Papers of the War Cabinet's Eastern Committee [‎201v] (402/544)

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instance. There are territories in Africa and elsewhere which she wants to keep.
Our relations with France and the future settlement by the Peace Conference will not
be a matter that will be determined in parcels in different parts of the world, but will
be part of a great whole. Are we necessarily bound to assume, to order to purchase
her surrender of the Sykes-Picot Agreement, that we must give her a larger area in the
same part of the world ?
MR. BALFOUR : I am entirely of your opinion. We have got accidentally on to
this question of exchange. My earlier observations were not based upon the Sykes-
Picot Agreement or anything connected with it. The broader question you have raised
is going to be the great difficulty of this Conference, I am convinced. You say, Why
cannot we come to an arrangement with the French embodying everything ? That is the
one thing the French want. If I were to go to the French to-morrow and say, “ Will
you make common cause with us against everybody ; we will support everything you
want which does not affect our interests, and you must support everything which does
not affect your interests,” l have not a doubt that we should come to an agreement.
We should come to it at the cost of our own principles, probably ; at the cost of our
obligations to the Arabs, probably; at the cost of our friendship with America,
probably; and at the cost of our friendship with Italy, probably ; but it could be done.
I do not think it ought to be done.
LORD CURZON : I was not assuming that, of course.
MR. BALFOUR : No, but the result is : how are you going to start these things ?
If you picture to yourself going to the Conference, and the French say, “ Come and
have a talk with us,” and the Italians saying the same thing, and the Americans saying,
“ What we want is to have a whole-hearted interchange of ideas ” ; if you draw out
that picture with any accuracy of detail you will see what an extraordinarily difficult
position it is.
LORD CURZON : We must in any case have a talk with them over these areas.
MR. BALFOUR : I do not think we ought to start. If they come to us and say,
“ We do not like the Sykes-Picot Agreement and we are prepared to modify it,” I am
prepared to go on.
LORD CURZON : We have already said that.
MR. BALFOUR : And I think we could press them upon that.
LORD CURZON : I was not thinking of backstairs arrangements, but of having
all the pieces on the board at the Peace Conference with regard to the different parts
of the world. All the fate of the world is going to be settled by the adjustments
that will be made, and we may have the opportunity of meeting France on many
points.
LORD ROBERT CECIL : Difficulties of this kind will arise. When you go to
Paris to meet the Allies, I suppose one or other of them some day or other will say,
“ What about the Middle East ? ” Then somebody will turn to Great Britain and
say, f ‘What are your ideas about, the way it is to be arranged?” We shall have
to begin by saying that we are bound by the Sykes-Picot Agreement, and anything we
say must be subject to our obligations there. Apart from that, if we are to look at it
generally, as to what would be the best settlement there from every point of view
primarily for the peace of the world—and that is the way we must discuss it—what
we should say would be that we think it is impossible to split up the other countries;
the mandatory for one Arab country must contain all the rest; we do not see who
could do it except ourselves, and therefore it must be left to us. Similarly, there must
be one mandatory for Armenia ; you cannot split up Armenia ; we think that should he
France. 1 should leave out the whole of the Caucasian republics if I were doing it,
and say nothing about them. If they said, “ You have forgotten the Caucasian
republics,” I should say, “ As to that we should be glad to hear what is to be said, but
we feel there is a very great difficulty in asking France to undertake such a difficult
job as that. ’ We are there, and I should try to make such a case as I could, although
personally I think it would be a very feeble one. The French would say, “ We should
like to go to Armenia ; we should be coterminous with these people ; you ought to let
us do it.”
MR. BALFOUR : Let us step lightly over what you have discussed, and then go on
to your next stage. What would you say to the Italians ?