T

CHAPTER IX

Russia and the Middle East, 1907—47

HE SUBJECT falls into six clearly-distinguished chronological
phases:

(1) The Tsarist Regime, down to 1917.

(2) The Revolutionary Wars, 1917-21*

(3) The Inter-War Period, 1921-39.

(4) The period of'Friendship' with Germany, 1939-41.

(5) The War, 1941-45-

(6) The Post-War Period.

(i) The Tsarist Period
With the signing of the Anglo-Russian Agreement over Persia
in 1907 the Russian government set to work to absorb completely
the northern zone of Persia. Its policy was made easier by the fact
that the British government was anxious to avoid friction with
Russia, in view of the overriding need to maintain the Triple
Entente as a bulwark against Germany, and had instructed
its Minister in Tehran in this sense. The Persian constitutional
revolution, which had begun in 1905, was now in mid-career,
and had inevitably upset what little stability there was in the
internal regime of Persia. In 1909 the Russians seat a military
force to support the reactionary Mohammed Ali Shah. The
Persian constitutionalists succeeded, however, in deposing
him, and power passed into the hands of the extremist so-
called 'Democrats', whose attitude was exasperatingly hostile
to the Russians. In 1911 the ex-Shah, with the connivance of
minor Russian officials if not of the government, passed through
Russia in disguise with a consignment of amis and ammunition
and made a lauding on the Caspian coast of Persia, but was defeated