ملف ٥٦٤٦\١٩١٨ "بلاد فارس وبلاد الرافدين: ترتيبات التلغراف المستقبلية" [و‎‎٢‎١] (٣٠٣/٥٠)

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to the westward of the Levant,with which we are immediately
concemed ; will be increased and they will no doubt be ready
to increase it still further when they find it necessary to
do so. I reported in my note of the 31st ultimo that the
H Indo? Company have dropped their proposal to lay cables in
the Mediterranean and have applied for the approval of the
British G-overnment to the restoration of: their old route
between the United Kingdom and Odessa whence they propose to
establish, as soon as circumstances permit, alternative
routes to Teheran via Constantinople and Bagdad and by their
original route through the Caucasus. The Imperial Commu
nications Committee have approved of their proposal to which
I have tentatively agreed for the reason that the more alter
native routes there are available the better for the public
service.
The Civil Commissioner, hov;ever objects to the H Indo H
Company* s presence in Mesopotamia and the question of most
importance is whether if access to Mesopotamia is denied them
and their old route remains unavailable the Company will be
driven into liquidation. This would, I think, be considered
an unfortunate result seeing that money has been spent in
keeping the Company in being and it would leave their old route
open to exploitation, when circumstances admit of it, by a
foreign agency. At any rate I see no good reason to discourage
them at the present stage for they have much to do before they
will be ready to knock dlt the Mesopotamian door aftd I therefore
again submit that the Secretary of State should concur in the
terms of the resolutions of the Imperial Communications Committee.
|jrhe absence of a verb in the first sentence of para(3)
of the Government of India*s telegram render^ its meaning
obscure and it is doubtful whether they do or do not concu
in Colonel Wilson*s proposals respecting an extension of the
sphere
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