Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 31, 1920. MESOPOTAMIA: ASQUITH'S DISSENT

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 77, 31 March 1920, Page 4

Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 31, 1920. MESOPOTAMIA: ASQUITH'S DISSENT

Among the new facts revealed by the rhetorical contest of the Liberal leaders at the National Liberal Club is the development of a, difference of opinion— perhaps of policy—on the subject of Mesopotamia. The cabled report of Mr. Asquith's speech contained no reference thereto, but Mr. Lloyd George is reported as expressing' disagreement -with "Mr. Asquith's suggestion that British interests in Mesopotamia should be restricted to the zone of Basra." The inference is that the leader of the Independent Liberals has advocated, tentatively if not firmly, a retirement from Mesopotamia, from the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates, to the country nearer the Persian Gulf—the country through which runs the Tigro-Euphrates confluent riv«r, the Shatt-el-Arab, towards the mouth of which is situated Basra fßussorah). To this Mr. Lloyd George, as leader of the Majority Liberals now in coalition- with the Unionists, replies that "our idea ia to remain as mandatories over territory which will include Mosul, in order to assist the Arab Government"; also that "almost all the tribes are anxkms that British government should remain." Mosul is on the Tigris, hundreds of miles inland from the Persian Gulf; Mosul may be said to be the interior outpost of Bagdad—in fact, of Mesopotamia—and the bastion against the attacks of Kurds and other mountain tribes who, from the Taurus heights, have for centuries raided tho cultivable lower lands of Meso potamia. Whoever holds Mosul must be always prepared for possible trouble from the Taurus, or Armenia, or even Azerbaizan, or Persia; yet it is difficult or impossible to hold Mesopotamia without holding Mosul, because Mesopotamia is an open alluvium with few natural defences. The alternative to an occupation of Mesopotamia, including Mosul, seems to be a withdrawal to the Shatt-el-Arab—or, as it is phrased in the cablegram, to the Basra zone—for the limited purpose of!covering the delta and the Persian Gulf, which latter is not only the terminus of the important Bagdad railway, but the* key to the Persian oil fields.

One argument advanced for the limited occupation, suggested by Mr. Asquith, j is that it covers the essentials ■of j strategy. It secures the Persian Gulf against the establishment there of a j foreign stronghold, which security is j essential to the British Empire, for if there had been an enemy' sallyport oh the Gulf during the war, the- Indian Ocean might have been as unsafe for shipping as the Atlantic, and the seapolicing task of the Navy would have been vastly increased. In fact, even a submarine station on the Gulf, in touch with the Bagdad railway—the terminus of which will be either the river-port Basra, or the Gulf port Koweit—would menace the Bed Sea route and would discount the value of the Suez Canal. Mr. Asquith may possibly contend that it is not necessary to go to Mosul, to go to Bagdad, or to go farther than Basra in order to keep enemies off the Gulf, and to keep open the outlet for the Persian petroleum that is so important to the fighting value of the modern oil-burning fleets. A Persian Gulf occupation, as opposed to a Mesopotamian and Persian occupation, would be claimed by its advocates to be cheaper in men and in money, since it would avoid contact with the most dangerous of the turbulent tribes, and the policing area would be comparatively small and in close touch with the sea, which is the bountiful cradle of British power. Against this, Mr. Churchill will no doubt contend that aerial tactics have reduced policing expenses, and that the parallel case of Egypt and the Sudan is an argument against a limited occupation. If occupation did not stop at Alexandria and Cairo, why stop at Basra; and if the British in Egypt went to KhaTtoum, why not to Mosul? To this Mr. Lloyd George will add—has already added—the plea that Mesopotamian government needs a strong hand and that the Arabs desire the British to stay.- And that plea, admittedly carries weight, provided that it is certain that the Arabs, or a majority of them, sincerely welcome British administration, and can be permanently reconciled to its impartiality and discipline. In this connection one of the chief elements of uncertainty is ths lack of cohesion among the Arabs themselves, their inter-tribal ■hostilities, and their dislike of settled government. Obviously, the administrative occupa-. tion of the Tigro-Euphrates country presents a European Power with no small problem. But the same was tree of the land of the Nile; in the "eighties it was true of Egypt, and, in the 'nineties, of the Sudan. Again, the dawning Arab nationalism is certain to tax the diplomatic skill 'of any mandatory State, whose task will not be lightened by the sectionalism and the weak frontiers of Mesopotamia. But Egyptian nationalism, which has disguised sectional differences without terminating them, is equally a thorn,-in the side of government, yet Mr. Asquith does not propose to evacuate Egypt or to withdraw to a purely Suez Canal zone. In Egypt and the Sudan and "Uganda British authority has followed an historic river many hundreds *3f miles inlMidt to *hs. heart of a dark continent! through, burning delfts held

by warlike nomads. And the Government can say,.not unreasonably, that the Tigro-Euphrates project is no more adventurous, and that it finds on the Nile a precedent; which contention is defensible so long a« Mesopotamia does not come within effective range of a militant Bolshevism or of some great military State still to be built in the regions where Europe and Asia meet. But to say that is to say that the real problem ia wrapped up with the undisclosed future. Meanwhile, Mr. Asquith's note of dissent is important, and will be carefully indexed in the Chancelleries of Europe.