File 4535/1928 Pt 8 ‘ – PERSIAN GULF – QUESTION OF ESTABLISHMENT OF PROTECTORATES OVER KOWEIT, BAHREIN, MUSCAT, TRUCIAL COAST.’ [‎94v] (182/194)

20
The British are still looked upon as the rulers, and how indeed can it be
otherwise ? We make and unmake rulers, we appoint administrators and officials.
Every important point is referred to us—the question of landing charges, readmission
of the Dowasir, arrival of foreigners, visit of the sheikh to Qatar, &c.
49. Now* on reading the history of the last 100 years it is not difficult to see
how the present situation has come about, nor the causes of the difierences which
have occurred between the sheikh and the political agont, the difference of outlook
of Sheikh Isa and Lord Curzon.
50. In the course of putting down piracy we were bound to take an interest in
Bahrein affairs, for we could not allow the islands to fall into the hands of a foreign
Power who might allow it to be a centre of disorder. In 1843 we allowed the sheikh
to be ousted as we did not find him satisfactory, and he was replaced by us by another
who was equally unsatisfactory, and who finally fled in 1868. We then recognised
Sheikh Ali, who was killed by usurpers, whom we defeated and deported, and we
,then installed his son Isa in his place in 1869, and in 1923 we deposed Sheikh Isa
and again appointed his son to rule.
51. During all this time we have protected the State from outside encroach
ment, and since the sheikh wms put and kept in his place by our power we have
felt some responsibility for his internal administration and have felt that common
gratitude on his part must give us some rights of advice.
We have, however, always publicly insisted upon his independence and he has
imbibed the idea of the fact that he is independent.
52. But with an uneducated Arab tribesman independence means the power
to do many things of wffiich we do not approve. It means administering the islands
for the benefit of the chiefs of the tribe to which he belongs, it means—as it means
in many native States in India—the exploiting of the people for the rulers, it means
to a bigoted Sunni the treating of the Shiahs as people of an unprivileged class (as
we see to-day in Ibn Sard's country, 50 miles away on the mainland), it means justice
tempered with a consideration of the position of the ruling tribes, and to a man
of 60, as Sheikh Isa was when the first crisis occurred, it means an abhorrence of
all newfangled ideas. Thus the more we insisted, the more he felt his position
threatened, and the more he resisted. The trouble that came was bound to come if
we desired a clean administration and elementary justice.
Indeed Colonel Knox, knowing the type of man and the civilisation with which
we had to deal, pointed out when the reforms were made that it was inevitable that
the power should fall more and more into the hands of the political agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. , at any
rate for some years.
o3. But we have already had, in the past, our experience of trying to work by
merely advising, and the Government, not the political agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. , finally had to insist
on threats instead of advice.
Sheikh Hamad is a pleasant man but a weak one, and it is idle to pretend
that he and his brothers would not backslide. He has already shown that he is
very much liable to the influence of Ibn Saud and to other Arab influences. He has
stated that he looks to Ibn Saud as the great Arab ruler whom they would all wish to
please.
He, in a way, likes the British officers he meets, but he, like every other Arab
sheikh, would gladly be rid of us all and go back to his definite Arab w T ays amongst
his fellow Arabs.
54. The question then is what are we going to do, now that Bahrein is,
however little we may desire it or have desired it, administered as a British
province, for apart from the British employees, the Levy Corps is entirely Indian
and we have nearly completed a revenue survey carried out by Indian surveyors.
55. I am separately from this despatch submitting suggestions for the
reduction of the number of the British employees and we are doing all we can to
induce Sheikh Hamad to accept the responsibilities of the post which he holds.
56. the reforms which we have introduced are essentially Western in
ethics and m principle, and foreign to the Eastern mentality of an Arab sheikh.
To relax too much, to allow Sheikh Hamad his way, means to go through the
same grind through which we have come, and we cannot afford to-day, anv more
than m the past, to let Bahrein come under the influence of any other Power Eastern
or Western. It must be remembered that only in 1906, thirty-seven years after we
had put Sheikh Isa on the throne, and after we alone had kept him from annexation,
and notwithstanding our treaties with him, he had ideas of acceotino- Turkish
nationahtv. -