TANGIER RECOVERED

Evening Star, Issue 25684, 7 January 1946, Page 2

TANGIER RECOVERED

LITTLE TRACE OF SPANISH RULE CHECKS ON RIVAL ASPIRATIONS (‘ London Times ’ correspondent in Tangier.V When the Spaniards were ousted at last from sole control of Tangier, which they seized in June, 1940, few of the local inhabitants were sorry to see them go. _ They went quietly, leaving little behind them except food, which for. the present Spain continues to supply to the International Zone, in spite of the prolonged drought and the difficulties it imposed on her own people. It must be acknowledged that this is a large gesture of conciliation which does her credit. On- taking over their former premises, the new administrators were informed that typewriters, telephone apparatus, and other movables had had to be scrapped shortly before. The fine municipal -water lorry was nowhere to be found in Tangier. Yet. such petty thefts were a slight price to pay for reinstatement (a greater was the profiteering that ensued during the transference of authority), and the very glibness of the excuse is in keeping with the artificial atmosphere of the place, which abounds in contradictions. A small cosmopolitan centre of strategic importance, Tangier is. a town without a country, a port without an adequate harbour, a barren promontory of Africa thrust towards the under-belly of Europe like a thorn about to pierce the flesh. It has been a cause of friction for a century, but never of open warfare between the Powers.

SPANISH BALANCE SHEET

The balance sheet of the Spanish usurpation makes brief reading. On this international city of native squalor and European squabbles it produced a negligible effect. In the course of five years buildings were planned, but only a school and a hospital were improved. Some Spanish residents frankly admit: “It’s a pity; we managed things badly, as usual.” The intruders brought with them peace, provisions, and the black market, order' without justice, the advantages of neutrality, and their various (kinds of police. They left the Mixed Court in being, and baked white bread of excellent quality. Otherwise Tangier became a replica, in miniature, of Spain. But already by tradition, geographically, if not legally, Tangier formed part of Spanish Morocco. .Spanish is the main language spoken, and the newspaper ‘ Espana ’ is the best of the local Press. Two-thirds of the European population of some 30,000 are Spaniards, who own half—that is, seven and a share—of the 15 banks in Tangier, and 60 per cent, of the industrial property; an economic interest amounting, in all, to about £10,000,000. These figures relate to the Spanish interregnum; but by the late eighteenth century Spain had long been dominant in Morocco, and Tangier ever since has presented to the visitor the threefold aspect of an Arab town, a. Spanish settlement, and a hotbed of international intrigue. There was Falangist gloating when Spanish-i Moroccan troops occupied Tangier in the name of the Jalifa, who is the Sultan’s Ambassador at Tetuan. But Spaniards in general were unmoved by this arbitrary violation of treaties which they were not alone in considering overdue for revision. They could argue that, with France defeated, the Low Countries overrun, and Britain at war with Italy, the international organisation had become unworkable, so that Spain saw no choice but to act in defence of her own security, which naturally depended on that of a near neighbour menaced by unrest within and by probable attack from abroad. Underlying this case, whether specious or not, was the old grievance that Spanish territorial ambitions across the Straits of Gibraltar are Invariably balked at one international conference after another, irrespective of the Government that is in power at home. Spanish propagandists now’ assert the provisional nature of the 1940 coupe de force. If so, Spain’s mistake surley lay in not avoiding humiliation by an expeditious withdrawal, instead of -waiting until she received the curtest possible notion to qut.

PAINLESS OUSTING

Still, it was a painless extraction, as it turned out, and one. could no more begrudge the French the triumph of their return in state, with the Mendub under the wing of the protecting Power, than one would seek to belittle the preponderant part they may be expected to play in the international administration of the zone. The prestige of France throughout her colonial empire has suffered too many blows for patriotic Frenchmen not to grasp this chance of soothing their hurt pride.. Unfortunately, however, with few and' honourable exceptions the French in Tangier during the war cannot be said to.have distinguished themselves in the cause of Allied liberty. No doubt as Vichy pensioners they had compelling reasons for their cautious attitude at the time, but these motives were unlikely to impress the Spaniards. It is no fault of the French, but of the German Armistice Commission, that the agriculture of their zone, which flourished under their perfect care, should now afford a sad contrast with the limited produce of the inferior lands allotted to Spain; Roles are temporarily reversed, and the Spaniards no longer need to envy their neighbour in the Atlas Mountains and beyond the Pyrenees. It must be granted, for instance, that the Moors, out of kinship, are apt to prefer the familiar hazards of Spanish misrule to a greater measure of political liberty and more systematic exploitation under the French. Because France holds the lion’s share of the spoils in North Africa, the Arab Nationalists consider her their chief foe. Though successful bargaining with the Kaiser’s Germany cleared the way, and the suppression of anti-European riots provided the pretext, the extension of French influence over the whole Shereefian empire virtually dates from an earlier start with the establishment of the Entente Cordiale. Indeed, since 1880 the race for supremacy in Morocco —or for economic equalitv—has been run in relays, with the Algeciras conference of 1906 and the London-Paris talks in 1923 marking the main pauses for discussion and compromise. Through a series of multinle or bilateral pacts stretching over 50 years, each nation closely concerned has shown greater diplomatic zeal in defence of its own interests than in service of the common ideal.

MERELY TOLERATED.

For example, there is still a strong tendency among Frenchmen to resent the existence within their protectorate of a Spanish enclave, which Britain also recognises less de jure than de facto. Whereas the United States has omitted