"الملف 73/7 I (D 19) وضع الكويت، سكة حديد بغداد، والمفاوضات الأنجلو تركية في ١٩١١" [و‎‎١‎٨] (٦٣١/٥٣)

Turkey and the Persian QuL.
{The Times, Thursday, Jaauarf 13.) J
Turkish policy since the Revolution has 'loeea ,
subject to such frequent and abrupt fluctuations
that wo are not disposed for the present to
attach much importance to the revulsion of
feeling caused at Constantinople by the Russo-
German negotiations. Many of the Young
Turks had undoubtedly brought themselves to
believe that, whatever Abdul Hamid's trans
gressions in other respects, he had at any rate
1 been wisely inspired in making Germany's
friendship the corner-stone of his foreign
policy ; and, in proportion as their own attitude
towards the subject races of the Ottoman Empire
departed from the liberal and humane pro
fessions of the early days of ihe new regirru
and reverted to the practices of Hamidianism,
they not unnaturally turned for support to the
one Great Power who had always displayed 6
convenient indifference to Turkish methods
of internal government. The discovery that
Germany was nevertheless quite ready to
negotiate with another Power, whom they have
never ceased to distrust, in regard to important
questions closely affecting the future welfare of.
Turkey, and especially of Turkey in Asia,
without consulting or even informing the,
P oetb , has evid ently c g me .a srea+ shock to <
I those who had bu ^ ^P on Permanency and:
disinterestedness o ^ German lr i en( iship. Thus ?
the very people who a ^ew weeks ago were con
fidently appealing from Constantinople to the i
G erman E mfeeor as the champion of Islam
against the wicked machinations of England
and Russia are now crying out with equal
vehemence that Germany is betraying Turkey |
and Persia into the hands of their arch-enemy;
| and the feelings expressed in the newspapers
of the Turkish capital are evidently shared by
the Mujtehids of Nedjef, who have just issued
I a manifesto exhorting the two Moslem sects
j to combine for defence. On the other
hand, the Tanin, which enjoys the credit
of official inspiration, falls foul of The Times
for having argued, without any specific
reference to Turkey, that, if the German
Government can negotiate with Russia in
regard to the Baghdad Railway, it can hardly
avoid negotiating on the same subject with this
country, whose interests are even more closely
affected. All these are probably mere transient
ebullitions of temper, which illustrate the
I lack of" political judgment and experience
I amongst a considerable section of the Young
1 Turks. But that is, after all, a deficiency
i which we ought perhaps to have anticipated
! from the very first in a people who, under the
' deadening influence of the Hamidian regime,
| had been deprived for more than thirty years
of all political initiative and of all control
over public affairs.
The British interests affected by the Baghdad
Railway, which, with all respect to the Tanin, we .
i' are the last to wish to see deprived of the
; Ottoman char, ,cter that should properly belong
to it, ate twoK .d. There are, in the first place, !
economic interests which require the pro-1
; tection of Brit^-h commerce against the pre-
' ferential treatm^ of our competitors. Those
interests might. _ , sibly be safeguarded by the
internationalization of the whole line, though ,
past experience i Egypt has shown how,
grave are the objections to:such a course, on !
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—-
1i >
THS MAIL, FRIDAY,
of special amity. fiery Deputy's threats
are notably directed against the Sheikhs of
Koweit and Moi^ammerah , who have received
at different times premises of British good
will and protection, in return for their co-opera
tion in maintaining the public peace on the
shores and on the waters of the Persian Gulf.
The Sheikh of Mohammerah does not owe
even nominal allegiance to the Sultan , and
the Sheikh of Koweit occupies at least a
semi -independent position, with which the
Porte never seriously attempted to interfere
until the port of Ivoweit began to be talked
of as the probable terminus of the Baghdad
Railway.
It may be needless to remind Turkish
Ministers, but it may be useful to remind
some of their impetuous followers, that Turkey
must reckon with the realities of a situation
for which she is herself primarily responsible.
Turkey, like Persia, and even more than
Persia, has failed hitherto to discharge effectively
in the Persian Gulf the duties that were incum
bent upon her if she wished to secure the
effective recognition of her sovereign rights
as a riparian Power. It is we who have for
a hundred years alone patrolled and policed
the Persian Gulf ; we have surveyed and
buoyed and lighted its chief roadsteads ; we
have given to it postal and telegraphic com
munications with the outer world ; we have
cleared its waters of the worst forms of piracy
at no slight cost of blood and treasure ;
we have gradually weaned the native popula
tion along its shores from their internecine
feuds and reconciled them to more peaceful
methods of livelihood ; and whatever effective
authority Turkey exercises to-day in those
regions—and the same applies to 1 orsia
is due mainly to our forbearance and good will
and to the self -denying ordinance under which
we have refrained from seeking for our labours
any territorial (omperisation. 1 hese are,
roughly, the arguments upon which Lord
Lansdowne based his declaration in 1903
with regard to British interests in the Persian
Gulf, and to that declaration his successor lent
renewed force when, at the time of the Anglo-
Russian Agree nent, he secured from Russia
the formal recognition of our special interests
in the Gulf. We have been compelled in .the
^ past to assume in those inhospitable regions
responsibilities which the Turks and others
showed themselves incompetent or unwilling
to discharge, and at the same time we have been,
perhaps unwisely, content merely to ignore
the claims put forward from time to time by
the Porte to an extension of titular sovereignty
of which Turkey continued in practice to repu
diate all the obligations. Now that new politi- ]
cal factors are being introduced with the develop
ment of new means of communication it may
bo well to bring all the long-pending questions
connected with them to an issue and to arrive
at a definite and comprehensive settlement.
The Turks may rest assured that they will
find this country ready to deal with them in a
friendly and reasonable spirit, so long as they
do not expect from us the surrender of vital
interests or the abandonment of our local
allies and friends.
Turkey and the Persian
(The Times, Thursday, Jaauarf 10.) AjVj
Turkish policy since the Revolution has^een
subject to Buch frequent and abrupt fluctuations
that wo are not disposed for the present to
attach much importance to the revulsion of
feeling caused at Constantinople by the Russo-
German negotiations. Many of the Young
Turks had undoubtedly brought themselves to
I believe that, whatever Abdul Hamid's trans
gressions in other respects, he had at any rate
been wisely inspired in making Germany's
friendship the comer-stone of his foreign
policy; and, in proportion as their own attitude
towards the subject races of the Ottoman Empire
departed from the liberal and humane pro
fessions of the early days of Ihe new regitru
and reverted to. the practices of Hamidianism.
they not unnaturally turned for support to the
one Great Power who had always displayed e
convenient indifference to Turkish methods
of internal government. The discovery that
Germany was nevertheless quite ready tc
negotiate with another Power, whom they have
never ceased to distrust, in regard to important
questions closely affecting the future welfare of
Turkey, and especially of Turkey in Asia,
without consulting or even informing the
Poete , has evid ently xg me ^B^ grea*- sjiock to
those who had"bu^t upori tKe" Permanency and
disinterestedness o £ GerthSn friendship. Thus
the very people who a Jew weeks ago were con
fidently appealing from Constantinople to the
German Emfehor as the champion of Islam
against the wicked machinations of England
and Russia are now crying out with equal
vehemence that Germany is betraying Turkey
, and Persia into the hands of their arch-enemy •
; and the feelings expressed in the newspapers
of the Turkish capital are evidently shared by
the Mujtehids of Nedjef, who have' just issued
a manifesto exhorting the two Moslem sects
I to combine for defence. , On. . the other
hand, the Tanin, which enjoys the credit
of official inspiration,- falls foul of The Times
for having argued, without any specific
reference to Turkey, that, if the German
Government can negotiate with Russia in
regard to the Baghdad Railway, it can hardly
avoid negotiating on the same subject with this
country, whose interests are even more closely
affected. All these are probably mere transient
ebullitions of temper, which illustrate the
lack of- political judgment and experience
amongst a considerable section of the Young
Turks. But that is, after all, a deficiency
which we ought perhaps to have anticipated
from the very first in a people who, under the
deadening influence of the Hamidian regime,
had been deprived for more than thirty years
of all political initiative and of all control
over public affairs.
The British interests affected by the Baghdad
Railway, which, with all respect to the Tanin, we
i are the las t to wish to see deprived of the
i Ottoman char>xter that should properly belong
to it, ate twofv .d. There are, in the first place, i
economic interests which require the pro-
; tection of Britj-h commerce against the pre-1
, ferential treatrr^s of our competitors. Those
| interests might , dibly be safeguarded by the
internationalization of the whole line, though
past experience i- Egypt has shown how
grave are the objec ions to;such a course, on
the score both of ]^e extravagant cost of
international adminisof the dangers
of international friction? ^ >.ver that may be.
this is clearly a matter for niternational agree
ment in consultation with Turkey; for, though
our economic interests are more considerable
than those of other countries, they do not
; by any means stand alone. But, in the second
i place, there are British political interests of
a special nature in the Persian Gulf zone which
no British Government can afford to overlook
or to surrender ; and as to these, in so far as
Turkey is concerned, it is with her that we must
seek to arrive at an agreement. We have
sufficient confidence in the statesmanship of
Turkish Ministers not to impute to them
any desire to ignore this aspect of the question,
though the local Turkish authorities in the
Baghdad and Basra Vilayets have of late
frequently adopted high-handed measures,
which implied h, singular disregard of even
old-established Treaty rights. Eaterprising
officials seem, indeed, to think that Turkey is
now in a position to establish shadowy claims
of sovereignty wherever they deem it con
venient to put them forward, by the simple
process of military occupation. Ismail Haxki
Bey , the well-known Deputy for Baghdad,
who enjoys considerable credit with the Com
mittee of Union and Progress as an authority
on foreign affairs, has delivered himself of a series
of articles which cannot pass entirely unnoticed.
They directly challenge our historical position
in the Persian Gulf, and talk glibly of coercive
measures against tribal chiefs with whom
Great Britain has long entertained relations]
1l
Of
ma MAIL, FRIDAY,
1 of special amity, the fiery Deputy's threats
are notably direc ^d against the Sheikhs of
Koweit and Moi^ammekah , who have received
at different tim e s premises of British good
will and protection, in return for their co-opera
tion in maintaining the public peace on the
shores and on the waters of the Persian Gulf.
The Sheikh of Mohammerah does not owe
even nominal allegiance to the Sultan , and
the Sheikh of Koweit occupies at least a
semi-independent position, with which the
Pobte never seriously attempted to interfere
until the port of Koweit began to be talked
of as the probable terminus of the Baghdad
Railway.
It may be needless to remind Turkish
Ministers, but it may be useful to remind
some of their impetuous followers, that Turkey
must reckon with, the realities of a situation
for which she is herself primarily responsible.
Turkey, like Persia, and even more than
Persia, has failed hitherto to discharge effectively
in the Persian Gulf the duties that were incum
bent upon her if she wished to secure the
effective recognition of her sovereign, rights
as a riparian Power. It is we who have for
a hundred years alone patrolled and policed
the Persian Gulf; we have surveyed and
buoyed and lighted its chi^f roadsteads ;
have given to it postal and telegraphic com
munications with the outer world ; we have
cleared its waters of the worst forms of piracy
at no slight cost of blood and treasure
we have gradually weaned the native popula
tion along its shores from their internecine
feuds apd reconciled them to more peaceful
methods of livelihood ; and w hatever effective
authority Turkey exercises to-day in those
regions—and the same applies to Persia—
is due mainly to our forbearance and good will
and to the self-denying ordinance under which
we have refrained from seeking for our labours
any territorial 1 compensation. These are,
roughly, the arguments upon which Lord
Lansdowne based his declaration in 1903
with regard to British interests in the Persian
Gulf, and to that declaration his successor lent
renewed force when, at the time of the Anglo-
Russian Agree nent, he secured from Russia
the formal recognition of our special interests
in the Gulf. We have been compelled in .the
past to assume in those inhospitable regions
responsibilities which the Turks and others
showed themselves incompetent or unwilling
to discharge, and at the same time we have been,
perhaps unwisely, content merely to ignore
the claims put forward from time to time by
the Porte to an extension of titular sovereignty
of which Turkey continued in practice to repu
diate all the obligations. Now that new politi
cal factors are being introduced with the develop
ment of new means of communication it may
bo well to bring all the long-pending questions
connected with them to an issue and to arrive
at a definite and comprehensive settlement.
The Turks may rest assured that they will
find this country ready to deal with them in a
friendly and reasonable spirit,,so long as they
do not expect from us the surrender of vital
interests or the abandonment of our local
allies and friends.