The Iraqis have long experience of Western imperialism. -- During the First
World War, the English, the French, and the Russians, without, of course, any
consultation with the local populations, reached secret agreements on how they
would divide up "Asiatic Turkey" (the holdings of the Ottoman Empire in Asia),
and British armies set out to enforce their imperial claims. The British Empire
suffered an important defeat in April 1916, when a British expeditionary force
was stopped on the way to Baghdad and forced to surrender. -- The
British, determined to restore imperial prestige in the region, massed 600,000
troops and resumed operations on the Mesopotamian front in the fall of 1916.
They entered Baghdad on March 11, 1917, and a week later the commander of
British forces, Sir Stanley Maude, issued this proclamation....
THE PROCLAMATION OF BAGHDAD
By Lt. Gen. Sir Stanley Maude
Harper's
May 2003 [originally issued March 19, 1917]
http://www.harpers.org/ProclamationBaghdad.html
--The following proclamation was issued to the inhabitants of Baghdad on
March 19, 1917, by Lieut. General Sir Stanley Maude, shortly after the
occupation of the city by British forces.
To the People of Baghdad Vilayet:
In the name of my King, and in the name of the peoples over whom he rules, I
address you as follows:
Our military operations have as their object the defeat of the enemy, and the
driving of him from these territories. In order to complete this task, I am
charged with absolute and supreme control of all regions in which British troops
operate; but our armies do not come into your cities and lands as conquerors or
enemies, but as liberators. Since the days of Halaka your city and your lands
have been subject to the tyranny of strangers, your palaces have fallen into
ruins, your gardens have sunk in desolation, and your forefathers and yourselves
have groaned in bondage. Your sons have been carried off to wars not of your
seeking, your wealth has been stripped from you by unjust men and squandered in
distant places.
Since the days of Midhat, the Turks have talked of reforms, yet do not the
ruins and wastes of today testify the vanity of those promises?
It is the wish not only of my King and his peoples, but it is also the wish
of the great nations with whom he is in alliance, that you should prosper even
as in the past, when your lands were fertile, when your ancestors gave to the
world literature, science, and art, and when Baghdad city was one of the wonders
of the world.
Between your people and the dominions of my King there has been a close bond
of interest. For 200 years have the merchants of Baghdad and Great Britain
traded together in mutual profit and friendship. On the other hand, the Germans
and the Turks, who have despoiled you and yours, have for 20 years made Baghdad
a centre of power from which to assail the power of the British and the Allies
of the British in Persia and Arabia. Therefore the British Government cannot
remain indifferent as to what takes place in your country now or in the future,
for in duty to the interests of the British people and their Allies, the British
Government cannot risk that being done in Baghdad again which has been done by
the Turks and Germans during the war.
But you people of Baghdad, whose commercial prosperity and whose safety from
oppression and invasion must ever be a matter of the closest concern to the
British Government, are not to understand that it is the wish of the British
Government to impose upon you alien institutions. It is the hope of the British
Government that the aspirations of your philosophers and writers shall be
realised and that once again the people of Baghdad shall flourish, enjoying
their wealth and substance under institutions which are in consonance with their
sacred laws and their racial ideals. In Hedjaz the Arabs have expelled the Turks
and Germans who oppressed them and proclaimed the Sherif Hussein as their King,
and his Lordship rules in independence and freedom, and is the ally of the
nations who are fighting against the power of Turkey and Germany; so indeed are
the noble Arabs, the Lords of Koweyt, Nejd, and Asir.
Many noble Arabs have perished in the cause of Arab freedom, at the hands of
those alien rulers, the Turks, who oppressed them. It is the determination of
the Government of Great Britain and the great Powers allied to Great Britain
that these noble Arabs shall not have suffered in vain. It is the hope and
desire of the British people and the nations in alliance with them that the Arab
race may rise once more to greatness and renown among the peoples of the earth,
and that it shall bind itself together to this end in unity and concord.
O people of Baghdad remember that for 26 generations you have suffered under
strange tyrants who have ever endeavoured to set on Arab house against another
in order that they might profit by your dissensions. This policy is abhorrent to
Great Britain and her Allies, for there can be neither peace nor prosperity
where there is enmity and misgovernment. Therefore I am commanded to invite you,
through your nobles and elders and representatives, to participate in the
management of your civil affairs in collaboration with the political
representatives of Great Britain who accompany the British Army, so that you may
be united with your kinsmen in North, East, South, and West in realising the
aspirations of your race. |
