'Report and Proceedings of a Sub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence on the Baghdad Railway, Southern Persia, and the Persian Gulf' [‎16v] (37/332)

* Appendix 2.
16
First Meeting, 2nd March, 1908.
. Sr f. E * . Grey : We should not mind especially about that. The Turks have
claimed it nineteen times; but in 1871 they said they had no intention whatever of
obtaining supremacy over Bahrein.
Mr. Morley : But that is not the same thing as acquiescence in our supremacy.
Mr. Lloyd-George : If the man on the spot agrees that you can act as his deputy
it should be all right.
Mr. Morley : The Sheikh, you mean.
Mr Lloyd-George : Yes. If he parts with his jurisdiction to the Representative
of the Indian Government, I think we can say : “ It is none of your business.”
Sir E. Grey : I do not think we should take any steps about this.
General Nicholson : \Ye should not admit that he parted with it, because that
would laise an international question, lie would say : “ I delegated all my powers.”
Mr. Lloyd-George : les ; we could exercise jurisdiction on his behalf.
Si r L. Grey : It is not a thing that the r I urk would take any trouble about, and
as to protests, he protests against everything. Me have exercised Consular jurisdiction
over the Bahreinese in L urkey, and he has recognized that apparently.
Sir C. Hardinge : Yes, he has.
Sir E. Grey : We have always done it.
Mr. Morley : I am only thinking that we must look forward to a time when a
pretty stiff controversy may arise about the Gulf, in all its aspects, between us and
perhaps two great European Powers, certainly one, when every point that can be made
against us will undoubtedly be made.
Sir E. Grey : I he point with Germany would be, of course, whether this Treaty
of 18b0, or the previous Treaty with the Sheikh, means really a Protectorate, or whether
it does not.
. ^ R - Morley : I only meant that we have got to be prepared for all the points
being taken.
. Sm E - Grey : As we have got a Treaty with the Sheikh which prevents him
having any correspondence whatever with the German Government without our
consent, I think that is quite enough ground for us to say to the Germans that any
correspondence they want to have with Bahrein must go through us.
Mr. Morley : I was thinking of the German operating on behalf of the Turk.
The Turk says he has always had a sort of status, and he might have—and to-day very
likely would have Germany at his back ; so that this wretched Bahrein, in that case,
w T ould bring us very close to serious international questions. That is only one of the
many effects of the Baghdad Railway.
Lord Esher : Do we rely on the Treaty of 1880 only, or on the Treaty of
1861 as well?
Sir R. Ritchie : M e rely on them all, but the Treaty of 1880 is the most explicit.
77. Lord Esher : Do you think that we should exercise wider judicial powers
under the Treaty of 1861 than we do actually exercise—I am referring to p. 146. #
Sir R. Ritchie : It would be regularising those important judicial powers.
General Nicholson : The functions of the court are given on p. 144.*
78. Lord Esher : Under the Treaty of 1861 do you think he could exercise wider
judicial powers than he actually has exercised ?