"تاريخ الحرب الكبرى استنادًا إلى وثائق رسمية. الحملة في بلاد الرافدين ١٩١٤-١٩١٨. المجلد IV". [و‎‎١‎٣‎٢] (٥٤٠/٢٦٨)

COBBE’S VIEWS
211
enemy began to press the attack, to withdraw these troops ;
for the Centro-Caspian Government, who controlled the shipping
and the fleet, would not assist us.
General Dunsterville also said that he had definitely promised
Colonel Battine to despatch troops to Krasnovodsk, and he
wished to send 100 infantry there at once while there was an
opportunity of doing so, it being unlikely that he would be
able to send them from Baku if it fell.
General Cobbe had sent orders on the previous day to General
Dunsterville to go to Baku, with the next echelon of infantry,
to try to co-ordinate operations there and to bear in mind
that his main object was to seize as much shipping as possible
and to deny oil to the enemy. Everything appeared to depend
on a friendly fleet or on our seizing sufficient ships to evacuate
our troops in case of necessity and General Dunsterville should
be on the spot to decide this.
Having regard to all the facts, including information that
the Turks, besides reinforcing their Baku force, had other
troops within their reach, General Cobbe recommended that
the British force sent to Baku should be limited to two or
three infantry battahons and aeroplanes. Artillery should
not be sent as it would be difficult to evacuate and, moreover,
the Turks attacking there were said to be short of guns. As
regards Krasnovodsk, where the reports both as to water and
supplies were not reassuring, he asked whether he or General
Malleson was to send a detachment of infantry. He hoped
that he would not be ordered to send artillery, which could
only take its equipment ammunition with it, as he already
had too little ammunition on the spot to meet the contingency
of a Turkish advance southwards from Urmia and Tabriz,
where they were then concentrating. He assumed that General
Malleson would be responsible for supplies at Krasnovodsk from
the local resources of Trans-Caspia.
In his opinion, the vital factor was either the complete
control by us of the Caspian shipping, or the maintenance
of such friendly relations with the fleet as would give us the
use of shipping to meet our requirements ; and he hoped that
General Dunsterville would be able to arrange this by other
measures than force. With shipping available, arrangements
could be made to bomb the Baku oil fields and to prevent the
movement of Bolsheviks from Astrakhan to Krasnovodsk. But,
without the means of evacuating Baku, any attempt to destroy
the oilfields would appear to be inadvisable. It was also to be