Possibilities in Syria
The importance of Syria is presumably being recognised by the War Cabinet, but some confirmation of the assumption would be reassuring The position in that highly important strategic area, so far as is known, is that an administration still recognising Vichy, but containing a number of officials sympa- thising strongly with General de Gaulle, is still in control; that an Italian Armistice Commission is on the spot, but compelled to move discreetly owing to the great hostility it arouses; that the Arab population, which after all matters a great deal more than the relatively small body of Frenchmen administering what was the mandate, is restive and apprehensive, and radi- cally opposed to any kind of Italian overlordship. Syria lies between Turkish territory and Palestine, and it would obvi- ously be of the greatest strategic value if it came under Allied control, thus enabling direct geographical contact to be established between British and Turkish territories.. Only firm and resolute action, and a policy calculated to commend itself to the Arabs, could achieve that, but there is no reason at all why such action should not be taken. British forces, co- operating with General de Gaulle, could secure possession of Syria without grave difficulty, and they should do so with the avowed and proclaimed intention of establishing Syrian inde- pendence, fortified by alliance with Britain and the new France; the advance to independence, as happened in Irak, was always implicit in the mandate. That change could not be- come effective till after the war, but the promise of it, with subjection to Italy as an alternative, would have decisive effects on the native population.
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