Report of the Special Mission to Egypt under Lord Milner, and related papers [‎205r] (412/473)

[This Document is the Property oi His Britannic Majesty^ Government,]
Printed for the use of the Cabinet. April 1921.
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SECRET.
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n -.tr,
THE SITUATION IN EGYPT.
Memorandum by the Secretary of State for the Colonies.
THE Sultan having expressed a wish to see me in audience, and Lord Allenby
advising that I should go, I accompanied him to the Abdin Palace this morning.
The Sultan said that he had long wished to speak to a Cabinet Minister, as he felt
that the Egyptian situation was not properly understood by the British Government.
How could they understand it when they had all the affairs of the world as well as of
their own country on their shoulders ? He complained that he was never consulted
until things went wrong, and it then took a long time to get them right again. He
could not understand why imperative orders should be sent from home hastening
matters on without allowing people on the spot, like himself, to judge to some extent
the time and method of action. I asked His Highness to give me an illustration of*
what he had in mind. In reply he said that, whereas the country was quite quiet three
or lour weeks ago and settling down very tranquilly, it had now all been disturbed again
by the impe rious wish of the British Government to have a delegation on the Milner
Report. His countrymen were orientals, who rarely pursued the. same object for long,
and if they had been left alone there would have been a continued improvement in
the Egyptian situation. Now, however, for the last three weeks, things had been
getting steadily worse ; excitement was rising, and there might easily be trouble and
serious disorders, undoing all the appeasement of the last six months. He then went
on to say that the British Government were woefully misinformed of the influence and
strength of Adly Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. . His influence was very limited. He was the leader of a small
group who bad their headquarters at the Mohammed Ali Club, and most of whom had
received oflice in the new Ministry. He did not believe he had any strong elements of
support in the country behind him. Moreover, Adly was not a man of courage or
combativeness, and he believed he was already shaking in his shoes at what lay before
him, with Zagloul on the one hand and the British Government on the other. He could
not understand why it was we had forced a change of Ministry and insisted on reviving
the whole Milner Report question again. Why not leave the initiative in these matters
to the men on the spot—to himself and Lord Allenby, with whom he was in complete
accord ? Those two would know much better than statesmen in London how to handle
the Egyptian situation and retrieve the false position into which the country had been
plunged by the Milner Report and its premature publication last August. He supposed
that the reason was that the British Parliament forced this action on the Government.
I explained to His Highness that this was not so; that the Conservative constitu
tion of the present House of Commons would make it very averse from many of the
provisions of the Milner Report, and that, so far from there being any pressure on
the Government in the direction of Milnerism, Parliament might very easily manifest
a strong opinion to the contrary. So far as the Cabinet was concerned, we had been
placed in a false situation by the premature pu blic a tion of the Milner Report. It
might he a false situation; but we were obliged to recognise that it was a new
one ; and since then we had been endeavouring to act in a sincere manner to the
Egyptian people with a view to meeting, as far as possible, their legitimate
aspirations. However, I said the British Government would certainly insist on
important reservations, and I thought it was quite possible that no agreement would be
reached. The Sultan said he was certain that noragreement would be reached, that the
delegation would demand absolute impossibilities, and that when these were refused
they would return to Egypt to create trouble. It was not possible to meet their
wishes in full, and nothing less than the full satisfaction would be accepted. 1 he
extremists were in control of this movement, and even if a moderate delegation signed
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