THE NEED TO WITHDRAW FROM MESOPOTAMIA AND PALESTINE.
ALTHOUGH we feel happy indeed in the possession of the present Government when we compare their directness, simplicity and absence of prevarication with the tortuousness and the shallow but glittering promises of their predecessors, we can see that the danger of the present Government is going to be the disinclination to assert a very definite and prompt policy upon critical subjects. The motive of this disinclination is really meritorious ; it is a desire not to deceive people by dazzling forecasts, and not to distract the mind of the nation from the primary fact that recovery will come only by the hard work and concentration of a huge mass of indi- viduals. Nevertheless, in certain matters nothing but very decided leadership and a willingness to accept tremendous responsibility will suffice. If the Government can show us these things, as we believe they will, they will prosper and bring untold blessings upon the country. A matter in which the qualities we have described seem to us to be urgently required is the problem of Mesopotamia, which was debated in the House of Commons on Tuesday.
We are fully alive to the grave facts that we have accepted a mandate for Mesopotamia (even though that mandate has not yet been sanctioned in its final form by the League of Nations) and that long before the mandate was thought of we made distinct pledges to the Arabs during the War. But as we hope to be able to show, neither mandate nor pledges are really obstacles to our complete freedom of choice as to what we ought to do about Mesopotamia. In our opinion we ought to with- draw and to do so as soon as possible. In 'the spacious and affluent days before the War there might have been a hundred good reasons for staying in Mesopotamia, but to-day the one consideration which overrides all others is economy. We simply cannot afford a steady and deadly strain on our central resources when we are still at death grips with the demon of bankruptcy.
In whatever sense we may be said to be " responsible " for Mesopotamia, it is fair to say that we are fifty times more responsible for other and ancient commitments of the Empire. The greatest dereliction of duty of which we could be guilty would be to let the Empire wither at the head. We should then have betrayed not one interest llut an incalculable number. We need only remember the menacing condition of employment at home— the great army of unemployed, who even now cannot look' forward to any strong probability of employment for a long time to come—to recognize that we are living on a volcano. The way to end unemployment is to revive trade, and there is little prospect of a revival worthy of the name till we have economized much more on national policy, have reduced taxation and have again liberated enough capital to revitalize the feeble and irregular pulse of our industries. There is little doubt from Mr. Bonar Law's speech on Tuesday that he would like to withdraw from Mesopotamia. He would not commit himself, as he said that a decision must depend upon the Treaty of Lausanne, which is now being considered by the Grand National Assembly at Angora. His tendency as shown on Tuesday was, of course, nothing new. In his speeches at the General Election he heartily regretted that we had ever gone to Mesopotamia.
Now look at the enormous expenditure which we have already incurred in that disastrous country : an expendi- ture which seems likely to lead to much more, continuing into an indefinite future, if we do not call a halt. As Mr. Asquith pointed out, in the year 1919-20 we spent well over /70,000,000 ; in 1920-21, 140,000,000 ; and in 1921-22 considerably over £80,000,000. Altogether we have spent since the Armistice about £150,000,000. The grandiose scheme was to Indianize Mesopotamia. The palace built at Baghdad is the visible symbol of the dream. Every million which we have spent upon Mesopotamia is written in botched policies at home, in starved plans for rehabilitating our domestic equipment, in the terrible tale of unemployment. In Mr. Asquith's view we have already amply redeemed the pledges we gave to the Arabs—pledges that we would free them from Ottoman rule and do everything in our power to establish an autonomous Arab State. Some people who agree with the policy of withdrawal do not accept Mr. Asquith's assertion that we have exactly redeemed our pledges, but this does not seem to be a real difficulty, as we shall explain presently. Much less worthy of respect is the objection to withdrawal con- tained in the arguments that we have only to. go on spending more money on irrigation, and in developing, for example, the wool industry, to get back our money. Surely it is plain that such enterprises are a speculation, and that it is an obvious duty for a Government situated as ours is to avoid any kind of speculation. Another argument is that we could not give up the oil, but the oil is hypothetical, and we need not trouhle much about it, as Mr. Donor Law said that in framing our policy for Mesopotamia oil never counted : " There is no question of oil and never has been." The whole sense of the debate, in fact, was in favour of leaving Mesopotamia, though Mr. Bonar Law naturally could not accept an amendment to the Address, which is always in form a vote of censure, and therefore the Government majority of 106 in the division was natural and expected.
We must now look further at the questions of the mandate and of our pledges to the Arabs. We could not, of course, slip out of Mesopotamia without a word of explanation. We must regularize our position. In order to give up the mandate we should have to apply for relief to the League of Nations. In Article XXII.
of the Covenant it is provided : " That a permanent Commission shall be constituted to receive and examine the annual reports of the Mandatories and to advise the Council on all matters relating to the observance of the, mandates." These words, of course, cover the case of a nation which wishes to resign a mandate, for it cannot be supposed that any nation would accept a mandate in perpetuity without any hope of ever being able to disembarrass itself even under entirely chanced condi- Hons. Then as regards the Arabs themselves. All the evidence seems to show that they do not want us to remain in Mesopotamia. We admit that it might give us pause if the Arabs said : " We earnestly desire you to remain. We consider that you have not yet fulfilled your promises, and naturally we look to Great Britain to act with good faith." The attitude of the Arabs is quite different ; apparently they resent our intervention, and they deride the rule of King Feisul which we imposed upon them. As Mr. Asquith said, King Feisul is " a coupon King " ; his appointment was " the supreme and final trial of the coupon system." At present we are taxing the Arabs, and collecting the taxes with great difficulty, for things they do not want. Mr. Bonar Law used the word " negotiation " to describe the prelimin- aries of a possible withdrawal. We imagine that the League of Nations could not possibly refuse a request for relief, and that negotiation with the people of Mesopo- tamia would end in their joyful assent to our proposals.
Although the case of Palestine is different from that of Mesopotamia we cannot help coupling the names of the two countries. We sincerely advise the Government to give up both. It is true that on paper the accounts of the new State in Palestine show no loss and that the British troops which are at present maintained in Palestine would in any case have to be maintained somewhere. We are looking, however, at the future rather than at the present. So far as we can understand, the authorities in Palestine do not feel able to develop the country on the revenue which is at present available, and where more money is to come from is a problem as yet unsolved. But quite apart from the money question, which is not nearly so serious as that of Mesopotamia, we frankly dread what might happen in Palestine. The Jews who have found there a national home are in a tiny minority, and the feeling against them of the overwhelming majority of the Arabs becomes more bitter instead of more con- ciliatory. It is quite possible that there might be an explosion. If there were riots, if there were a constant state of disturbance, if there were a massacre, Great Britain would be held responsible. It would then be extremely difficult for us to wash our hands of the whole business without seeming either callous or dishonourable. We strongly urge the Government, therefore, to make up their minds to get out, not only of Mesopotamia, but of Palestine, while there is time to do so quietly and creditably.
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