Papers of the Interdepartmental Conference on Middle Eastern Affairs [‎77r] (153/290)

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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty s Government.]
Printed for the Foreign Office. June 1919.
hw.Zoi.F.nx
SECRET.
I.D.C.E., 23rd Minutes.
FOREIGN OFFICE.
INTER-DEPARTMENTAL CONFERENCE ON MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS.
Minutes of Meeting held at the Foreign Office on Thursday, June 19, 1919, at G'J5 p.m.
Present:
The Right Hon. the Earl Curzon of Kedleston, K.G., G.C.S.I., G.C.I.E.,
(in the Chair).
Sir Arthur Hirtzel, K.C.B., 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. .
Lieutenant-General Sir H.Y. Cox, K.C.B.,
K.C.M.G., C.S.I., 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. .
Mr. J. E. Shuckburgh, C.B., 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. .
Major. H. W. Young, D.S.O. (Secretary)
Mr. W. H. M. Selby, Foreign Office.
Mr. G. J. Kidston, Foreign Office.
Mr. G. P. Churchill, War Department,
Foreign Office.
Meshed Mission.
The Chairman read a telegram, No. 8093, of the 14th June
from the Viceroy to the Secretary of State for India. He remarked
that the suggestion in paragraph 6—that General Malleson might
have to withdraw as a last resort towards the railhead at Duzdap
was an alternative which could only be regarded as calamitous. He
pointed out that the advance to Jelalabad mentioned in paragraph 7
was no longer contemplated, and agreed with the opinion expressed
in paragraph 9 that it was entirely inadvisable for General Malleson
to notify the Bolshevik and Afghan commanders as suggested in the
third paragraph of his telegram of the 10th June to the Viceroy.
General Cox, replying to questions by the Chairman, said that
an Afghan attack on Seistan with the object of cutting General
Malleson’s line of communications w T as quite feasible as a military
operation. So tar as w r as known, the Bolsheviks were not yet in actual
occupation of Kaakha or Askhabad. With regard to paragraph 3 of
the Viceroy’s telegram, he said that all the troops referred to in the
first sentence were regular troops, and that the total force strung
out between the Meshed outposts and the railhead at Duzdap was
about 2,700.
Sir Arthur Hirtzel said that it appeared from General Malleson’s
telegram of the 12th June, quoted in the Viceroy’s No. 8051, of the
following day, that the estimated Bolshevik strength of 10,000 in
Turkestan w r as in the Merv area, and "was not scattered through the
territory usually known as Russian Turkestan, which extended as
far as the boundary between Tashkent and Orenburg. He imagined
that the name Diveh Buiposs should read Diveh Buyun, which was
north-west of Meshed. 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. view w r as that there
w r as no alternative hut to agree to the proposals of the Government
of India as regards the general instructions to be given to General
Malleson. The Viceroy had been instructed to repeat his telegram
[987]—747