مجموعة ١١١/٢٨ "بلاد فارس. كرمانشاه - يوميّات سياسية." [و‎‎١‎٠‎٨] (٧٥١/٢١٦)

-4-
July irom 14 rialo to 24 rials > r batman* The stssaiiJfL&xX&Ju&
officials and >olice do not stop unauthorised wheat
either from coming into the town, or Irora illicitly leaving the
aistrict for less rich aua more i.'®rvous areas beyond Hamadan,
often it is said on British-coutrolled U.h.C.G* lorries.
iv;. Whatever regulations Dr* Uillapau^h may issue, it is
ailiicuit to see how they can be applied by any oi the present
w type of Iranian official, whether civil, police or military.
U^:J •! wilat ws ® needed was a score or more Englishmen a couple of months
ago to give some bac bone to the rclimiaaries o£ wheat—collection,
Our inability to spare these from the large lorces in the Middle
East for a few weece only may perhaps mean that we may have to
spare several sorely—needed cargo ships for many mouths bringing
American grain lor the Persian towns as before while the country—
siae bulges with hidaen and sometimes rotting foodstuffs. Many
Persian notables here are already sayi.^, whether with honest or
di-shonest intentions, that whatever the present harvest may be
ll<ce, the 1944 harvest must be a failure. Besides the ground
being tired after this year*a enormous crop, they say that there
I will be no farm animals left among the peasants to till the
ground this autumn for next simmer's crops. M< n$r oxen died
last winter owing to the artificial shortage of ana high irices
for barley and fodder, or were slaughtered for food. Prices
for the remaining animals rose to unheard-of levels, so that the
improvident and short-sighted peasants a id smallhqu e rs were
induced to sej.1 all their cattle, including draft animals. Thus
only the already rich and powerful landlords owning scores of xUdba
villages (some own a hundred or more) will now have beasts. Is
Persia to become a country of latifundia, or will the social
outbreaks following on social degradation (already intolerable
enough even to the most casual foreign observer) which RoaBan or
Russian history warns one are inevitable occur first? Allowing
for changed and difficult world conditions, even a perfunctory
glance at Plowden (1*385) or Rabin© (1906) will show how dis-
quietingly this part of Iran has declined in fertility, agri
cultural yield, revenue, size and number of villages and rural
population. A quarter of an hour , s visit moreover to a place
like bhahabad, where the moael buildings ana houses put up by
the ex-Shah a dozen years ago are falling into desolate decay
or have been violently pulled to pieces, and famished beggars
swarm in one of the most fertile s dts in Iran, or even ten
minute's walk through the main street of squalid and unlovely
•\ Kemanshah emid its magnificent natural surroundings, will
present anyone with a picture beside which Goldsmith's "Deserted
^ Village" would seem like a prosperous American tourist-resort's
illustrated brochure.
oOVi./J ACTIVITIES.
11. The Soviet Consulate remains still in chai*ge of a
Vice-Consul named Ceerov, who does not im iress one ..uch. He
has been recently to Khurramabad and Pizful, but the excursions
into Kurdistan appear to have ceased. The various clerks and
secretaries otill prowl around the lesser purlieus of the town,
but their connection with the Tudeh or any radical movement
seems very slight. They obviously watch very closely however
the manner in which the blind and greedy richer classes here are knc
knocking away the social foundations and inevitably bringing
nearer catastrophe for the country and themselves. There were
rumours at the end of June that Soviet forces from -zerbaijan
haa occupied Saqqiz but these were not afterwards substantiated.
People from that district say that a lot of cattle aiid sheep
have been leaving Kurdistan for the Russian-occupied' zone.
GENERAL . 12/