Papers written by Curzon on the Near and Middle East [‎42v] (84/348)

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officials. I reminded him that, over and over again during the past six months, he
had come to me and made protests—as I alleged, and indeed had demonstrated, without
any sufficient foundation—concerning the supposed intrigues of British officers and of
the British in general against the interests of the French in Syria ; and he had
repeatedly urged that the French should he allowed to take charge of Cilicia and
Syria, where they not only had traditional interests of great importance, but where *
they would be warmly welcomed by the people. Over and over again I had informed
him that this confident prediction on his part did not tally with the facts as they had
been reported to me; that, on the contrary, I had every reason to believe that the
French were regarded with no sort of favour by the peoples of the territories concerned ;
and that their appearance on the scene, so far from producing peace or harmony, would
result in grave disturbances. The Ambassador had consistently disputed the validity
of these warnings. Only a few days before, at a meeting of the Allied Conference,
M. Berthelot had assured me that the Emir Feisal had gone back to Syria with a signed
agreement with the French Government, to which they were convinced that he would
be loyal and to which he had pledged himself to secure the adhesion of his countrymen.
I had replied that our information was quite to the contrary, and that, so far from an
agreement having been concluded which the Emir had pledged himself to carry out, he
had merely accepted an agreement subject to submission to his countrymen, and had
never attempted to commit the latter to its acceptance. M. Berthelot had entirely
disputed my account of what had passed, had treated the matter as settled between
the French and the Emir, and had indeed presented to us for consideration the form of
French mandate for Syria to which he believed the Emir to have agreed, and which
should be the basis of discussion between ourselves with regard to the future, both of
Syria and of Mesopotamia. Now, I said, the truth of my prophecies and the small
foundation for the French confidence had become apparent. As long as the British
were in occupation of Cilicia and Syria no trouble had occurred; nor did I believe that,
had they remained in occupation, recent events would have happened. In deference,
however, to the insistent pressure of the French Government, we had in November last
evacuated both Cilicia and Syria, not without warning the French Government of the
serious results that might ensue if they attempted to extend their military occupation
of the latter.
What had happened ? In Cilicia there had occurred the lamentable events at
Marash, by which had been placed in jeopardy not only the position of the French in
Cilicia, but the entire fortunes of the Allies in the Middle East. In Syria General
Gouraud had persisted in disregarding the warnings we had given him about any
occupation of the Bekaa, and he had created a sense of irritation in the Syrian people
which had culminated in the incidents we were now discussing. Thus the future of
France and Great Britain in those parts of the world was imperilled because of the way
in which the French Government, in pursuance of traditional or historical aspirations,
had insisted on forcing themselves into areas where the French were not welcomed by
the inhabitants.
I explained to M. Cambon that I did not make these statements with any idea of
uttering reproaches against the French Government, who had evidently been mis
informed ; but, inasmuch as by their action we had now been driven into a situation
which compromised us both, I felt it necessary to place on record that the responsibiliry
was not ours, but belonged in the main, if not exclusively, to the French. These
considerations would not, I said, deter me from acting loyally and steadily in accord
with them, as far as possible, to redeem the situation. But at least I wished to make
it clear that the present position had been brought about by a course of action which we
had foreseen, but which, owing to the pressure placed upon us by the French Govern
ment, we had been powerless to resist.
The Ambassador listened in silence to these remarks, and did not attempt to
dispute a single one of my propositions. Indeed, I cannot help thinking, from the
tenour of his previous conversations with me, that he recognised their essential truth.
Upon the main facts of the case we agreed, as I have said, to reaffirm our conten
tion that the fate of Syria could not be determined by an irresponsible body in
Damascus, but could be settled only by the Pvace Conference in London or Paris; and
we decided to repeat the invitation, which had appeared in my earlier telegram, to the
Emir Feisal to come and state his case before the Conference in Paris.
I added that there was one special feature in the proceedings of the Damascus
Congress which concerned the British Government even more than it did the French,
it was that the Emir in addition to the inclusion of Palestine in the area of Syria over
which he had been proclaimed King, appeared actually to have incorporated Mosul as