CHAPTER V

THE PASSING OF PERSIA

The weakness of the Ottoman Empire and of Morocco served to bring the colonial and commercial aspiration of Germany into conflict with other nations of Europe. The recent fortunes of Persia, the third--and only other--independent Mohammedan state, have also helped to make possible the general European war.

The first decade of the twentieth century brought about in Persia, as in Turkey, the rise of a constitutional party, which was able to force a despotic sovereign to grant a constitution. The Young Persians had in many respects a history similar to that of the Young Turks. They were for the most part members of influential families, who had been educated in Europe, or had been sent into exile. They had imbibed deeply the spirit of the French Revolution from their reading, and had at the same time developed a narrow and intense nationalism. But to support their revolutionary propaganda, they had allied themselves during the period of darkness with the Armenians and other non-Moslems. As Salonika, a city by no means Turkish, was the _foyer_ of the young Turk movement, so Tabriz, {85} capital of the Azerbaidjan, a city by no means Persian, was the centre of the opposition to Persian despotism.

Young Turks, Young Persians, Young Egyptians, Young Indians, and Young Chinese have shown to Europe and America the peril--and the pity--of our western and Christian education, when it is given to eastern and non-Christian students. They are born into the intellectual life with our ideas and are inspired by our ideals, but have none of the background, none of the inheritance of our national atmosphere and our family training to enable them to live up to the standards we have put before them. Their disillusionment is bitter. They resent our attitude of superiority. They hate us, even though they feign to admire us. Their jealousy of our institutions leads them to console themselves by singling out and forcing themselves to see only the weak and vulnerable points in our civilization. Educated in our universities, they return to their countries to conspire against us. The illiterate and simple Oriental, who has never travelled, is frequently the model of fidelity and loyalty and affection to his Occidental master or friend. But no educated non-Christian Oriental, who has travelled and studied and lived on terms of equality with Europeans or Americans in Europe or America, can ever be a sincere friend. The common result of social contact and intellectual companionship is that he becomes a foe,--and conceals the fact. Familiarity has bred more than contempt.

The Young Persians would have no European {86} aid. They waited, and suffered. Finally, after a particularly bad year from the standpoint of financial exactions, the Moslem clergy of the North were drawn into the Young Persia movement. A revolution, in which the Mohammedan _mullahs_ took part, compelled the dying Shah, Muzaffereddin, to issue a decree ordering the convocation of a _medjliss_ (committee of notables) on August 5, 1906. This improvised Parliament, composed only of delegates of the provinces nearest the capital, drafted a constitution which was promulgated on New Year's Day, 1907. The following week, Muzaffereddin died and was succeeded by his son, Mohammed Ali Mirza, a reactionary of the worst type.

Mohammed Ali had no intention of putting the Constitution into force. A serious revolution broke out in Tabriz a few weeks after his accession. He was compelled to acknowledge the Constitution granted by his father. In order to nullify its effect, however, the new Shah called to the Grand Vizierate the exiled Ali Asgar Khan, whom he believed to be strong enough to overrule the wishes of the Parliament. The Constitutionalists formed a society of _fedavis_ to prevent the return to absolutism. At their instigation, Ali Asgar Khan was assassinated. The country fell into an anarchic state.

Constitutional Persia, as much because of the inexperience of the Constitutionalists as of the ill-will of the Shah, was worse off than under the despotism of Muzaffereddin. There was no money in the treasury. The peasants would not pay their taxes. One can hardly blame them, for not a cent of the {87} money ever went for local improvements or local government. Throughout Persia, even in the cities, life was unsafe. The Persians, no more than the Turks, could call forth from the ranks of their enthusiasts a progressive and fearless statesman of the type of Stambuloff or Venizelos. In their Parliament they all talked at once. None was willing to listen to his neighbour. It may have been because there was no Mirabeau. But could a Mirabeau have overcome the fatal defects of the Mohammedan training and character that made the Young Persians incapable of realizing the constitutionalism of their dreams? Every man was suspicious and jealous of his neighbour. Every man wanted to lead, and none to be led. Every man wanted power without responsibility, prestige without work, success without sacrifice.

It was at this moment that one of the most significant events of contemporary times was helped to fruition by the state of affairs in Persia. Great Britain and Russia, rivals--even enemies--in western and central Asia, signed a convention. Their conflicting ambitions were amicably compromised. Along with the questions of Afghanistan and Thibet, this accord settled the rivalry that had done much to keep Persia a hotbed of diplomatic intrigue like Macedonia ever since the Crimean War.

In regard to Persia, the two Powers solemnly swore to respect its integrity and its independence, and then went on to sign its death warrant, by agreeing upon the question of "the spheres of influence." In spite of all sophisms, this convention marked the {88} passing of Persia as an independent state. Persia is worse off than Morocco and Egypt. For one master is better than two!

Here enters Germany. For many years German merchants had looked upon Persia as they looked upon Morocco and Turkey. Here were the legitimate fields for commercial expansion. Probably there were also dreams of political advantages to be gained later. In their dealings with the three Moslem countries that were still "unprotected" when they inaugurated their _Weltpolitik_, the Germans had been attentive students of British policy in the days of her first entry into India and to Egypt. There were many Germans who honestly believed that their

## activities in these independent Moslem countries would only give them

"their place under the sun," and a legitimate field for the overflow of their population and national energy, but that it would also be a distinct advantage to the peace of the world. Great Britain and Russia and France had already divided up between them the larger part of Asia and Africa. In the process, Great Britain had _recently_ come almost to blows with both her rivals. If Germany stepped in between them, would this not prevent a future conflict? But the rivals "divided up." Germany was left out in the cold. It is not a very far cry from Teheran and Koweit and Fez to Liège and Brussels and Antwerp. Belgium is paying the bill.

The Anglo-Russian convention of August 31, 1907, was the first of three doors slammed in Germany's face. The Anglo-French convention of April {89} 8, 1904, had been an attempt to do this. But by Emperor William's visit to Tangiers in 1905, Germany got in her foot before the door was closed! In Persia there was no way that she could intervene directly to demand that Great Britain and Russia bring their accord before an international congress.

Germany began to work in Persia through two agencies. She incited Turkey to cross the frontier of the Azerbaidjan, and to make the perfectly reasonable request that the third limitrophe state should be taken into the _pourparlers_ which were deciding the future of Persia. Then she sent her agents among the Nationalists, and showed them how terrible a blow this convention was to their new constitutionalism. Just at the moment when they had entered upon a constitutional life, Great Britain and Russia had conspired against their independence, went the German thesis.

If only there had been a sincerity for the Constitution in the heart of the Shah, and an ability to establish a really constitutional _régime_ in the leaders of Young Persia, the Anglo-Russian accord might have proved of no value. But--unfortunately for Persia and for Germany--the Shah, worked upon skilfully by Russian emissaries and by members of his _entourage_, who were paid by Russian gold, attempted a _coup d'état_ against the Parliament in December, 1907. He failed to carry it through. With a smile on his lips and rage in his heart, he once more went through the farce of swearing to be a good constitutional ruler. But in June, 1908, he succeeded {90} in dispersing the Parliament by bombarding the palace in which it sat.

It would be wearisome to go into the story of the revolts and anarchy in all parts of Persia in 1908 and 1909. After a year of fighting and Oriental promises, of solemn oaths and the breaking of them, the constitutionalists finally drove Mohammed Ali from Teheran in July, 1909. The Shah saved his life by taking refuge in the Russian legation. A few days later, he took the road to exile. He has since reappeared in Persia twice to stir up trouble in the north. On both occasions, it was when the Russians were finding it hard to justify their continued occupation of the northern provinces.

Mohammed Ali was succeeded by his son Ali Mirza, a boy of eleven years, who was still too young to be anything more than a mere plaything in the hands of successive regents.

The civil strife in Persia gave Great Britain and Russia the excuse for entering the country. In accord with Great Britain, Russia sent an expedition to occupy Tabriz on April 29, 1909. Later, Russian troops occupied Ardebil, Recht, Kazvin, and other cities in the Russian sphere of influence. Owing to the anarchy in the south during 1910, Great Britain prepared to send troops "to protect the safety of the roads for merchants." This was not actually done, for conditions of travel slightly ameliorated. But Persia has rested since under the menace of a British occupation.

Every effort made to bring order out of chaos in Persia has failed. Serious attempts at financial {91} reform were undertaken by an American mission, under the direction of a former American official in the Philippine Islands.

The new American Treasurer-General would not admit that the Anglo-Russian accord of 1907 was operative in Persia. One day in the summer of 1911, I was walking along the Galata Quay in Constantinople. I heard my name called from the deck of a vessel just about to leave for Batum. Perched on top of two boxes containing typewriters, was a young American from Boston, who was going out to help reform the finances of Persia. I had talked to him the day before concerning the extreme delicacy and difficulty of the task of the mission whose secretary he was. But his refusal to admit the political limitations of Oriental peoples made it impossible for him to see that constitutional Persia was any different, or should be treated any differently, from constitutional Massachusetts.

From the sequel of the story, it would seem that Mr. Shuster had the same attitude of mind as his secretary. He refused to appoint fiscal agents in the Russian "sphere" on any other ground than personal fitness and ability. Russia protested. Mr. Shuster persisted. A march on Teheran to expel the Americans was threatened. Persia yielded and gave up the American mission--and her independence.

When Germany saw that the Russian troops had entered northern Persia with the consent of Great Britain, and had come to stay, there was nothing for her to do but to treat with Russia.

In November, 1910, when the Czar was visiting {92} the Kaiser, Russian and German ministers exchanged views concerning the ground upon which Germany would agree to the _fait accompli_ of Russia's exclusive political interests in Northern Persia, and the Russian military occupation. Satisfactory bases were found for an agreement between Russia and Germany concerning their respective interests in Persia and Asiatic Turkey. The Accord of Potsdam, as it is called, was made in the form of a note presented by the Russian Government to Germany, and accepted by her. Russia declared that she would in no way oppose the realization of the project of the Bagdad railway up to the Persian Gulf, and that she would construct to the border of Persia a railway to join a spur of the Bagdad railway from Sadije to Khanikin. In return for this, Germany was to promise not to construct railway lines outside of the Bagdad railway zone, to declare that she had no political interest in Persia, and to recognize that "Russia has special interests in Northern Persia from the political, strategic, and economic points of view." The German Government was to abandon any intention of securing a concession for a trans-Persian railway. On the other hand, Russia promised to maintain in Northern Persia the "open door," so that German commercial interests should not be injured.

The accord between Russia and Germany was badly received everywhere. France feared that Germany was trying to weaken the Franco-Russian alliance. Great Britain did not look with favour upon a recognition by Russia of German interests in Asiatic Turkey. The Sublime Porte felt that {93} Russia and Germany had shown a disregard for the elementary principles of courtesy in discussing and deciding questions that were of tremendous importance to the future of Turkey without inviting the Sublime Porte to take part in the negotiations. Turkey in the Potsdam accord was ignored as completely as Morocco had been in the Algeciras Convention and Persia in the Russo-British accord.

The Potsdam stipulations brought prominently before Europe the possible significance of Germany's free hand in Anatolian and Mesopotamian railway constructions. It also aroused interest in the possibility of an all-rail route from Calais to Calcutta, in which all the Great Powers except Italy would participate.

The trans-Persian and all other railway schemes in Persia came to nothing. Between 1872 and 1890 twelve district railway projects had received concessions from the Persian Government. One of these, the Reuter group, actually started the construction of a line from the Caspian Sea to the Persian Gulf. A French project for a railway from Trebizond to Tabriz had gained powerful financial support. All these schemes were frustrated by Russian diplomacy. In 1890, Russia secured from the Persian Government the exclusive right for twenty-one years to construct railways in Northern Persia. Needless to say, no lines were built. Russia had all she could do with her trans-Siberian and trans-Caucasian schemes. But she deliberately acted the dog in the manger. By preventing private groups from building railways in Persia which she would not {94} build herself, Russia has retarded the economic progress, and is largely responsible for the financial, military, and administrative weakness, of contemporary Persia. By the accords of 1907 with Great Britain and 1911 with Germany, Russia secured their connivance in still longer continuing this shameful stagnation. To this day no railroad has been built in the Shah's dominions.

Just a month before the outbreak of the European war, the boy Shah of Persia was solemnly crowned at Teheran. It was an imposing and pathetic ceremony. The Russians and British saw to it that full honour should be given to the sovereign of Persia. The pathos of the event was in the fact that the Russian and British legations at Teheran paid the expenses of the coronation. The Shah received his crown from the hands of his despoilers. A similar farce was enacted a little while before in Morocco. Turkey alone of Moslem nations remains.

The last effort of Persia to shake off the Russian octopus was made on October 8, 1914, when Russia was requested once more to withdraw her troops from the Azerbaijan. The Russian Minister at Teheran, without going through the form of referring the request to Petrograd, answered that the interests of Russia and other foreign countries could be safeguarded only by the continued occupation. To this response his British colleague gave hearty assent.

The importance of the passing of Persia is two-fold. It shows how in one more direction Germany found herself shut out from a possible field of expansion. Through the weakness of Persia, Great Britain {95} and Russia, after fifty years of bitter struggle, were able to come to a satisfactory compromise. It was in Persia that their animosity was buried, and that co-operation of British democracy and Russian autocracy in a war against Germany was first envisaged. The failure of the Persian constitutional Government was a tremendous blow to Germany. It strengthened the bases of the Triple Entente. For the events of 1908 and 1909 put the accord to severe test, and proved that it was built upon a solid foundation. The agony of one people is often the joy of another. Has Persia suffered vicariously that France may be saved?

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