Manuscript of Persia and the Persian Question (Continued) [‎300r] (599/690)

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ig the respective policies of Ifcissria
in Persia, l^am approaching' an in-
ifnatiojKl question of some delicacy, whic
wi 14"-Ho my wulearour tu luindio fairly and
wvPJT justice to those whoso interests in feiwt
-etmnfery undoubtedly clash with our own. I shall
put out of recollection the fact that Russia has to
a considerable extent usurped the position, power,
and prestige at the Persian Court, which in the
earlier years of this century were exclusively in
English hands, because I conceive that the trans
formation, upon which our rivals are entitled to
congratulate themselves, so farfrom being a ground
for legitimate offence, is a condition of affairs for
which our own policy, weak in its conception and
calamitous in its results, has been mainly respon
sible ; and that to cry over spilt milk is as futile
an expedient in politics as it is in any other walk
of life. It is sufficient to admit that the succes
sive conquests of Russia, and her subsequent
policy, pursued in Persia with much industry, if
with no superabundant scruple, have placed her
in a position where she exercises a powerful con
trol over Persian affairs, and requires to be con
sulted in any readjustment of Persia’s political re
lations. More to my immediate purpose will it be
to discuss the extent to which that control actually
or in prospect amounts, and the designs which it
is beyond question that it is to be utilized to pro
mote.
A
FirstLthen, as to Russia’s claims and preten
sions in Persia. I venture without fear of con
tradiction upon the statement that these are dis
tinctly, and in parts avowedly, hostile. Surveying
the history of the present century, we see that,
piece by piece, partly by open war and partly by
furtive nibbling, Russia has appropriated more
and more of Persian soil. By the Treaty of Guli-
stan, in 1813, she acquired from Persia the pro
vinces of Georgia, Imeritia,Mingrelia, and Persian
Daghestan, Shirvan, Ganjeh, Karabagh, parts of
Talish, and the ports of Derbent and Baku, while
Persia was prohibited from maintaining any armed
vessels upon the Caspian. In 1828, by the Treaty^,
of Tur^omanchai, besides conhrming these eon- '
quests, she gainedErivan, IS[aJv|chi|van (including
the Armenian religious centre, Etchmiadzin), as
well as a war indemnity of nearly £4;000,000.
Since then it is true that no open hostilities have
occurred between the two countries ; but the pro
cess of territorial absorption has continued under
the cover of an amicable alliance, and is being
stealthily pursued at this very hour. In the course
of the Shah’s recent visit to Europe I observed
that some too flattering courtier congratulated his
Majesty upon not having lost or ceded one inch
of Persian soil during his long and, on the whole,
meritorious reign. This compliment must have
caused the Shah an inward twinge. Did he, per
haps, remember that in 1869, when the Russians
occupied Krasnovodsk and Balkan Bay, he had
protested against the act as a violation of Persian
territory ? And if this could becontendedof those
places, how much more would it hold good of
tCbliikishliar and Ashurada ? Even if it bo ad
mitted that the Persian sovereignty over Merv was
but a shadowy claim (though it has been more
than once acknowledged by the Tekkes themselves),
yet it is beyond question that the Transcaspian
conquests of Russia have transferred many Persian
villages to Russian hands. The pastures of the
Atek, lying below the Kopet Dagh, the villages of
Kaahka, Mehna, Chacha,and Dushak, the position
at Sarakhs—all these were once Persian property,
but are so no more. In my kifctero from Khorasan
I showed thht the erosive process is still going on,*
and the Persians have more than once complained
of the too liberal interpretation of the Akhal
Boundary Treaty of 1881, by which the Russians
have included within their border the Persian
territories of Kulkulab, Germab, and Kelta Chinar,
and are daily appropriating more and more of the
head waters of the mountain streams. These
movements are typical of a policy which may
temporarily content itself with such small pick
ings, but whose ambition ranges over a much wider
ultimate horizon,
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