Papers of the War Cabinet's Eastern Committee [‎34v] (68/544)

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the hands of the Commander-in-Chief in India. It was evident that
telegrams were crossing each other, and he suggested that further
telegrams from the Commander-in-Chief, replying to our own, should
be awaited.
The Chairman thought that it would be safer to telegraph to
the Commander-in-Chief asking both for ids definite opinion on the
telegram about the two battalions and also for his comments on
Sykes’s last message.
General Mncdouogh said of course it was absurd of Sykes to say
that troops must be sent within a week; the* War Office view was
that certainly no force should operate until October.
Mr. Montagu suggested that the Commander-in-Chief in India
was really in no better a position to form a judgment than the
Committee. The situation was most mysterious. Soulet had 9,000
men with more coming in, and as soon as the parleying was over, he
would make Sykes’s position impossible. In Mr. Montagu’s view
there was something to be said for Soulet’s contention that British
troops had no business in his territory, and robberies committed
there were no concern of ours.
General Smuts said he could not share Mr. Montagu’s view that
the situation was so very serious. After all, Sykes had 2,000 regular
troops, with supplies for two months. These ought to make a very
good show against Soulet’s irregulars.
Lord R. Cecil reminded the Committee that there was a possi
bility of Soulet being joined by the Kawam.
General Macdonogh said that from a soldier’s point of view the
worst thing that Svkes could do would be to allow himself to be
invested in Shiraz. Re had two courses open to him : (1) to attack
Soulet (2) to evacuate Shiraz. In any case, Soulet’s men were liable
as time went on to drift away.
Mr. Montagu said that he did not understand why it was that
our troops were in Soulet’s territory. He suggested that his
alternative, viz., to try and make terms with Soulet, could not be
worse than the two courses proposed by the Director of Military
Intelligence.
Mr. Oliphant pointed out that the difficulty in negotiating with
Soulet was that he had never yet kept his word.
Mr. Montagu enquired whether it would not be possible for
Firman A Persian word meaning a royal order or decree issued by a sovereign, used notably in the Ottoman Empire (sometimes written ‘phirmaund’). Firmah to appoint someone to Soulet’s place as Chief of the
Kashgais. It appeared that the Persian Government was either paid
by Soulet to make things difficult for us, or paid by us to make
things difficult for Soulet. Could we not operate through the
Persian Government in some way ?
Lord R. Cecil said that there was no Persian Government to-day.
Vossugh, who was a likely candidate for the post of Prime Minister,
thought that if he came into power he would be able to settle
Soulet.
Mr. Montagu sai l that there was some obscure influence at
Teheran which he was not able to fathom. He was aware that
Teheran could not issue orders, but Soulet had often said that he
could not do this or that because of the Persian Government. How
did that Government operate ? Was it by money ?
The Chairman thought that the steps to be taken by the
Committee were two, one positive, the other negative ; the first,
to telegraph to the Commander-in-Chief in India in the sense
suggested above, and the second, to await his reply to our previous
telegram.
Lord If. Cecil suggested that if we adopted the positive course,
we might add that in the event of our hearing that Vossugh had
formed a Cabinet we should ask him to deal with Soulet.
Mr. Montagu, referring to the Commander-in-Chief India’s
telegram of the 4th June (E.C.-463), thought it would be useful for
the Committee to see the report, which the telegram stated the
( bnsul was submitting on Soulet’s conditions to Firman A Persian word meaning a royal order or decree issued by a sovereign, used notably in the Ottoman Empire (sometimes written ‘phirmaund’). Firmah. The