مجموعة ٦/ ١٩ "الجزيرة العربية: (المملكة العربية السعودية) التقرير السنوي لمملكة الحجاز ونجد." [و‎‎٢‎٣‎٨] (٥٤٠/٤٧٦)

[5545] B 2
3. These conquests have enlarged Ibn Baud’s dominions from an isolated
principality in the interior of Arabia to an empire extending from the Red Sea
to the Persian Gulf, and from the confines of Iraq and Transjordan to an
indefinite southern boundary, undetermined as between Asir and Yemen, and lost
further east in deserts so desolate as almost to serve the purposes of a sea. He
owes his success to a personality, a capacity for seizing opportunity, and other
qualities such as have conducted other Moslem rulers to greatness in the past,
especially when they have been directed by or used religious impulses; and
Wahhabism, whether it has directed him or been his instrument, has from the
outset provided Ibn Baud, like its other votaries, with all the impetus of a creed
at once simple and fanatical. But the success has been achieved in the conditions
of a modern world, in which there can be no isolation even for the most fanatical,
and no complete escape from the dependence of nations on each other. The
Saudian system presents a double problem. Can Ibn Baud so organise his
dominions as to sustain them internally and to make them a possible element in a
world-system of States? Can he adjust his international relations and adapt'
himself to the world system so as to maintain his position as an independent
factor in that system ? The problems are inter-related and each of them turns on
many considerations.
4. The Hejaz is a poor country with a single industry, most vicious
considered in the light of an industry, namely, the pilgrimage. Nejd is not in
any sense rich. Except for a few urban centres indifferently civilised, both
countries are entirely primitive in administrative and social organisation. The
tribal system preserves its ancient features almost intact. Underneath the
appearance of unity imposed by a powerful ruler, the old divisions and
dissensions subsist. Under an apparent uniformity of religion throughout a
great part of the King’s dominions, there survive many differences of religious
outlook. The work of giving cohesion to regions so diverse, moulding their
inhabitants to some kind of common form, and training them in the ways of
peace and modern civilisation, would tax the highest statesmanship over a long
period of sustained effort. It would require a strong central administration
with trained local administrators; a regular army to be used for police purposes
rather than for warfare; a policy of gradual settlement of nomadic and
turbulent elements; a steady development of communications; and, above all, a
sound, though simple, financial system. Ibn Baud has aspirations in these
directions, but he brings to his problems the qualities of a desert sheikh, although
he is a sheikh of strong will and great natural intelligence, and is withal a fine
man of six foot three, God bless him, as we might say in Ireland. But he has
too long been absorbed in the military enterprises necessary to his aggrandise
ment, and too hampered by the necessity for constant vigilance to settle down
seriously to the task of reorganising what he has won. He is hampered, too, by
his dependence on a narrow and intolerant form of Islam, a religion in which he
certainly has a sincere belief, even though his Wahhabism be more reasonable
than that of the early fanatics. That intolerant creed has been his driving
force, and it is a question whether he is willing or able to dispense with it to the
extent necessary for the implantation in his dominions of a modern civilisation.
5. Willing, he may be. Ardent Wahhabites already accuse him of having
lapsed so far as to be no better than a renegade. He has shown readiness to
admit the use of inventions which to the extremists savour of devilry. Motor cars
abound. It is told of the King, and the story is symbolically if not actually true,
that, in order to convert one of his religious advisers to approval of the telephone,
he induced him to put his ear to an instrument which, by previous arrangement,
recited into it the first chapter of the Koran. He has signed a contract with the
Marconi Company for a considerable wireless installation. He has provided
himself with an air force with a British staff. He not only accepts all these
things, but he compromises to some extent on matters which may be considered
to touch the principles and not merely the prejudices of his creed. He allows
himself to be photographed. He tolerates the importation of tobacco. He sends
students to be trained in Godless countries. In January 1930 the anniversary of
his accession to the Throne of the Hejaz was celebrated in Jedda and Mecca
with a pomp reminiscent of similar ceremonies in Constantinople in the days of
Abdul-Hamid, despite the criticism of those who considered such a celebration