100 Years Ago - Persia
A COSSACK REGIMENT IN PERSIA
SIR PERCY SYKES. Formerly British Consul-General at Meshed. Author of "A History of Persia," Restored order in Southern Persia in 1916
THE FIRST ARMOURED CAR (RUSSIAN) SEEN IN TEHERAN
THE RUSSIAN GENERAL BARA TOFF (IN UNIFORM) AT THE RECEPTION BY THE SHAH' IN THE PALACE AT TEHERAN. The marble throne can he seen in the background.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/kultur-in-persia-rp6whb88b
Kultur in Persia
August 17, 1916
German methods in Persia have a peculiar interest since they offer a model, on a small scale, of her political machinery as a whole. Nowhere else have the threads of her intrigues been laid so bare; nowhere are the motives, source, method, and effect of her propaganda so transparent
(FROM Edmund Candler) It is the achievement of a handful of Germans in Persia to have introduced war, brigandage, loot, and murder into one of the few countries of the world which might have enjoyed peace. Happily they have discovered that lies and assassination, though useful in disturbing the equilibrium of a neutral country, cannot be made the permanent basis of authority. With the entry of General Sykes into Kerman one of the last centres of propaganda has been swept clean.
German methods in Persia have a peculiar interest since they offer a model, on a small scale, of her political machinery as a whole. Nowhere else have the threads of her intrigues been laid so bare; nowhere are the motives, source, method, and effect of her propaganda so transparent. The specific is always more illuminating than the general, and to follow the machinations of the firm of Wonckhaus before the war or the comings and goings of the agents, Wassmuss and Neidermayer, during the last 12 months is to read the history of the government in the individual.
In Persia one cannot but admire the adroitness with which the German has combined the contradictory roles of fugitive and protector. The persuasive tongue of Wassmuss resounds in the proclamations of the Khans of Tangistan, in which these unregenerate highwaymen profess themselves shocked at the violation of Persian neutrality, and demand the restitution of their innocent “guests”. The “guests” were the same Germans and Austrians who had brought their machine-guns over the Turkish border, flooded the country with inflammatory leaflets, and against the express orders of the Persian Government set up their wireless installation at Ispahan. Allied with these champions of Persian neutrality were the Turks, who occupied Kermanshah, overran the province of Azerbaijan, captured Tabrin, and put the inhabitants of the city to the sword.
DEMOCRACY IN A STRANGE GUISE
The German in Persia is a champioN of democracy as well as of the integrity of small nations. “Germans and Democrats” has been a common catchword in the south, and the Persians linked the words in all innocence, so that to the ignorant “Democrat” must have come to mean “an employer of assassins who is prepared to pay a high wage”. “Democracy” is a strange standard for the German to fly; but he is adaptable, and for the moment autocracy was not in the air.
For a long time Ispahan is the centre of intrigue. On February 4, 1915, Dr Pugin arrives with a semi-royal escort, and hoists the German and Turkish flags. Before evening the German flag is torn to shreds, but it is soon flying again. In May, the wireless is installed. Protests, orders, expostulations pour in from Teheran but the Governor-General is dilatory in putting them into effect. And it would be a pity to remove this toy. For the voice of the War Lord is heard daily in Ispahan speaking with the elect. He tells of colossal disasters to the Slav, the destruction of the British Navy, the failure of the Bank of England, and the extinction of France. Farther south, Wassmuss has a dummy wireless of his own, and he, too, confers with the All Highest in the camp of the simple Tangistanis, drawing sparks with a magnet in the night.
AN ILLUSORY ZEPPELIN
The comic muse still holds the stage at Ispahan on May 20, when large crowds flock to the cemetery of Takht-i-Rihad to see a German Zeppelin arrive laden with sugar - symbolic freight - from the north. The townspeople search the sky with strained necks until dark, when they return home disappointed, much to the diminution of German prestige. But things are to move more quickly in the city, and the tragic muse will take her turn on the boards. When Seller comes the truculent Pugin is discredited as not truculent enough. “What have you done for us?” he is asked. “Nothing at all”. The man stands a self-confessed weakling, ill words and bluff, when he should be the father of riot and assassination. Clearly a more resourceful head, a livelier propaganda is needed. On May 18 Von Kayer, manager of the Russian Bank, is shot dead as he is driving home from the Russian Consulate, where he has, dined. An Arab in the employ of the German Consul is called in by the local authorities for examination in connexion with the murder, but the man is suddenly spirited away by Seller to Teheran. Soon afterwards Mr Grahame, HM’s Consul-General, is shot at and wounded as he is riding through the streets, and his Indian orderly is killed.
MURDER PURE AND SIMPLE.
“A small party of Englishmen,” writes Zugmeyer to a certain chief, “have come to D-. It will be very easy to crush them. Proceed at once, kill them, and take possession of all their property, arms and ammunition, and send me one rifle of each kind possessed by them as an specimen.” There is something medieval in this direct appeal. It is murder become routine, not war.
Germany’s propaganda in the East has not received the attention it should. Those who shrug their shoulders and hesitate to believe the iniquities of Louvain and Gerbeviller will find here corroborative evidence in support of the accepted estimate of the mind of the German. The only difference is that the Persian murders were perpetrated by agents in cold blood, and had not the same provocation as excesses committed in the blind rage of war.
The events of Ispahan and Kerman were repeated at Yezd and Shiraz and over the greater part of Persia. It is the same story of bribery and assassination forged proclamations, and spurious Jehads. The Germans hypocrisy is based on a desperate opportunism; his Islamic bubble is nearly burst; and every, month that the war is protracted Germany’s mask is the more transparent. If she wishes to establish an Empire in Asia, she will have to mend her ways. For no Government that intrigues with religion, cynically playing off sect against sect, will endure as single generation in the East.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sir-percy-sykess-march-wfs5tbwpp
Sir Percy Sykes’s march
February 21, 1917
The object of Sir Percy Sykes was to organize in Southern Persia a force of military gendarmerie under the Persian Government, but officered by British officers with Indian experience. That force was ultimately to attain to a strength of 11,000 men.
Westminster, Tuesday. In the House of Lords tonight, Lord Curzon lifted the veil which has hung over events in the Middle East for many months. He had a fascinating story to tell the country, in reply to Lord Bryce, who sought some information regarding the present position of affairs in Persia.
Mention had not hitherto been made, Lord Curzon explained, of the march of the force under Sir Percy Sykes to Ispahan and finally to Teheran, some 1,000 miles, in circumstances of the most arduous and, in some places, of a perilous character. It had resulted in the establishment of order over a wide area. In Teheran it had already secured the existence of a Government friendly to the Allied Powers. Russia and Great Britain had been constant, although not imprudent, in giving steady financial assistance to the Persian Government.
The object of Sir Percy Sykes was to organize in Southern Persia a force of military gendarmerie under the Persian Government, but officered by British officers with Indian experience. That force was ultimately to attain to a strength of 11,000 men. Sir Percy Sykes, Lord Curzon continued, had at present a force of 5,000 men, in addition to a military escort of about 800 troops from India. A similar force of gendarmerie was being raised from Bakhtiari tribesmen.
Lord Curzon hoped that before very long Sir Percy Sykes would be able to march from Shiraz, where he now was, and to clear up the brigand camps and robber nests with which that part of Persia was infested. A new announcement was that on the eastern side of Persia a similar success had been obtained by another force under Major Keith, who had succeeded in pacifying the whole of that considerable quarter.
LOYALTY OF THE AMEER.
Travelling further afield, Lord Curzon was able to assure the House that in Afghanistan the Ameer had remained loyal to his obligations to Great Britain. He had declined to be seduced by the tempting offer of the spoil of the Punjab. The attempt to improve the general situation in Persia had been considerably assisted by the successes of General Maude in Mesopotamia, which had resulted in 15,000 Turkish casualties, and by the movement of the Grand Shereef of Mecca.
At the same time, Lord Curzon could not say that the situation was altogether free from anxiety. Turkish troops had still to be turned out of parts of Persia, and there was still disorder in the hinterland of the Persian Gulf. Still, the position of the oilfields was practically secure, and he had not heard for many months of any interruption of communication in that region.
Lord Curzon, in conclusion, warned his hearers that no one could prophesy about the East, but he hoped that the worst was over and that the great chain of ambition stretching from Europe to Asia had been twisted aside, if it had not been broken.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/in-a-persian-city-s5rhzmg5f
In a Persian city
February 21, 1917
If in other countries “all roads lead to Rome”, in Persia it may be said that all roads lead to the robber’s den.
(From a correspondent) Kerman, Dec 8.
For many days past I have been travelling at the slow, dignified pace of the Eastern camel caravan over broad, sweeping plains and range after range of wild mountains. Now at last I have come to Kerman, most renowned of the cities of East Persia, and am resting in the enjoyment of civilized surroundings and the consciousness of a goal attained.
The spell of the desert road is still upon me. At night the tinkle of the many-toned caravan bells still seems to float to me up shadowy valleys, and I have only to shut my eyes to see the tall, black shapes of the camels stalking in slow procession against the crimson dawn. Yet there is satisfaction not unmixed with relief in the thought that my wanderings are for the time being over. For in Persia, even when the world is at peace, he who starts upon a journey can never be sure that he and his goods will arrive at his journey’s end. Marauding tribes are many and powerful, and their operations are far-reaching; there is not a caravan route that is not liable to be closed for weeks at a time by robber bands.
If in other countries “all roads lead to Rome”, in Persia it may be said that all roads lead to the robber’s den. Thanks, however, to luck and the protection of a comparatively strong escort, we have reached Kerman after a journey, of 24 days from Bandar Abbas without serious mishap. Once, indeed, in the small hours, when I the caravan was winding over a mountainside 9,500ft above the sea, 30 or 40 Afshar tribesmen attempted to “cut out” a couple of strings of camels in the dark; but the alarm was raised, and in the ensuing scuffle between the robbers and some of the escorting sowars who came up the former were driven off leaving five prisoners in our hands. Two camelmen robbed of some of their clothes and one sowar slightly wounded was all the damage we sustained.
THE TABLES TURNED.
Here at Kerman peace reigns, though it be that of the calm which follows a storm. Although the greater part of the British colony, including the ladies, has not yet been allowed to return, British prestige stands as high as ever. It seems to have suffered nothing from the temporary eclipse which it underwent last winter and spring, when the local Democratic revolutionaries, led and financed by German and Turkish agents, turned out the. British colony, and with the help of the Swedish Gendarmerie ruled Kerman. The advent of General Sir Percy Sykes’s column in June last most effectively turned the tables, and now Kerman itself and most of the province are strongly on our side.
Never were relations between the Consulate and the local Persian authorities more satisfactory. The new Governor-General, a young Prince of the Royal House, who has travelled in France and Russia, and, together with most of his staff, speaks French with an excellent accent, is thoroughly pro-Ally in his sympathies. The Deputy-Governor Sirdar Nusret, who is the most powerful noble in the province, is one of the oldest friends of the British cause, and remained loyal in its darkest hour. Everyone is ready to help us, and the voice of the Democrat is stilled.
Thanks to these favourable conditions as well as to the ability and devotion of its British officers, the new corps of South Persian Rifles, which is being raised by General Sykes to take the place of the old Swedish Gendarmerie, is rapidly growing both in numbers.and in organization. As a corollary to the institution of the Rifles, a new telegraph line is under construction connecting Kerman with the Gulf at Bandar Abbas. This line has already reached the foot of the mountains 50 miles from the sea. The same route is being surveyed. for a road capable of carrying motor traffic, and in spite of enormous difficulties connected with transport and supply, and with the nature of the terrain itself, it is hoped that next year will see both completed. When this is the case conditions in Kerman and in the south of Fars will be revolutionized both commercially and strategically.
IN THE BAZAAR.
Meanwhile, at Kerman itself, the calm which broods over the political landscape enables the newcomer to gather undisturbed impressions of this old-world, typically Persian city and its beautiful surroundings. To reach the British Consulate, which stands in the midst of cypress-shaded gardens a mile or two from the eastern gates of the town, the traveller from Bandar Abbas or Teheran must pass right through the town itself.
The long, crowded bazaar, reminiscent of the Bezistin at Constantinople, boasts a roof of domes along its entire length. Through the high side windows white shafts of sunlight strike down through the dust-laden atmosphere. The throng which passes and re-passes beneath is not clad in many colours as in other Eastern countries, for the Persian is sober in his apparel, eschewing all bright tints, but the women, in their white garments and mysterious burqas, lend the requisite Oriental flavour to the scene. Here a group of hairy, ill-clad ruffians suggest what no doubt they are, brigands from the hills. There, the brightly coloured patchwork pantaloons of a passing woman betray her despised Gabr race; for here and at Yezd alone in the country of their origin, are to be found surviving communities belonging to this the ancient Zoroastrian creed.
A SCENE OF BEAUTY.
Except for the bazaar there is little for the visitor to see, for here, as elsewhere in Moslem lands, domestic architecture is represented, so far as the sightseer is concerned, by a high blank wall. Kerman, like Damascus, looks better from a distance. The city, walled and heavily gated as a city should be, stands in the midst of a vast rolling plain, grey-brown for the most. part and fading into misty distances except where the abrupt hillsides cut it short. Great dark-brown and purple mountains, snow-sprinkled, bound the view in most directions, but sufficiently far away for their hugeness to be tempered down and not overwhelming. High above the plain, tower the crumbling walls and bastions of the ancient Fort reared aloft on imposing perpendicular crags; below them the city, a wilderness of brown walls and domed roofs diversified by the dark green of cypresses and here and there a graceful fluted “wind-tower”.
Yesterday evening I walked under the eastern cliffs of the Fort hill and came through a little pass full of ruined walls and towers to the west side. Never shall I forget the beauty of the scene. The distant hills are deepest purple beneath the rose of sunset, while a pearly mist full of light swathes both city and plain; only the tops of mosques and wind-towers, or an occasional clump of trees, stand out black like islets of the sea. Below is a mysterious greyness, through which loom vaguely shapes of ruined towers and massive walls, except where fields of newly-sprouting corn add a last exquisite touch of tenderest green to the scheme of colour. High up on one side hang the crags and bastions of the Fort, now of flaming gold, and the same golden light bathes hill and dale to the eastward, while a ray of palest shell-pink touches the distant snows. Purple, green, gold, and rose, and a pearly vagueness between, the brooding peace of evening over all. But for the distant murmur of the town, with its note of man’s unrest, the land would seem to be asleep and dreaming, dreaming of the wars that have surged up to those castle walls in the past, of the intrigues and revolutions that have centred in them and in the city beyond.
The jackal’s long-drawn howl comes from his hole in the rocks, echoing ancient wrongs, and a.string of camels, home from the grazing, passes across the gathering dusk like shadows of past-days.