Coll 6/4(1) 'Asir: Assumption by Ibn Saud of control of internal administration of Asir.' [‎182r] (370/1104)

3
7. Before leaving the telegrams on pp. 7 to 13, two exchanged between Ibn
baud and the Idnsi may he noted. The latter’s, of the 28th October is brief and
asks why his nephew. Ah, had left Mecca. Ibn Sand’s long reply of the
29th October explains that Ah is a danger to his uncle and that therefore Ibn
baud was keeping him with him as one of his own sons and had taken him to
Riyadh.
8 . It was not until the 5th November, the day Jizan was attacked, that the
mission, comprising Sheikh Hamad Suleiman, Under-Secretary of Finance, and
Khalid Be\ A1 Qarqani, a 1 ripolitan exile, who is anti-Italian and has long had
friendly relations with the Idrisi, set out from Jedda to investigate the Idrisi's
complaints, although it seems probable from internal evidence that these
complaints had been made to Ibn Saud some time previously. It was not
until the 6 th November, the day Jizan fell, that the first reinforcements left for
the south, by car by way of Jedda and the coast road. It is a bad track and
some 450 miles to Jizan. At the same time Shereef Khalid-bin-Luwey set out
from I uraba for Abha, accompanied by a nephew of Ibn Saud, his sister’s son,
Abdul Aziz-bin-Musaid, and collecting tribal contingents under their war
standards on his way to an estimated total of about 5,000 camelmen. He
apparently did not reach Abha until the 25th November, or even later. The
crow-flight distance is 200 miles. About the 25th November a similar force left
Riyadh under the Amir Khalid-bin-Muhammad, eldest son of Ibn Saud’s elder
brother. From the 6 th November to the end of the month some 2,000 reinforce
ments continued to flow through Jedda, composed mostly of regular troops from
the town garrisons, but with some street-loafer mercenaries too, and accompanied
by several hundred lorry-loads of arms and ammunition. Some of the earlier
contingents went by dhows and two Government launches, and one of the last by
a specially-chartered German ship, which spent ten days for its pains on a reef
off Jizan. On the 17th November the coastal corps retook Jizan, also Sabya. On the
23rd, there seems to have been a general counter-attack by the rebels, of the results
of which reports are still very contradictory. The revolt, meanwhile, seems to have
become widespread and general, and the Saudi columns have made very slow, if
any, progress. The last communique, dated the 9th December and attached atp. 22 ,
stated that the column “ charged with the liquidation of any vestige of insur
rection in the coastal region of Asir " was then at full strength and at Jirzan
and Sabya; there are, I think, no more regular troops that can be spared, the
last contingent of all which passed through Jedda in early December having been
composed of tribesmen from Nejd. The communique placed Shereef Khalid-bin-
Luwey still at Abha and stated that letters had been sent to all the tribes and the
Idrisi himself, inviting them to surrender within six days. In spite, therefore,
of the tenor of the telegrams exchanged between Ibn Saud and the Idrisi and
given on pp. 14 to 17, the latter had consistently been deceiving Ibn Saud, had
made his hay while the sun shone, and was still at large. The communique made
no mention of the force from Riyadh under the Amir Khalid-bin-Muhanunad.
Such information as I have regarding it is non-official, though reasonably reliable.
1 am inclined to think that it may be the nucleus of a much larger Nejdi force
destined to strike at Sana from the east if and when the Imam Yahya shows his
hand.
9 . The last point to which I would draw attention in this despatch is the
curious exchange of telegrams between Ibn Saud and the Imam Y ahya, repro
duced on pp. 18 and 19. The Imam’s telegram of the 15th November was either
very corruptly received or has been rewritten for publication, for its Arabic is
poor and ungrammatical and is well below his normal standard. 1 he Imam tells
Ibn Saud that the Saudi Governor of Jizan had taken refuge at Midi whence
he had given orders that he should be driven out. The next issue of the t mm a -
Qura tries to put things right by explaining that the telegram was corrupt an
that what the Imam had really said was that the Idrisi had taken at 1 J*; 1 ’
and that he (the Imam) had given orders that the Saudi Amir should, it possible,
be released; which explanation holds no water, for Jizan was not retaken un i
two days after the Imam sent his telegram, if its date is conecthy given, o i i
£» T »n fuk otiil in iVip THrisi’s hands. Be that as it may. tne
Imam goes on to preach patience to Ibn Saud reminding nim inai nasue i* m uir
devil, and warning him against the “ deceits of foreigner^, with speeia men ion
of the fate of four places which the French now hold, fez, Tunis, Algiers an