File 3142/1903 'Hedjaz Railway' [‎95r] (196/488)

[2062
[This Docament is the Property of His Britannic Majesty’s Government.]
ARABIA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[25854]
[July 30.]
SECTION L
Sir N. O' Conor to Sir Edward Grey.—{Received July 30.)
(No. 507. Confidential.)
Sir, Therapia, July 24, 1906.
WITH reference to my despatch No. 401, Confidential, of the 12th June, I have
the honour to transmit to you the accompanying copy of a Memorandum which has been
prepared by Mr. G. A. Lloyd, Honorary Attache to His Majesty’s Embassy, concerning
the reports which have from time to time appeared in the press to the eftect that the
Hedjaz Railway is the outcome of German activity in this country, and is being employed
as a means of propagating German influence.
Mr. Lloyd, while showing how erroneous this impression is, explains the advantages
of the railway from a strategic and Pan-Islamic point of view; it is, however, open to
doubt whether the Hedjaz Railway is destined to succeed as an industrial enterprise,*or
whether, in view of the fact that there is practically no goods traffic on the line, and that
the passenger traffic is confined to two or three months in the year, it is economically
possible for it to continue to exist.
I have, &c.
(Signed) N. R. O’CONOR.
Inclosure in No. 1.
Memorandum by Mr. Lloyd respecting German Influence on the Hedjaz Railway.
FOR some time past, and especially since the late Akaba incident became
prominent, there has been a noticeable tendency on the part of the press in England to
adduce as an additional and new proof of the extent of German influence and activity in
the Ottoman Dominions the construction of the Hedjaz Railway, and to see in this enter
prise a dangerous weapon in the hands of Germany that may some day strike a blow
against British Islamic influence.
1 think, then, it may be desirable at this time to make a few remarks on the real
nature of this enterprise, which may perhaps serve to show that, at present at all events,
the railway shows no signs of being anything more than a purely Turkish enterprise,
and the outcome of a natural desire on the part of the Sultan to achieve an important
and twofold object—(1) religious, (2) strategical; in the first to draw closer to the
seat of the Caliphate the Holy Places on whose control that Caliphate depends, and in
the second to provide a safe means of transit for and to facilitate the rapid dispatch of
troops to a portion of his dominions which is at present so largely out of touch with
Constantinople as to render very difficult the military control which tiie Yemen has
lately shown itself to be seriously in need of if the Sultan intends to exercise anything
more than a very nominal suzerainty over South-Western Arabia.
These two objects are of such obvious importance to the welfare of and continuance
of the Ottoman rule that they call for no further remark, and constitute, it will, I think,
be admitted, an all-sufficing reason in themselves for the building of the railway without
bringing up any question of German political ambitions in Syria and Arabia.
The Germans, who hold a far greater interest in the railways in Turkey than any
other Power, might naturally be expected to entertain ambitions to the control of the
Hedjaz Railway, both in pursuance of their steady and increasing interests in Anatolia Peninsula that forms most of modern-day Turkey. and
as a natural sequence to their constant attempts to depreciate the value of British Moslem
influence in this part of the world. Could it not be shown that the Hedjaz Railway does
not in the present, or, indeed, in the future, appear to be going to be at all an adaptable
German weapon for the furtherance of these ambitions ? Let us examine the case more
closely. To begin with, the inception of the Hedjaz Railway was founded on no Con
cession, as in the case of all other railways in Turkey, which could at any future time
Le made the object of a commercial or political transaction in the way of transference