'SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS AND MEASURES OF THE VICEROYALTY OF HIS EXCELLENCY LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON, VICEROY AND GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF INDIA IN THE FOREIGN DEPARTMENT. I. JANUARY 1899-APRIL 1904. II. DECEMBER 1904-NOVEMBER 1905. VOLUME IV. PERSIA AND THE PERSIAN GULF.' [‎59r] (122/386)

Germany about tbe construction of the Baghdad Railway, as a flank defence
to the position of Great Britain in Southern Persia and the Gulf. In their
view, tae interests of Germany in Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. were
more likely to be antagonistic than favourable to our own, and no interna
tional combination could safely be looked to as a buttress to our influence
in that quarter. The question of the ultimate completion of the German Asia
Minor Railway to the Gulf had never been referred to the Government of
India for opinion, but they presumed that it was an accepted principle with
His Majesty’s Government that, should the line ever be continued south of
Baghdad, this could not be done without British co-operation and consent; and
that no terminal port could be selected without such consent and unless the
port were made open and international in character. Further, if these views
were also entertained by His Majesty’s Government, they thought that Germany
should be made acquainted with them, lest, when her railway reached
Baghdad, she might complain of having been kept in ignorance of British
policy and intentions.
The other alternative, namely, that of an agreement with Russia about
the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , the Government of India viewed with still less sympathy.
They favoured the fullest statement to Russia of our views and intentions;
but did not at present see either the material for a compromise or the necessity
for an understanding. The»'e was another respect in which the views that
the Government of India had been invited to discuss seemed to them to be
coloured by apprehensions in excess of the case. The situation which had
been contemplated in some quarters was one in which an attempt would be
made to occupy the whole of Southern Persia, within a line drawn from Seistan
on the east to Kermanshah on the west, by British U'oops, while these would
be confronted at a short distance by the forces of Russia, in similar occupation
of the north of the country. Stress had been laid upon the risks of a position
in which at least 50,000, and perhaps 100,000 British soldiers would jte required
to hold a long and in places indefensible frontier. Such ° situation seemed
unlikely to occur iu any of its features, and it w.is extremely improbable that
Rusda would ever he able to concentrate the great bulk of her forces in Persia,
as that country was unlikely to bee me cittier ti»c sole or the main theatre of
viar between Ru'sia and Great Britain.
The first necessity, in the opinion of the Government of India, was to
correlate the problem, both with the general tendency of Kussian policy in Asia
and with the facts of the Persian situatio i. The Asiatic history of Russia
during the past half century lent ro support to the theory that she desired to
annex Persia or to subvert the Pers an monarchy On the c mrrary, bet policy
everywhere, at Constantinople, at Tehran, at Khiva and Bokhara, at Lhasa, at
Peking, and at Seoul, was to support the reigning sovereign, hut to reduce him
to a state of vassalage to herself. M hat she had done in the Central Asian
Khanates, she would like to do in Persia. For these purposes it was necessary
that the unit with which she was dealing for the time being should be so weak
as to be dependent, bat not so weak as to fall absolutely to pieces It was
notorious that in Persia the pace at which the monarchy had of late been
advancing on the road to ruin was too fast to suit the designs of Russia, and that
the last thing which she desired was to precipitate a crisis.
No solution of the strategical problem would possess much value which was
arrived at without keeping these political considerations prominently in mind.
There -were two contingencies which Great Britain might have to meet.
The first of these was the advance of Russian forces across the Persian frontier
and the occupation of a single point, which might he Tabriz, Meshed or Tehran ;
the second was that of a sustained and simultaneous Russian invasion of the
whole of Northern Persia.
The probability of the first or smaller programme immeasurably exceeded
tbat of the second. The operation would not involve the smallest military
risk and the only ground that would permanently induce Russia to desist t rom
the ’undertaking would be the certainty that any such step would provoke a
retaliatory movement on our part, which would jeopardise the success of the