‏"ملخص الأحداث والتدابير الرئيسية التي اتخذها سمو نائب الملك اللورد كرزون من كيدليستون، نائب الملك والحاكم العام للهند في إدارة الخارجية. ‏I‏. يناير ١٨٩٩-أبريل ١٩٠٤. ‏II‏. ديسمبر ١٩٠٤-نوفمبر ١٩٠٥. المجلد IV. بلاد فارس والخليج الفارسي." [ظ‎‎٤‎٦] (٣٨٦/٩٧)

79
the chief of Gaih ; hut it is difficult to discriminate with certainty between the
results of this redistribution and those of the geneial internal disorganisation
which be°*an in 1897 and has since increased rather than diminished. The new
distribution had at least the effect of adjusting benefits in a more correct
proportion to responsibilities.
In 1901 Mir Mahmud Khan, brother of the chief of Dashtyari with whom
he was at war, entered on a course of hostility against the British Government;
he raided a number of villages in the neighbourhood of Chahbarand carried off
cattle belonging to British Indian subjects and to the British telegraph station.
In 1902 the British Legation remonstrated with the Persian Government on the
condition of affairs in Mekran, but the admonition passed unheeded; the
Persian officials continued to prey unchecked on the chiefs, the chiefs in their
turn to ravage their own territories and even to sell their subjects into slavery,
and the people at large to become impoverished and to emigrate. In 1904
Mir Mahmud Khan spontaneously assumed a more correct attitude towards
the British Government and was in the end recognised as joint ruler with his
brother of the Lashtyari district; but general lawlessness and oppression
continued unabated.
Meanwhile the settlement of British pecuniary claims was proceeding,
though slowly, being delayed at first by the apathy of the officials whom the
Persfan Government deputed to represent them, and by the obstructiveness of
the local chiefs without whose aid nothing could be accomplished. In 1899
and 1901 meetings took place between British and Persian officials and a
number of the outstanding cases were settled, but disposals did not keep pace
with the occurrence of fresh cases, and in 1904 the value of the unsettled
claims reached Bs. 82,000. In this year a third meeting of British and Persian
representatives was arranged at which cases to the value of Ks. 58,000 were
decided- In 1905 a fourth meeting was held and at the end of the year the
balance of claims undisposed of was Bs. 33,000.
We are now in a positron to estimate the results attained in the Persian
Gulf during Lord Curzon’s tenure of office. Attacks on the ascendancy
of Great Britain in the Gulf had begun with the visit of a Bussian
surveyor to Hormuz in 1895, but they did not become serious until 1898,
. , when the Prench attempted to establish
Political review of the period. a naTal ^ j n 0man Great imp etu»
was given to foreign rivalry by the Transvaal war of 1899-1902, especially
during its earlier stages when an erroneous anticipation of the future
position of Britain obtained general currency ; and these years accordingly wit
nessed preparations by Eussia for establishing a naval station in the Persian
Gulf and for constructing a railway across Persia to the sea, as well as the
foundation of a Bussian line of steamers and trading company and intensified
efforts by the French to push their influence in Oman. There were at the same
time uumistakeable symptoms that, in the Gulf, Russia and France were
actuated to some extent by a common policy. The manifestations of foreign
activity were accompanied by displays of naval force and were attended by a
general expansion of the Russian and German consular establishments in the
Gulf region.
As, however, the British Empire gradually and without loss of stability
emerged from the South African difficulty a revulsion of feeling appeared to set
in ; the more dangerous enterprises of Russia were suspended ; and eventually
little remained to differentiate the situation from that which had existed before
the crisis except the considerable mercantile undertaking to which the Bussian
Government had committed themselves and the increased consular establish
ments of that Power and of Germany. By the end of 1903 the tension in the
Gulf had completely relaxed.
The assault on British predominance had been energetically met and
repelled at every point ; nothing had been conceded even at the time
when the state of international politics was most favourable to the
adversaries of Britain ; and British activity continued unabated for a while
after the causes which had provoked it were withdrawn. The strategical posi
tion was examined from the Indian point of view and dispositions were made for