File 3874/1908 'Railways:-Trans-Persian Railway.' [‎104v] (210/536)

financial side of the scheme, which, instead of being a great economic undertaking not
requiring any special sacrifice from the Russian Imperial Treasury, would come near
the category of expensive political designs. The right thing would be to construct the
(whole) line together, admitting one other element, the French, which would be most
useful both for balancing the others and from the purely financial and technical
points of view. Perhaps it would be possible to give a certain share to the Persians
themselves in connection with their indebtedness to Russia and to Fngland. • • • •
It is very probable that the French participators in the scheme would agree to leave
their share in the profits of the construction of the line to the Russian factories which
live on French capital. 0 . x ,
The same might be said of Russian fuel, m which English capital is so strongly
interested The making of a directhne through Persia will help to better our
relations with Persia, giving to our international position in that country a stability
which could not be destroyed by any new political combinations. Persia will become
convinced that Russia is not returning to her former policy of hindering the construction
of railways.
Northern Persia has long been a useful market for our export, which was guarded
from competition by two measures : (a) prohibition of the transit of foreign goods
through Batoum, which cost us more than 150,000Z. yearly ; and (b) the preventing of
the railway construction (in Persia) The making of the Anglo-Russian agiee-
ment has made it quite possible to create railway and steamboat communication, both
for the English in their sphere of influence, and perhaps for others in the neutral
Z one From Constantinople our Persian market is threatened simultaneously by
the railway from Trebizond to the Persian frontier, and by a series of branch-lines from
the Bagdad Railway, of which the chief is from Bagdad to Khanikin, and on to
Kermanshah and Tehran, So, to think that we shall always be able to keep our
Northern Persian market under a glass case of preventions and abstention from
railway construction is to refuse to take account of events So the right thing
is, independently of the world-wide importance of the line, ourselves to go right into
Persia, and not to wait passively till foreign goods, coming in from three sides, destroy
our monopoly. Apart from that, only by developing the prosperity of Persia can one
increase the capacity of the Persian market, which is at present very limited. Another
class of interests which can be affected by the project is the English steam-ship
companies, especially the P. and 0., which carries the Indian mail At present
the post takes twelve-and-a-half days from London (via Brindisi) to Bombay. If a land
route cut this down to six or seven days, then of course the steam-ship companies
would have to sacrifice their interests to an evident Imperial advantage (for
England).
It is on this ground (reasons of State) that the Russian Consortium insists on the
quickest possible realisation of its project, which is favoured by the change in the
political conditions, and by all the circumstances of the present, and, lastly, by the clear
proofs that by the force of things, if we delay, the plan will be executed without us,
outside our frontiers, and even in spite [of us 4 5 6 In a few years—from four to
seven—the Bagdad Railway Company, that is the German Bank, will bring its line to
Bagdad. 7 It is self-evident that after this will arise the question of extending
this line (the Khanikin branch) into Persia—if only the question is not settled earlier,
and if the German Bank does not decide to proceed wifh this branch simultaneously
with the Bagdad Railway (main-line), which would of course considerably shorten the
period within which the present project can be realised.
How to realise the project. . . . First, we must here notice the important services
rendered to the Empire by the late engineer of State Railways, S. E. Palashkovsky,
who died in 1910 He stood for a line from Baku to Tehran, and on to the
Bay of Chakhbar, on the Indian Ocean.
.... Later projects, connected with the investigations of twelve years ago,
conducted by the engineer Sakhansky, entertained, besides the above, two other
directions : (a) Tehran to Bushire, and (b) Tehran to Bunder Abbas But now
the question is not of making a line which can attract transit and later he developed,
4 M. Kokovtseff, it appears, approves of this idea. If the Persian debts are to be converted, England
and Russia will both be concerned in the matter, and the occasion might be taken to interest Persian capita
to some small extent in the railway scheme.
5 Opinion of M. Pechkovsky and of M. Bunge.
6 Underlined in the original, but printed in italics.
7 The Bagdad line has reached Konieh.