Already the annual expense of running Mesopotamia is estimated at
35 millions. Mr. Asquith challenged the whole policy of the Government in Mesopotamia, add suggested withdrawal and a concentration on Basra. He pointed out that Mesopotamia had no " natural boundaries," but was " a vague geographical expression," and he questioned whether we had any legal right to be there as we had received no mandate from the League of Nations. Mr. Lloyd George in his reply to his critics declared that our mandate in Mesopotamia had been received from the tatiad Powers—the only body which cowl I give a mandate. We were doing under that mandate exactly what we ought to do, and what we were entitled to do. If we had cleared out, who would have taken our place ? Perhaps Mustapha Kemal ! The League of Nations would then have said to Great Britain : " We make you mandatory," and we should have had to go back and reconquer the country.
