 | CHAPTER VII The Egyptian problem |  |
CHAPTER VII
EGYPT DURING THE WAR
When war broke out between Great Britain and
Germany on August 4th, 1914, Abbas Hilmi was in
Constantinople. He had been quite aware when he
left Cairo in the early summer that he had at last exhausted
Lord Kitchener's patience, and he knew that, unless
the power of Great Britain was broken, he was in grave
danger of forfeiting the Khediviate. His sympathies
and co-operation were secured in advance to all our
enemies. As was the custom in his absence, the Prime
Minister, who was Hussein Rushdi Pasha, acted as Regent.
His Cabinet, which had only been recently formed after
the resignation of Mohamed Said Pasha, was a relatively
strong one, and on the whole well disposed towards the
British controlling power. It included men of considerable
capacity, such as Adli, Serwat, Serri, Yusuf
Wahba, and Ismail Sidki. Their paths were ultimately
to diverge, and Ismail Sidki, perhaps the ablest of them
all, who afterwards joined Saad Zaghlul's party and
became a member of the Nationalist Delegation to
Europe, had to resign early in 1915 in consequence of
a deplorable domestic scandal. This was the most
important of the few changes which occurred in the
composition of the Cabinet, and Rushdi continued
to preside over it all through the war and for the first
few months after the Armistice.
It would have been well if there had been the same
(afterwards Sir Milne) Cheetham, who was Councillor,
had been left in charge in the usual course when Lord
Kitchener went home on leave before the war, and he
continued to carry on for several months after Lord
Kitchener had gone to the War Office on the outbreak of
hostilities. Sir Henry MacMahon, an able officer of the
Indian Political Department, who had been Foreign
Secretary in India, but was on leave in England, was
sent out, on Lord Kitchener's recommendation, to
Cairo as High Commissioner after the Proclamation of the
Protectorate. But barely two years later he was somewhat
abruptly recalled, and Sir Reginald Wingate, who
had been Sirdar and Governor of the Sudan for nearly
two decades, was appointed to succeed him. Sir Henry
MacMahon had no knowledge at all of Egypt, and though
Sir Reginald Wingate had served in Cairo during his
earlier years in the Egyptian army and kept to some
extent in touch with Egypt from Khartum, the conditions
he came back to as High Commissioner must have been
almost as unfamiliar to him as they had been to
Sir Henry MacMahon. Moreover, the administrative
machinery of which they in turn took charge was already
out of gear, and their own authority was more and
more cast into the shade by the military authority which,
as the war dragged on, took things more and more into
its own hands. Worst of all, neither of them seems to
have ever enjoyed the real confidence of the Foreign
Office, as they were both new to diplomacy, and their
advice, even when, as the event may have ultimately
shown, it was sound, never apparently carried enough
weight to command consideration amidst the conflicting
views of the different Departments and the many grave
preoccupations of the War Cabinet. The very fact
that, to the surprise of many, Egypt during the war gave
very little trouble led to a careless over-confidence for
which we had to pay after the war was over.
From the day war was declared between Great Britain
Egypt was practically part of the British Empire and
therefore itself at war with Germany, and as early as
August 6th, 1914, on the ground that "the presence of
the British Army of Occupation in Egypt renders the
country liable to attack by the enemies of His Britannic
Majesty," the Prime Minister published a "Decision"
of the Council of Ministers that, amongst other war
measures, German ships in Egyptian ports were henceforth
to be dealt with as enemy ships. Such action
obviously implied a definite repudiation of Turkish
suzerainty by Egypt, as Turkey, on the contrary, had
proclaimed her neutrality and did not openly depart
from it for another three months. No immediate breach
ensued, as the Porte professed, for the time being, to
accept the assurances of the British Government that
"neither in Egypt nor elsewhere would the war be
used as a pretext for any action injurious to Ottoman
interests."
For the rest, the outbreak of hostilities, so long as
they were confined to the European continent, produced
less excitement in Egypt than had been generally anticipated.
There was an undercurrent of hostility towards
us amongst the more aggressive Nationalists, and Mahomedan
feeling swung more and more towards the German
Emperor, who had lavished so many ostentatious professions
of friendship upon the Sultan and Khalif, as the
probability of active co-operation between those two
potentates increased. But most people were more
concerned with the effects of the war upon the Egyptian
produce markets and the general curtailment of trade
with Europe. A great wave of prosperity had been
suddenly arrested, and no one at that time foresaw that
the period of economic depression was to be of short
duration, and that the war was ultimately to pour fresh
and undreamt-of wealth into Egypt.
It was only after the Sultan had finally thrown in
his lot with the Central Powers that Great Britain proceeded
Egypt to the Ottoman Empire. The Proclamation of
Martial Law and the establishment of a very rigid censorship
at the beginning of November were the first symptoms
of the gravity of the situation that was to be created by
a rupture with Constantinople. The British Protectorate
was not proclaimed till December 18th, and on the following
day another Proclamation announced that His
Majesty's Government had deposed the Khedive Abbas II
and conferred the rulership of Egypt on Hussein, a son
of the Khedive Ismail, with the title of Sultan. After
very nearly four centuries, Egypt ceased to form part
even nominally of the Ottoman Dominions, and the
"veiled" Protectorate exercised by Great Britain for
thirty-eight years was transformed by the end of 1914
into an open Protectorate.
What were the precise advantages of making at that
moment a change which did not materially alter the situation
in Egypt itself, where our dominant position, plus
martial law, already gave us a free hand, has not yet
been authoritatively explained. The chief argument in
support of it is that the Regent and his colleagues found
themselves placed in a very difficult position from the
point of view of constitutional law. They had been
willing to carry on whilst the Ottoman Empire remained
neutral, and to assume the sanction of the Khedive
for measures still formally taken in his name and under
the authority delegated by him to the Regent before he
left for Constantinople, so long as Turkey, where he
had taken up his quarters, was not actually an enemy
country. Now, however, that polite fiction could no
longer be maintained, or at any rate the Egyptian Ministers
were reluctant to assume the responsibility of maintaining
it. This may well have seemed a sufficient argument to
the British authorities on the spot, who naturally disliked
the prospect of a Ministerial crisis, involving the resignation
of the Regent, in addition to all the difficult
military problems raised by Turkey's entry into the war.
have met it by simply deposing the Khedive, who had
deserted his country, and confirming the Regency of the
Prime Minister for the duration of the war. This would
have been no more arbitrary an exercise of their authority
than either annexation or the proclamation of a Protectorate,
and it would not have reacted so detrimentally
as did the proclamation of a Protectorate upon our
relations with our Allies and other neutral States. That
was a measure hard to reconcile with the spirit of the
reciprocal engagement already taken at our instance by
the Entente Powers, that no territorial changes in favour
of any one of them should become effective till the end
of the war, when they should be discussed and settled
by common agreement. For the proclamation of the
Protectorate constituted a change in the status of Egypt,
as hitherto established by international treaties, and
a change to our own advantage. We were able to secure
the acquiescence of France and Russia, as we were prepared
to promise Syria to the former and the possession
of Constantinople and the Straits to the latter. But
it helped to embark the Allies on that dangerous course of
secret agreements and treaties which led to so many
misunderstandings, during as well as after the war.
In the course of a semi-official mission on which I was
sent by the Foreign Office to the Balkans in the summer
of 1915, I had abundant opportunities of noting how
serious an obstacle the prospect of Russia being established
at Constantinople was to Entente diplomacy in Athens,
Sofia, and Bukarest, and how general was the belief
that it was the price we had been selfishly willing to
pay at their expense for the permanent possession of
Egypt. The only doubt, however, that appears to
have arisen in London was whether His Majesty's Government
should not proceed a step further and annex Egypt
to the British Empire instead of merely proclaiming
a British Protectorate. Lord Curzon has stated in the
House of Lords that "the opportunity of incorporating
wisely rejected, because it was intended in the wide latitude
which the formula of a Protectorate affords to give
free scope to the political aspirations and self-governing
capacities of the Egyptian people." It is a strange
argument in the mouth of a member of the British Cabinet,
which was at that very moment introducing a Government
of India Bill of which the avowed purpose in regard
to India, though India is certainly "incorporated in the
Empire," was exactly the same as that which, according to
him, could not have been achieved in Egypt if incorporation
in the Empire had been preferred to a Protectorate.
Nothing was said of such a purpose in the two Proclamations
which intimated to the Egyptian people that Great
Britain had taken charge of Egypt and given her a new
ruler. Nor was it easy to read such a purpose into
the much lengthier Note addressed to the new Sultan
by Mr. Cheetham, who was still acting as the representative
of the British Government in Cairo. The Note began
by showing how "a band of unscrupulous adventurers"
in Constantinople had deliberately provoked a rupture
between Turkey and Great Britain, and how the Khedive
Abbas Hilmi had definitely thrown in his lot with the
King's enemies. Hence "the rights over Egypt whether
of the Sultan or of the late Khedive are forfeit to His
Majesty." Of those rights the British Government "regard
themselves as trustees for the inhabitants of Egypt,"
and they had decided that "Great Britain can best
fulfil the responsibilities she has incurred towards Egypt"
by declaring the Protectorate, and by inviting "the
Prince of the family of Mehemet Ali most worthy to
occupy the position" to undertake the government of
the country "under such Protectorate." Great Britain
accepted "the fullest responsibility" for the defence
of Egyptian territories "against all aggression whence-soever
coming," and all Egyptian subjects, "wherever
they may be," would be "entitled to receive the protection
of His Majesty's Government." The British Representative
relations between the Egyptian Government and the
representatives of foreign Powers. The Note further placed
it on record that the Capitulations "are no longer in
harmony with the development of the country," though
their revision would be most conveniently postponed till
the end of the war. In the paragraph dealing with
"the field of internal administration" it was stated that :
"it has been the aim of His Majesty's Government,
while working through and in the closest association with
the constituted Egyptian Authorities, to secure individual
liberty, to promote the spread of education, to further
the development of the natural resources of the country,
and, in such measure as the degree of enlightenment of
public opinion may permit, to associate the governed
in the task of government. Not only is it the intention
of His Majesty's Government to remain faithful to such
policy, but they are convinced that the clearer definition
of Great Britain's position in the country will accelerate
progress towards self-government."
The Note concluded with an assurance that "the
religious convictions of Egyptian subjects will be scrupulously
respected," and that "His Majesty's Government
are animated by no hostility towards the Khalifate,"
to which past history showed the loyalty of Egyptian
Mahomedans to have been quite independent of any
political bonds between Egypt and Constantinople.
This Note was doubtless quite suitably drawn for a
diplomatic chancery, but not for a more unsophisticated
public. Had it been translated into more popular
language and widely circulated, it might have done something
to allay the not unnatural apprehensions of a
people, alien to us in race and religion, who found their
destinies settled for them suddenly without any warning
or consultation. But nothing of the kind was done,
whilst a great deal, on the other hand, was done to lend
colour to the sinister interpretation which our ill-wishers
hastened to place upon the Protectorate.
Compare for a moment what we did in Egypt during
the war and what we did in India. The genuine enthusiasm
with which the princes and people of India
rallied to the cause of the Empire elicited at once a
generous response both in Simla and in London. Lord
Hardinge rightly gauged the feelings both of the Indian
Army and the Indian people when he urged that the
Indian Expeditionary Force should be dispatched straight
to France to fight shoulder to shoulder with the British
troops, and to fill during the critical winter months of
1914-1915 a gap which until our new armies and those of
the Dominions were ready to take the field could not
have been filled from any other quarter. Later on,
in Gallipoli, in Mesopotamia, in Syria, Indian troops,
Mahomedans as well as Hindus, played a conspicuous part
in every campaign against Turkey. The Viceroy's
Legislative Council and the Provincial Legislative Councils,
as the recognised bodies through which—subject as they
were to many limitations—Indian opinion found constitutional
expression, were drawn into constant consultation,
and they associated themselves with, and sometimes
took the initiative in, the various measures deemed
necessary by the Government of India for the successful
conduct of the war—even a Defence of India Act as drastic
as our own Defence of the Realm Act. Great Britain
reciprocated by giving India access, for the first time, on
a footing of equality with the self-governing Dominions
and the United Kingdom itself, to the councils of the
Empire at the Imperial War Conferences held in London
and ultimately at the Paris Peace Conference. It was
during the war that an Indian was first called to the House
of Lords, and Lord Sinha with the Maharajah of Bikanir,
a Rajput prince who had seen war service himself, signed
on behalf of India the historic Peace Treaty of Versailles.
More than that, Mr. Asquith, when he was still Prime
Minister, had announced that India's loyalty required
the problem of Indian governance to be approached
from a new angle of vision, and in the very middle of the
was made on behalf of His Majesty's Government in
Parliament, that the object of British policy was to
give Indians a greatly enlarged share in the conduct of
their own affairs and lead them by gradual stages to the
final goal of self-government within the Empire. Nor
was any time lost in giving effect to that declaration.
The Secretary of State, Mr. Montagu, himself proceeded
to India for the purpose, and jointly with the Viceroy,
Lord Chelmsford, drew up an exhaustive Report which
served as a basis for a new Government of India Bill.
As soon as it had been introduced into Parliament, it
was referred to a Joint Committee of both Houses, who
spent several months in taking exhaustive evidence,
including that of Indians, some of whom represented
even the most extreme schools of Indian political thought.
In the last days of 1919 the Bill, amended and substantially
improved by the Committee, passed into law.
A stirring message from the King-Emperor brought
home to the princes and people of India that they had
not shared in vain in the Empire's great struggle for
liberty.
Opinions may differ, and do differ very widely, as to
the details of this very far-reaching Reform Bill and as
to many other issues raised by recent British policy
in India. The unabated hostility of Indian extremists
and the ugly storm that broke over the Punjab have
tended to discourage the perhaps over-sanguine expectations
raised by the great wave of enthusiasm which swept
over India in the early part of the war. Nor must the
Indian analogy be carried too far. There were many
things we were able to do in India which it would have
been obviously impossible to do in Egypt. India had
long been an integral part of the British Empire. It
was not till the war that Great Britain had claimed
any paramount rights over Egypt. But the importance
of reconciling the Egyptian people to their new relationship
with the Empire might well have inspired the British
mutandis, on the same broad and sympathetic lines as
their Indian policy. The very reverse took place. The
methods adopted in Egypt and the spirit in which they
were carried out were as the exact antithesis of those
by which India was brought during the war, and
through the war, into closer communion with the
Empire.
Sultan Hussein, on assuming his new functions under
the Protectorate, had at once requested the Egyptian
Prime Minister to continue in office. In a letter setting
forth the circumstances in which he had himself deemed
it "a duty to Egypt and to our glorious ancestor, the
great Mehemet Ali, whose dynasty we desire to perpetuate"
to respond to the appeal made to him by the British
Government, he declared himself openly in favour of
representative institutions by expressing his own wish
"to associate the people more and more closely with the
government of the country," adding that to that end
he was assured of receiving the most sympathetic support
from the British Government, and that "the more precise
definition of Great Britain's position in Egypt, by
removing all causes of misunderstanding, will facilitate
the collaboration of all the political elements in the
country."
Hussein Rushdi, hitherto Regent, remained Prime
Minister, and the rest of the Cabinet continued in office.
There is no reason to doubt that at that time they loyally
accepted the Protectorate, and if they and the Sultan
himself regarded it as essentially a war measure, that
reservation was not placed on record and can hardly
even be read into His Highness's reference to "the
more precise definition of Great Britain's position in
Egypt," which might well be interpreted to mean that
which had just taken place through the Proclamation
of the Protectorate. They gave a still more striking
proof of their desire to take their full share in the prosecution
of the war if, as the Egyptians still assert, they offered
army. That this offer was ever made, or at any rate
that it ever took formal shape, is now disputed in British
official quarters. Anyhow, whether or not it was made
and declined, General Sir John Maxwell, commanding
the British forces in Egypt, had already issued, immediately
after the rupture with Turkey, a Proclamation which,
after announcing the existence of a state of war between
Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire, stated that
though "the British were now fighting to protect the rights
and liberties of Egypt which were originally won upon
the battlefield by Mehemet Ali" and to secure the continuance
of the peace and prosperity which she had
enjoyed during the thirty years of the British Occupation,
Great Britain nevertheless, "recognising the respect
and veneration with which the Sultan is regarded by
the Mahomedans of Egypt, takes upon herself the sole
burden of the present war without calling upon the
Egyptian people for aid therein," merely requiring them
in return not to hamper our military operations nor to
render aid to the enemy.
The material value of Egyptian co-operation in the
field would probably have been slight, as the greater
part of the army, which was only about 30,000 strong
altogether, was required since the reconquest of the
Sudan for garrison duties in that remote and far-stretched
dependency. But would not the moral effect have been
worth taking into account? Having thrown cold water
on any good will which a generous appeal to Egyptian
co-operation might have elicited, we never even carried
out the promise we had so loftily given that we should not
call upon the Egyptian people for aid in the war! Far
from doing so, we frequently used Egyptian officers
and soldiers on the Suez Canal, in the Hedjaz, in Syria,
and, in fact, wherever and whenever we found it convenient
to do so, and before the end of the war we imposed,
directly and indirectly, many heavy burdens upon the
Egyptian people. In other respects, in fact, than actual
challenge comparison with that of many other parts of the
British Empire, though she was never given the chance
of gaining credit for conscious and voluntary sacrifice.
It is sometimes argued that she would never have gained
such credit if it had been left to her free will to decide
what contribution she should make, but it is hardly
an argument we are justified in using, since the fiction
was always maintained, however little it ultimately
corresponded to the facts, that compulsion was never
applied to Egyptians in regard to any war services they
rendered. Not once during the war were the legislative
bodies created to give limited opportunities of constitutional
expression to Egyptian public opinion allowed to
meet, or given an opportunity of associating themselves
publicly with the many measures actually taken by the
Sultan and his Ministers in furtherance of the war.
Nowhere was the censorship more rigorous and, according
to most people, more unintelligent. Yet on the whole,
and even in the towns, the new régime had been accepted
without any outward manifestations of disaffection.
Amongst the Mahomedan population of Cairo, over
which such a powerful centre of Mahomedan orthodoxy
as the University of El Azhar always exercises a great
influence, as well as amongst the younger Pan-Islamic
and Nationalist parties who had been in fairly close
touch of recent years with the Young Turks of Constantinople,
Great Britain doubtless had few well-wishers.
In the first months of the war, the prospect of a Turkish
invasion could hardly fail to create some popular excitement.
A Turkish army was known to be concentrating
in Syria in order to move against the Suez Canal, and if
possible sever our communications through that vital
waterway with India and Australia. But the excitement
subsided as soon as the attack was foiled in the early
days of February, 1915—when, by the way, Egyptian
artillery played an extremely useful part in the defence
of the Canal—and Turks were marched into Cairo as
Egyptians may have continued to believe in the ultimate
triumph of Turkey's Germanic allies, and abundant
assurances came from Constantinople that Egypt would
then be restored to Turkey, who would in turn grant her
complete independence. But such faith as they may
originally have placed in the Turkish armies being able
to drive us out of Egypt died steadily away as they saw
their country converted into a huge British military base
and an endless stream of British units pouring in from
India and Australia and New Zealand. Gradually, too,
Sultan Hussein's great personal qualities enabled him to
overcome the unpopularity he had at first incurred by
the acceptance of a title which in itself jarred upon
Mahomedan ears accustomed to associate it with the
Ottoman Sultans, who were also Khalifs, from the hands
of an alien and non-Mahomedan Power. Sultan Hussein
was universally respected, and amongst the rural population
he had acquired a great reputation as an excellent
landlord and an expert farmer. He was also a grand
seigneur and was known for his liberality—two very
important assets in an Oriental country. I had known
him for many years and saw a good deal of him when
I passed through Cairo on my way back from India
in the spring of 1915, and whilst nothing struck me more
than the absolute faith he had in the triumph sooner or
later of the Allied cause, he did not underrate the difficulties
of his situation nor the distrust which the silence of the
British Government was already causing as to the ultimate
consequences of the Protectorate. He himself, though
he did not actually say so, seemed to have accepted it
as an essential war measure, and his purpose was to
proceed in person to London as soon as the war was
over and effect a settlement with the British Government
which would satisfy the legitimate aspirations of his
people. It must be acknowledged, too, that we did not
take much trouble to help him, and, though it was clearly
in our interest to enhance as far as possible in the eyes of
throne with the new and higher title of Sultan, he did not
disguise from me his mortification at being sometimes
treated with less ceremonial deference than had been
usually shown to the Khedives. Very unfortunately,
on October 9th, 1917, Sultan Hussein, who had been
failing for some months, died, and his brother, Ahmed
Fuad, was hastily chosen by the British Government to
succeed him, not it would seem because he possessed any
special qualifications, but because, having very few friends
in the country, he would be compelled to lean upon us
alone for support.
Had the war been of shorter duration the mistakes
made at the outset might have been perhaps easily
repaired. But the longer it endured the more completely
did military authority overshadow civil authority;
and the one officer, Sir John Maxwell, whose long experience
of Egypt and whose popularity with Egyptians of
all classes went a long way to mitigate the harshness
of martial law, had been removed in the second year
of the war. The time came too when, in order to secure
the success of new operations on a very large scale against
Turkey in Palestine and Syria, the assurances originally
given by the British Government that the Egyptian people
would not be called upon for aid in the war, of which
Great Britain had taken upon herself the sole burden,
had to be considerably watered down in practice. Egypt
was the base of those operations. New railway lines
had to be laid with the utmost speed across the desert
from the Suez Canal to the old Turkish frontier, and
then pushed on again as fast as possible into Turkish
territory as our advance progressed. No labour was
available except Egyptian labour. At the same time,
the expeditionary force, which grew into a large army,
as well as the forces in Egypt itself, had to be kept constantly
supplied and fed, and the dearth of shipping and
the growing submarine danger in the Mediterranean made
it imperative to supply and feed them as far as possible
to pay handsomely for everything we required from the
Egyptians, and to induce Egyptian labour to volunteer
by the offer of attractive terms. But in practice those
excellent intentions were ultimately frustrated by the
increasing exigencies of the war, and very heavy burdens
were forcibly imposed upon Egypt, which unfortunately
fell chiefly on that section of the population that had
been least affected by the political agitation against the
British controlling power before the war.
The sudden fall in prices which, in Egypt as elsewhere,
followed the outbreak of war had hit the fellaheen very
hard, but measures were taken to avert a panic, and
within a year the pendulum had swung right away in the
other direction, and prices for all agricultural produce
soared steadily to heights never dreamt of before. The
lion's share of profits went to the large landowners.
They at once screwed up the rents of their tenants, a
large proportion of whom had always remained, and
preferred to remain, yearly tenants. But on the whole
the fellaheen themselves waxed fat, as has been shown
by the astonishing rapidity with which they began to
repay the loans granted to them by the Agricultural
Bank and other institutions. About the war itself they
for a long time knew little and cared less, though it
furnished not unwelcome material for wild rumours and
blood-curdling stories. They have so hated the Turks
from times immemorial that even the religious appeal
of their Khalif at Constantinople did not stir them
deeply. It was none the less an extraordinary piece
of folly on our part to make in a Mahomedan country
repeated collections, which, under pressure from the local
authorities, became really compulsory levies, for the Red
Cross, as the mere name lent itself to easy misrepresentation
and was in fact suspected of covering some mysterious
purpose of sectarian propaganda. But the fellaheen
had been told officially that they would not be made to
suffer in any way by the war, and as they were beginning
leave it at that, and even the Protectorate and the
dethronement of the Khedive made little impression on
them, as, to them, Sultan Hussein was well known
as an excellent landlord and agricultural expert. They
grumbled a little when, at the time of the Gallipoli
expedition, the army began to place large contracts
for clover and hay in the hands of Greek and other contractors,
who bought up the Egyptian supplies at low
prices and made huge profits for themselves. But the
civil authorities redressed this first grievance by taking
the purchase into their own hands and paying liberal
prices direct to the fellaheen themselves, Gradually,
however, in 1917 and 1918, under increasing war pressure,
the question of army supplies assumed a different complexion.
They became practically forced contributions.
Those who had the stuff to supply had little cause for
complaint except that payments were often slow to reach
them or melted away in transit. But the small fellah
who had not sufficient barley, or hay, or chopped straw
of his own to provide the quota demanded of him had
to buy it at ruinous prices from his more fortunate neighbours,
who, it was often suspected, had friends at court
and themselves got off lightly. Worse still was it when,
in November, 1917, his precious beasts of burden, his
donkeys and his camels, began to be requisitioned for
army transport. They were hired, it is true, at reasonable
rates, but nothing could fully make up for the loss of them,
and even if he ultimately received compensation for those
that were lost during the war, it was calculated, not on
the very much higher prices at which he could alone
replace them, but on the original valuation.
The most serious trouble of all came with the recruitment
of the Labour Corps in Egypt. It was started in
the summer of 1915 for participation in the operations
on the Gallipoli Peninsula, as an adjunct to the Mediterranean
Expeditionary Force, but in an entirely noncombatant
capacity. Its object was to furnish wholesale
service were such—clothing, food, and 30s. a month—
as to attract the Egyptian fellah in large numbers, particularly
at a time when low wages and much unemployment
still prevailed. No difficulty was experienced in
getting together a large number of men. The recruiting
was carried on in the provinces with the assistance of
provincial Mudirs and district Mamours and village
Omdehs, under the supervision of special "Egyptian
Labour Corps" officers, British residents or protected
subjects, and sometimes foreigners of Allied nationality,
who were collected without much discrimination and
very hastily trained.
After Gallipoli, the Corps was brought back to Egypt.
Some were sent to France and some to Mesopotamia.
Others were sent to the Suez Canal and beyond, when we
began to feel our way into the Sinai Peninsula. For
trench-digging, the crection of earthworks, road-making,
pipe-laying, etc., Egyptians could be freely employed
to release our own men for combatant duties. To a
fresh appeal early in 1916 the fellaheen again responded
freely. But before the year was out, and notably after
our unfortunate reverse at Katia, a revulsion of feeling
took place. Fear had crept into the minds of the labourers,
and still more so into the minds of their relatives in the
villages. The Corps had been under shell-fire. Men had
died whose deaths were not notified by the authorities
to their relatives. Typhus had broken out and was
making ravages. In the Egyptian villages the Labour
Corps suddenly became synonymous with the bottomless
pit. That was how the difficulty of enrolling fresh recruits
arose, though a great number of those who had
already served were still willing to re-enlist of their own
free will. The authorities failed to deal squarely with the
situation. Had they frankly adopted a system of conseription
to which the people were already accustomed
in the Egyptian army, and had they seen to it that it
was fairly enforced all round, not nearly so much harm
was kept up, whilst Mudirs were given to understand
that men were required and that no efforts should be
spared in getting them. The Mudir transmitted the
injunction to his Mamours and these in their turn to the
Omdehs. All through 1917 and 1918 the screw was put
on more and more severely as the military operations
expanded and the lines of communication grew longer,
for experience had proved that there are no better workers
than the Egyptians, whether on roads or railway embankments.
In some places the fellaheen began to fly from
their villages, and soldiers and police had to scour the
country to bring the "volunteers" in under escort to
the labour dépôts. The British military authorities
needed the men and asked no questions. The British
civil authorities, harassed and overworked, had lost touch
with the people. So many officials had been allowed to
go to the front or diverted to other kinds of war work,
that far too few were available to exercise any control
over what was going on in the interior. Such supervision
as was attempted had to be in most cases entrusted to
young officers, entirely ignorant of the country and the
language, who could only work through native officialdom,
or to men picked up in highways and byways who knew
only too well how to work in with native officialdom.
And native officialdom, left to itself, was callous or
frightened. The chief anxiety of the higher provincial
authorities, even of the better type, was to shuffle responsibility
on to the lower ones, and these in their turn
passed it on to those beneath them. Those of a worse
type saw opportunities of gaining kudos for zeal with the
British whilst feathering their own nests.
It was in the villages themselves that the worst things
happened. The whole system of village governance in
Egypt cries out for inquiry and reform. It assumed its
present form under Mehemet Ali, and many Egyptians
who have closely studied it maintain that the French
model, of which it was a clumsy adaptation, was never
Maire, is a Government official. Sometimes he may be
a large landowner; or more often he is just an ordinary
peasant. In any case he must own ten acres of land,
a qualification often acquired by very devious means.
There are 3,600 of them in Egypt, and a considerable
portion of them are petty tyrants who terrorise their
neighbours whilst maintaining themselves in office by
pandering in every way to their superiors. It can be
imagined what a chance the recruiting of the Labour
Corps offered to their cupidity and vindictiveness, and
how greedily they availed themselves of it. If the Mamour
of the district or the Mudir of the province was not a
man to be squared by the usual methods, he was not
likely, at any rate, to lay himself open to the suspicion
of lukewarmness with the British authorities by
obstructing any process of recruitment that yielded
good results. And all this could be done, and was
done, under shelter of "orders from the English Government."
The Egyptian Labour Corps rendered most valuable
services. It was well organised and, having regard to its
constitution and the purpose for which it was created,
well-officered, at least in the field. It grew continually
in size. The information semi-officially published by
the British military authorities with regard to the Egyptian
Labour and Transport Corps has been meagre. The
total strength of the Corps is put down at a much lower
figure than the estimate current in Egypt. "The
numbers involved," according to a "Record of the
Syrian Expedition" printed under authority, "eventually
reached a total of 135,000 men engaged on six months'
contracts, giving an annual turnover of some 270,000
men, apart from replacement of casualties." But it is not
clear whether these figures are meant to include the labour
"pools" mentioned as having been established "at the
base ports of Alexandria, Port Said, Kantara, and Suez."
In 1916, 10,463 men of the Egyptian Labour Corps,
whilst at the time of the Armistice there appear to have
been just over 100,000, besides about 35,000 assigned
to transport and other services, actually employed in
connection with the operations in Syria. The casualties
in the Labour Corps are not given, but only those in the
Camel and Donkey Transport Corps, amounting altogether
to 713, of which the great majority were deaths from
exposure. In his official despatches from the seat of war,
General Allenby paid more than one tribute to the great
importance of the services rendered by the Egyptian
Labour and Transport Corps and to the excellence of the
work done by them. Even if the official methods of
calculation do not convey a misleading impression as to
the call made in point of numbers from first to last on
the people of Egypt, it represents a not inconsiderable
percentage of a total male population of less than one and
a half million between the age of seventeen and thirty,
to which recruitment was chiefly confined. There is,
fortunately, no reason to believe that the men were
not on the whole well treated in the field and in camp.
The tales of widespread cruelty and injustice can be dismissed
as untrue. Harsh treatment and even brutality
there may have been, but they were, at any rate, the
exception, not the rule. The "Gippy" drivers in their
blue galoubiyehs with their camels and their donkeys
were very popular with our men, who knew how often
their food and their drinking water itself depended
on these transport services in an often waterless and
roadless country. With regard to the Labour Corps,
the following is another extract from the same "Record":
"Those who have seen many thousands of Egyptian
Labour Corps labourers on task work, either driving
a cutting with pick and fasse through Palestine clay, or
in their thousands carrying baskets of earth to pile up
some railway embankment, will long remember such
examples of intensive labour. No less striking was it to
watch the line of laden boats leaving the storeships
the beach, there to be hauled high up by teams of cheerful
Egyptians working to whistle signal under their own
officers." At times, particularly in 1917, hospital accommodation
and medical treatment were terribly inadequate,
but one must remember that Egyptians of the fellaheen
class have not yet learnt to set much store by such matters,
except when they are the actual sufferers, and the very
great frequency of re-enlistments, which were certainly
voluntary, shows that the Egyptian Labour Corps had
few serious grievances at the front.
But what the fellaheen as a whole felt and remembered
were the methods by which the Corps came to be ultimately
recruited in their villages. They quite wrongly
ascribed them to the direct orders of the British controlling
power, whereas they were just the old methods of
indigenous oppression revived by their own officials as
soon as the vigilance of the British controlling power was
relaxed. But because it was relaxed when it was most
needed, we cannot repudiate our responsibility for what
happened. When the war came to an end we had
certainly clarified the situation in Egypt by proclaiming
our Protectorate, but in other ways we had not by any
means strengthened our position. Sultan Hussein's
premature death had robbed us of the wise and loyal
ruler whom we had been fortunate enough to have the
opportunity of placing on the throne. Though we had
freed Egypt from the last vestiges of Turkish domination,
we had done nothing to secure the willing assent of
the Egyptians to the new relationship into which we
had forcibly brought them with the British Empire.
Though we had poured vast amounts of money into the
country and the war had ultimately brought unprecedented
wealth and prosperity to Egypt as a whole,
the people had suffered not only under the many restraints
which are almost unavoidably incidental to a state of war,
but also some grievous hardships which hit them all the
harder in that we had begun by promising them complete
nothing to gain the confidence of the educated classes,
whose impatience at the maintenance of even a veiled
Protectorate had been steadily increasing even before the
war, and we had for the first time profoundly estranged
the agricultural masses that form the vast majority of the
population.
| CHAPTER VII The Egyptian problem | |