File 1341/1921 Pt 1 'Khorassan Intelligence Summaries 1921-1922' [‎391r] (429/1080)

Meshed .—The transference of the administrative control of Kborasan
from Gendarmerie to Persian Cossack officers may be considered to have been
effected during the week under report.
The Persian Government has exhibited considerable caution in dealing
with the situation arising from the recent rebellion, and rightly so, for there
has been an ever present danger of another leader arising who might sway the
existing armed force, and other malcontent elements, in the direction of a fresh
insurrection.
Fortunately, the Khorasan Gendarmerie, both officers and men, have
shown themselves to be so irresolute as to which side to turn their coats that
the operation of intruding the Tehran force into Meshed has met with no op
position. Added to this, the revolutionaries among the townsmen, those who,
as members of the Milyun party, tried to create disorder on approved Bolshevik
lines, those who put their names and seals to documents protesting against
Tehran’s nominated Governor-General and who demanded, instead, the incum
bency of Muhammad Taqi Khan and autonomy for Khorasan, those who wrote
and published vituperative and treasonable articles in the press and by means
of pamphlets, now find they are proscribed and their liberties, if not theh lives
in some danger. 1
xhe commencement of what is hoped will be a ruthless campaign against
all such traitors, libelling editors, revolutionaries, and disloyal officers, be^an
on the 4th-5th November and numbers are already under arrest. Many” of
these are those who put their names to the contumacious petitions aforesaid,
others are those who treated with the Bolsheviks for military assistance. Un
fortunately the list of those at present incarcerated shows too few of the mili
tary officers who engaged in treasonable warfare. The preliminary amnesty
offered to these may enable them to go unpunished.
It is to be regretted that the most culpable, the most treacherous of all
after Muhammad Taqi Khan, namely Major M.ahmud Khan Nauzari, remains
unscathed so far. His was the hand that penned, or inspired, the articles in
the “ Bahar ” and the posters vituperative of the Prime Minister and the
British. It was he who telegraphed to the Capital advising that no official
well disposed to British interests be appointed to office in Khorasan, and it
was a letter over his signature and seal which was brought to the British
Consulate-General wherein he asked assistance of Bolshevik organisations in
Transcaspia.
A Court consisting of four officers and two civilians has been convened to
try all political prisoners and has commenced its sittings.
There have been a few individual cases of tension between the two forces
—the Gendarmerie and Cossacks—but otherwise they are living together peace
ably enough. Measures are contemplated for absorbing certain of the
Khorasan Gendarmes into the Cossacks, for resuscitating the regular units
which existed previous to Muhammad Taqi Khan’s incursion into State affairs
and of raising Barbari units for service further west. At present everything
is inchoate with regard to military administration and the time is not yet when
changes and reorganization may be recorded.
Major Ismail Khan, Bahadur, author of the abortive coup d'etat of the
16th October has been sent from Birjand under arrest to Tehran.
Sedition ,—Two Turks, whose arrival from Baku was notified from Quchan
where they passed as Pashas, are under observation here. Their names are
AzizEffendi and Kazim Effendi. Another Turk calling himself Hussein
Bahimov, a member of the Baku and Tashkent International Propaganda
Departments, is also stopping in Meshed.
VO. in INDIA FOREIGN*
~ EC EE TAFuY’ S NO IOOM
DATED 15 th DEC .
Eec c. SrciJAN.