THE DEFENCE OF EGYPT.
IF the Sultan imagines that there will be any difference of opinion here in regard to his attempt to encroach upon the frontiers of Egypt, and to take possession of certain strategic points in violation of the Firmans under which the boundaries of Egypt were settled, he is very greatly mistaken. Not only will the British Government support the Egyptian Government with all the force at their command, but they will have a united people behind them. The Sultan will not even have on his side the minute group of " peace-at-any-price " men who incline to believe that a British Government must always be in the wrong if they insist on their rights, for Turkey in such quarters is even more suspect than Downing Street. But while there is no sort of doubt that the British Government will receive a unanimous support in whatever action they may deem it necessary to take, the public as yet have probably not realised the nature of the dispute. They are quite willing to back the Government, but they do not understand why there is so much fuss about a few miles of sand and a minute Arab town on the Gulf of Akabah. A very small amount of attention to the map, and to the strategic and geographical conditions involved, will, however, make it abundantly, clear why the matter is one of vital import- ance, and why no Government can possibly submit to tho Turkish demands.
One of the great advantages which have hitherto belonged. to Egypt has been the assumption that Egypt might be strategically considered almost as if it were an island. The Mediterranean lies on one side, the Red Sea, including the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Akabah, on another, and the Land of the Nile's only other frontiers are vast spaces of sand, which, though they cannot be commanded by the guns of a British fleet, are so waterless as to make them well-nigh as impassable for a land. invader as the sea itself. No doubt this comfortable view of the strategic isolation of Egypt is, contradicted by the fact that Egypt in classical and mediaeval times was again and again invaded by the El Arish route, the route which runs from Gaza, on the Syrian coast, parallel with the sea to a point on the Suez Canal not far from Port Said. This way came the Assyrian, the Persian, the Greek, and the Roman, and. it was by this route that in modern times first Napoleon and then Mehemet All marched and remarched their troops. The El Arish route, however, is so ill-supplied with water, and so near the coast, that of late it has been considered safe to regard. it as impracticable, at any rate for a Turkish army. What a Turkish army under European military inspiration might do is a matter which has only quite recently entered. the region of practical politics. Of late the strategic isolation of Egypt has been threatened from another point. On July 29th of last year we published a letter drawing attention to the Hedjaz Railway, a railway which the Turkish Government have constructed from Damascus with a view to reaching the Holy Cities, and which last spring had got within four days' march of the Turkish port of Akabah, on the Red Sea. The line, though nominally intended for pilgrims, is in reality a strategic line designed by German engineers, and held and worked by the Turkish military authorities. Our correspondent, indeed, declared that he had been informed on good authority that the originator of the scheme was General von der Goltz, and. that it formed part of that distinguished strategist's plans for the strengthening of the Turkish Empire from a military point of view. At present we understand that the Hedjaz Railway has not been carried much beyond Ma'an, but that the intention is to construct an extension to a point on the Gulf of Akabah. It is in order to give the line its full strategic advantage that the Turks have encroached upon Egyptian territory and seized the town of Tabah, which has always hitherto been regarded. as within Egyptian territory. As our correspondent pointed out—a view which we have ourselves endorsed on several occasions —the construction of such a railway goes a great way to destroying the strategic isolation of Egypt, and. at once places the Suez Canal in a position of danger. No doubt it would be difficult to prevent Turkey from building such a railway on her own territory, but at any rate the British Government cannot tolerate, and do not mean to tolerate, the seizure of Egyptian territory in order to render the menage to Egypt more complete. We do not wish in any way to make a bogey of Germany, or to suggest that in the present instance the Germans have induced Turkey to take action. We may, however, quote what our correspondent wrote in regard to the German influences behind the railway, for they certainly are not less active now than they were a year ago :— " German hostility to Great Britain is no new thing, though we have recognised it rather late in the day. With Turkey hostile to the first Moslem Power in the world, German ambitions might contemplate the possibility of using the Turkish forces to create a formidable diversion during an Anglo-German conflict, at Koneit and on the Egyptian border. I am aware that the devotees of sea power proclaim that Egypt is an island, and must remain the prize of the Power that controls the seas. But the Suez Canal could be blocked with the greatest ease ; llia'an is only fifteen marches from Ismailia, and though the Sinai Peninsula and the desert of El Tih are inhospitable enough, large armies have entered Egypt from the north-east since the dawn of history, and the Turkish soldier requires little but bread, water, and cartridges. The concentration of an army in Southern Palestine would not be hard to screen, and even if the first attack proved a total failure, it might well be repeated with greater success. And can we assume that the first attack would fail even if the Soudan remained absolutely quiet, and certain elements in Egypt required no watching 0 The movement on Egypt would be made by two or three corps &armee collected in Syria for the ostensible purpose of suppressing an Arab or Druse rising ; and whatever may be said of the natural difficulties, Sultan Selim and the Saracen rulers of Egypt and Syria took large and well- equipped armies across the same deserts in the past. The difficulty of inducing the Ottoman Government to take the risk would no doubt be considerable, but German influence has made such strides in Turkey that the conclusion of an offensive and defensive alliance between the Kaiser and Sultan Abd-ul-Hamid is now a possibility. If ever the rivalry between England and Germany comes to a head, it is not unlikely that our great opponent will do her utmost to force us to a land struggle and use Moslem fanaticism as one of her weapons."
Though we have ourselves no doubt that Germany has viewed with satisfaction the increased vulnerability of Egypt caused by the making of the Hedjaz Railway, we would warn our readers against regarding her action in the matter as exhibiting any immediate unfriendliness. The Germans, and rightly enough from their point of view, argue something in this fashion :—‘ We do not at present want to fight with Britain, and we hope that we never shall. There is, however, always a possibility of such a conflict arising, and especially since Britain has so strongly lent her support to France. But if war should ever arise between us and Britain, it is obvious that we must find some means of attacking Britain, for he who merely stands on the defen- sive has lost the battle before it has begun. Before Britain occupied Egypt there was practically no way in which Germany could attack her. Since, however, the Sultan and we are in alliance, and since the Sultan feels that he has been robbed of Egypt by Britain, and. that he has the right to recover possession whenever he can, nothing would be more natural than for the Turks to invade and reconquer Egypt if an opportunity were open to them. If, then, we were at war with Britain, we might strike a very effective blow by inducing and assisting the Turks to invade Egypt. Hence anything which makes Egypt more vulnerable to Turkish attack ought to be quietly encouraged and organised by Germany, and therefore Germany must view with satisfaction, and give what help she can to, the creation of the Hedjaz Railway, and to its extension to the Gulf of Akabah, for such a railway goes a great way towards destroying the strategic isolation of Egypt.'
We cannot, of course, say that German politicians or strategists have ever argued the matter out in this way, but most certainly if they have not done so they have been strangely remiss from their point of view, and such remissness is seldom noted in German Departments of State. But whether Germany has or has not been behind Turkey in this matter, our duty is clear. We have got to think, not about motives, but about facts, and the fact remains that if we allow Turkey first to appropriate a piece of Egyptian territory, and then to build on it the extension of a railway which already involves a strategic menace to Egypt, we shall be acting with extreme folly. But it is clear that the Govern- ment have no intention whatever of committing such a piece of folly, and that they will back up Lord Cromer and. the Egyptian Government to the full in resisting Turkish aggression. If the Sultan imagines that the British Government have not still plenty of methods of coercing him, he is very much mistaken. We do not want to use the language of menace, but it is patent to all the world that the condition of Arabia is anything but satis- factory from the Turkish point of view, and that if Turkey were to involve herself in. hostilities with Britain, the end. would probably be the loss of the Holy Cities to the Turkish Empire. Meantime, we can assure the Sultan that he is making a very great mistake in encouraging his emissaries to attempt to inflame popular feeling in Egypt. Such efforts will fail in their object; but the attempt will not be forgotten when the time comes for a final settle- ment of the Turkish question. The British are no doubt a long-enduring people, and can sometimes be trifled with very successfully by foreign potentates. But the Sultan is not one of them.
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