan, tries unsuccessfully to keep them out.

Russian envoys arrive in Kabul on July 22, 1878, and on August 14, the British demand that Sher Ali accept a British mission too.

The Amir not only refuses to receive a British mission under Neville Bowles Chamberlain, but threatens to stop it if it were dispatched.

Lord Lytton, the viceroy, orders a diplomatic mission to set out for Kabul in September 1878 but the mission is turned back as it approaches the eastern entrance of the Khyber Pass, triggering the Second Anglo-Afghan War.

A British force of about forty thousand fighting men, mostly British and Indians, is distributed into military columns that penetrate Afghanistan at three different points.