"تاريخ الحرب الكبرى استنادًا إلى وثائق رسمية: العمليات في بلاد فارس ١٩١٤-١٩١٩" [ظ‎‎٢‎٣‎٩] (٥٦٦/٤٨٥)

422
OPERATIONS IN PERSIA
Mahomedan Government of Azerbaijan (installed by the Turks)
and the Georgian Government were tyrannical and anti-
Russian, the result of years of corrupt, oppressive and incom
petent Russian military administration ; and any attempt to
restore these old methods would probably bring all parties
together into an intense opposition. An occupation by the
Allies and the restoration of order would not be difficult; and
moderate men of all parties accepted gladly the idea he sug
gested of a temporary coalition government for Azerbaijan, to
replace the existing Turkish-made Cabinet, which the Allies had
not recognised and with which he could not work. It seemed
advisable, he said, that Allied representatives should assume
early control at Tiflis of railways, telegraphs, posts, customs and
other civil services and accelerate the withdrawal of the Germans.
By the end of November, the evacuation of the Turks was
on the whole proceeding satisfactorily, though the Armenians
were taking advantage of their departure to massacre Tartars,
and the Turkish troops were taking with them much plundered
material and food stuffs which we had to take steps to detain
at Tiflis or Batum.
As soon as Baku had been occupied, arrangements were made
by Captain Washington to control and organise trade on the
Caspian under a shipping controller ; and the coasting trade in
the southern portion of that sea at once began to revive. To
the north, however, it remained limited. Towards the end of
November four of the British armed ships started on a sweep
to the north, from which they returned to Krasnovodsk early in
December, their cruise having asserted British control and put
heart into the pro-Ally Ural Cossacks. It was reported that
the Astrakhan Bolsheviks were arming ships and, with torpedo-
boat destroyers and submarines which had arrived from the
Baltic via the Volga, intended to establish an ice-free base at
Chechen with a view to operations against the British flotilla
and to the capture of Baku.
Trans- On the 8th December, two of the British armed vessels, a
C racn?in anchor in el fog off Chechen, being attacked by three Bolsheyi
North-West armed ships which were convoying three transports carrying
Persia ; Bolshevik troops, immediately weighed and accepted ba e.
A running fight ensued which lasted two hours and resul e i
the Bolshevik ships fleeing northward and escaping under cov
of the fog, one of them having apparently sustained serio
damage. This defeat by a force inferior b oth in ships an
* The armament of all the British ships was weak and they were a
short of British personnel.