Miscellaneous correspondence, reports, maps and other papers concerning the Middle East [‎42r] (84/220)

[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty’s Government.]
EASTERN.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[170193] No. 1.
Copy of Letter from Lord R. Cecil to M. Pichon covering Draft Memorandum.
Dear M. Pichon, Paris, October 8, 1918.
IN reference to the affairs of Syria, of which you snoke to me to-day, I have great
pleasure in sending you the annexed memorandum, to which the Prime Minister agrees.
It has not yet been approved by the Cabinet, and until that has taken place it must be
treated as to that extent provisional.
Yours very sincerely,
ROBERT CECIL.
[October 8.]
Section 1.
Memorandum.
His Majesty’s Government are prepared to accept the arrangement reached at the
conference held at the Foreign Office on the 30th September upon the understanding
that it is to be treated solely as providing for the situation caused by the recent advance
of General Allenby’s force into Syria, and is to be deemed to refer only to the territories
occupied, or to be occupied, by that force.
With regard to the future government ot the other territories mentioned in the
Anglo-French Convention of L916, His Majesty’s Government think it right to point
out that the general position has so much changed since that agreement was entered
into that its provisions do not in all respects appear suitable to present conditions. Not
only has the military position in Mesopotamia, Palestine, and Syria completely altered,
but two political changes of vast importance have taken place. The United States
have come into the war and Russia has gone out. It is manifest, on the one hand, that
America cannot be ignored in any settlement of the future of these countries,
and particularly of Syria and Palestine. And, on the other, the arrangements
contemplated for the north-eastern part of Armenia have been completely upset by the
collapse of Russia. A further difficulty is caused by clause 9 of the Treaty of London,
which recognises the claims of Italy in connection with the Eastern Mediterranean.
The provisional suggestions made at Saint-Jean de Maurienne for meeting these claims
have lapsed, and, indeed, would in any case be difficult now to enforce without protests
from Greece and even from Turkey. While calling attention to these points, His
Majesty’s Government feel it would be useless to attempt a settlement of them at the
present moment, and they suggest that they should form the subject of fresh conversa
tions, in which the Governments of Italy and the United States as well as the French
and British Governments should be invited to take part.
Paris, October 8, 1918.
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