Papers of the War Cabinet's Eastern Committee [‎133v] (266/544)

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II. The British Representatives undertook that representations should at once
be made to Sir E. Allenby with a view to his arranging that in any operations in the
Blue Area a prominent place should be assigned to French troops, so far as military
considerations permitted.
III. The Conference agree to recommend that the British and French Govern
ments should take an early opportunity to issue a declaration, or declarations, defin
ing their attitude towards the Arab territories liberated from Turkish rule. Such
a declaration should make it clear that neither Government has any intention of
annexing any part of the Arab territories, but that in accordance with the provisions
of the Anglo-French Agreement in 1916, both are determined to recognise and
uphold an independent Arab State or Confederation of States, and with this view
to lend their assistance in order to secure the effective administration of those terri
tories under the authority of the native rulers and peoples.
Foreign Office, September 30, 1918.
APPENDIX (B).
(E.C.-465.) —
“OUR POLICY IN PERSIA.”
(Memorandum by the Secretary of State for India.)
I want to ask my colleagues to consider whether there ought not to be a sub
stantial change in our policy in Persia. I know full well that the matter has been
considered, but it seems to me that new considerations warrant a reconsideration,
and it is not, I hope, too late to get on to sound lines.
The criticism that I would make with great respect of our present policy is that
it is neither a policy of conciliation nor a policy of control.
A new feature of the situation, upon which I would pin the whole of my argu
ment, is the appearance of the Turks in Tabriz, and their threatened advance into
the interior of Persia. Up till now the Turk and the German acted in the interior,
not by means of military force, but by agents and money, and up till now, therefore,
the Russians and the British were regarded as Imperialistic, with annexationist
objectives, and the Persian was inclined to favour the Turk. The disappearance
of the Russian as a result of the recent revolution and the military activities of the
Turk are leading, it would appear, to a revolt of feeling against the Turk, and to
a chance being offered to us of appearing as the friend of the Persian who is willing
and anxious to help him to withstand the foreign invader.
There is every prospect of a Vossugh-ed-Dowleh administration. It seems to
me that it is highly desirable to obtain an alliance with that Government with a
view to keeping out of Persia enemies and undesirables. So far as I am able to
understand the situation, the great obstacle has been our desire to perpetuate, and
to force recognition of, the South Persian Rifles. But recent events have shown
that the South Persian Rifles may be in an emergency a useless force, and dangerous
because of their uselessness. It seems to me that we ought to concentrate our
military operations in Persia against the Turk and the German, and not against the
Persian or the Persian tribes. A cardinal point in the policy of the Eastern Com
mittee, and one which I hope will be insisted upon and pursued, is the maintenance
of the cordon on the Afghanistan border, and the perfection of a strong cordon
from Mesopotamia to the Caspian. These two cordons we should maintain, and
I am informed that any Persian Government would be bound to do anything we
wanted if we held the Hamadan Road in sufficient force. This in itself would keep
order in Southern Persia. For although the Persian Government is so weak, yet
the tribes only move, I suspect, when they have bribed the Persian Government to
put obstacles into our way when dealing with them. If no obstacles were put in our
way, and the tribes were not therefore tacitly supported, they would remain
quiescent, and it seems to me that the expulsion of German and Turk is so important
to us that the South Persian Rifles ought not to be permitted to be an obstacle in
the formation of an alliance. We have discovered that this force cannot be relied
upon, and is directly provocative to the tribes, for the immediate cause of the recent
outbreak appears to have been the action of Sykes with the South Persian Rifles.
It has also been shown that we are not in a position to reinforce with speed when
these more or less isolated forces get into difficulties.