'Seistan' [‎324r] (649/782)

attribute to them an exclusively Indian complexion. Ever since the first visit
of the late Shah to Europe, Persia has been drawn increasingly into the vortex
of European politics. Neither France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Holland, nor
Belgium own possessions contiguous to the Persian dominions. r i heir commercial
stake in the country is relatively small. Notwithstanding they find it to their
interest to maintain, what are in some cases costly and extensive, diplomatic
establishments at Tehran, and they occupy a minor, but nevertheless a definite,
position upon the local diplomatic stage. It is to be surmised, therefore, that,
even had British India not existed, or had it passed into other hands, the British
Government would nevertheless before now have been compelled to take an
active political interest in Persian fortunes. Persia is in fact one of^ those
countries which, whether or not they had fallen into the orbit of A\ estern
Powers, more vigorous than themselves, must inevitably have attracted the
attention of Europe, partly from their increasing infirmity, but still more
from the opportunities suggested by their latent, though neglected, sources of
strength. The two-fold British interest and responsibility here indicated have
indeed been recognised by the system, now of long standing, under which the
charges of the diplomatic establishment maintained by Her Majesty’s Govern
ment at Tehran are shared between the Imperial and the Indian Exchequers.
That such a division of common interest has become necessary, that the politics
of Tehran, which with one eye turned towards India looks with the other towards
St. Petersburgh and Constantinople, are but one aspect of the eternal Eastern
question, and that the control of British diplomacy at Tehran must therefore
be vested in the hands of Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,
are propositions which 40 years ago were hotly contested by certain schools of
thought, but that will not any longer be a matter of dispute. They serve to
illustrate the Imperial, as distinct from the purely Indian, character of Anglo-
Persian relations.
7. The strategical interests of Great Britain in Persia arise from conditions
with which India is most intimately concerned. Long before the boundaries
of British India had been extended to their present limits, or. before Ilussia
had become a great Central Asian Power, approaching or impinging at many
points upon the Indian frontiers, the fortunes of Persia, though not at that time
a coterminous country, had become a matter of vital concern to the British
dominion in India. In the early years of the present century, when the ambi
tions of France were the main source of apprehension, it was through Persia
that a blow at British supremacy was expected to be struck, and that an inva
sion of India w T as planned. The same idea has re-appeared at intervals since.
Now that the boundaries of Afghanistan, which have been demarcated and
guaranteed by Great Britain, march for many hundreds of miles with those of
Persia; that Persian territory is also coterminous for hundreds of miles with
Baluchistan, a State under a British Protectorate, and in large measure actually
administered by the officers of the Government of India;.and that the sea
which washes the southern coasts of Persia is one in which, both from its
proximity to the Indian Ocean and as a result of the exertions of the past century,
Indian interests and influence have become supreme—it is clear that Persia has
assumed a strategical importance, in relation to British India, which might not
be serious, were the resources or the designs of that country itself alone to be
considered; but which is indisputably great, when it is remembered that closely
pressing upon Persia and upon Afghanistan is the ever-growing momentum of
a Power whose interests in Asia are not always in accord with our own, and
that the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. is beginning to attract the interest of other and some
times rival nations. These conditions, however,‘while they indicate the supreme
concern -which those who are responsible for the government of India cannot
fail to feel in the fortunes of Persia, are nevertheless sufficiently obvious m
their general application to render it unnecessary for us to point out their
far more than local range, or to argue that they affect not merely the destinies
of British dominion in India, but those of the British Empire. It is from
this point of view that we hold strongly the opinion that Persia in its strategical,
no less than in its political, aspect is not only an Indian, but is also an Imperial,
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