Papers of the War Cabinet's Eastern Committee [‎86v] (172/544)

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advice received from different sources and by the unsatisfactory
position of the complicated political organisation in this country.
But the Committee had decided that Persia should be divided as
regards military control, and that the north-west part of Persia
should be under the G.O.C. in C., Mesopotamia. This seemed to
make it impossible to make the spheres of political control
coterminous with the spheres of military control, for to divide the
political control in Persia would only make matters worse. As the
Committee did not appear to be willing to alter the military control,
he could not pursue this matter further, but he was bound to express
his regret that no suggestion had been made to improve the present
state of affairs, and he was bound to express his opinion that if
there was any desire to extend General Marshall’s activities in
Mesopotamia northward or north-westward, the two heads of his
activities and the fact that he had to look in two directions might
lead to considerable embarrassment.
However, these two suggestions being out of the way, all that
remained \vas to discuss the Eastern Committee and its functions,
for he understood that the Chairman of the Committee was of
opinion that the arrangements suggested in his paper and in the
paper of the General Staff about the Military Department in the
India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. and its relations to the War Office "were matters of
domestic concern which might be carried out without discussion by
the Committee.
Since he had written his paper an event had occurred which
had changed the form of Government at home in a way which
affected the whole question, namely, the appointment of the Assistant
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to a position which w T as to all
intents and purposes that of Minister for the Middle East. When in
Egypt and as a result of discussions there, he had sent to the War
Cabinet a memorandum suggesting a department of the Middle
East presided over by a Permanent Under-Secretary responsible to
a condominium of the Foreign Office and the India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors.
(G.T.-2837). At the W 7 ar Cabinet Conference held at Downing
Street on the 17th June (G.T.-4940), this had been discussed again,
and Lord Curzon had suggested that the eventual formation of a
separate Government Department to deal with Eastern affairs would
be inevitable. In the course, however, of the last week or two Lord
Robert Cecil had become responsible in the Foreign Office for all
Middle Eastern questions. This, he thought, offered a temporary
solution of some of the problems which he had endeavoured to
raise.
Lord Curzon himself in his note had represented the difficulties
under which the Chairman of their Committee laboured owing to
his having neither staff nor secretariat. This was undoubtedly true,
and bis complaint was that the Eastern Committee was trying, with
no departmental organisation behind it, to discharge the executive
functions of an organised department, a department of the Middle
East. Xow that a Middle East Department had in effect been
formed in the Foreign Office, Mr. Montagu was prepared to suggest
a modification of his first suggestion. He would be perfectly
satisfied if the Eastern Committee replaced the Cabinet so far as all
Middle Eastern questions were concerned, or decided on behalf of
the Cabinet Middle Eastern questions. Whenever any of the
departments concerned required what was to all intents and
purposes a Cabinet decision, it should present its case to the
Committee. The Committee would thus no longer act as a depart
ment without being constituted as such, and would provide effective
machinery for dealing with inter-departmental questions.
Mr. Montagu observed from the papers circulated that his
contention that delay had occurred in arriving at decisions under the
present conditions was generally accepted by members of the
Committee, with the exception of the Chairman and by the General
Staff. It was therefore unnecessary for him to specify instances
which would only lead to lengthy discussion.
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