ANGLO-RUSSIAN AGREEMENT.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 181, 9 June 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

ANGLO-RUSSIAN AGREEMENT.

Included in last week's war news was the brief intimation that the Petrograd newspaper "Novoe Vremva" had given publicity to a report that an agreement has been arrived at between Britain and Russia, covering Persia and ■Constantinople. If this be true, then, although the clauses of the new treaty -oan obviously do nothing more than set out in detail the result of one of the decisions arrived at two months ago in Paris, the completion of the agreement must be regarded as a most important step towards the attainment •of far-reaching results. British and Russian interests and aims in regard to Persia and Turkey have by no means travelled in happily parallel .lines, and those who have appreciated ■this fact have all through the war cn'tertained some little concern as to how .matters were eventually to work out. ■On a couple of occasions recently certain members of the Russian Duma ;have raised the subject, and have at.tacked the Minister for Foreign Affairs for his attitude in regard to it. .For instance, it is reported that on Mie 3rd April M. Markoff, a Conservative, >declared that all questions at issue between Russia and Great Britain were invariably decided against Russia, and he urged the Government to make the ' following demands: ''Great Britain to .resign her claims to the Dardanelles; Russia to receive full control of the ■straits, Constantinople, Adrianople, and .a large part of Asia Minor, Gal'cia, .and Bukovina; Armenia and Trebizond to belong to Persia; and Palestine to •be brought under the joint administration of Russia and Britain." These are, of course, extreme demands, but they serve to indicate the trend of a •certain section of Russian opinion. M. rSazonoff, the Russian Minister for Foreign Affairs, is reported to have replied that "no agreement had been -made between Russia and Great Britain in respect to the Dardanelles which was ■unfavourable to Russia." Assuming it to be true that a comprehensive agreement has now been arrived at, it might, -as a contemporary puts it, savour o! -cooking the hare before it is caught, hut "there was everything in favour •of coming to an agreement, before the end of the war, as to what should be /done in the event of victory. Primarily it wdl have the effect of infusing ijiore ■co-operation and cohesion into the activities of the Allies, both in the chancellories and in the field. To remove from international relationship the .poison which has eftvenomed European policy for three-parts of the nineteenth -century, is to achieve something of :great practical value at this stage." It .has been pointed out, too, that one important result of the Auglo-Russan -agreement will be to remove the 'ear ■ entertained by some representative .men that Russian demands are pre venting the conclusion of a separate /peace with Turkey. When it is proved that the Russian and British demands .are identical, this suspicion must be at an end. It will be clear that the hope •of a separate peace with Turkey rests upon the ability of Turkey to cont.nue in the war, on her successful resistance to the Russian advance from Er- j -zerum, and on her fear that if she | were to make peace .she would be in •vonsiderab'e danger of an attack from Bulgaria. One writer, who evidently accepts the "Novoe Vremya's" report .as well-founded, is of opinion that the most important of the advantages gained by the new treaty is that it completes the work which was only half done by the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 "That treaty was hailed as the •end of an age-long rivalry. It purported to give Russia a predominant interest in the north of Persia, and Britain the same interest in the •south —or, rather, in that part of Persia which, in Lord Kitchener's phrase 'could be conveniently defended from India.' But :n a very few years the arrangement revealed its ov.n weakness. The Potsdam agreement let in the Germans with a promise of railway concessions in the north just at the time when they had begun to undermine ..lie British interests in the south. The Russian officials, with or without authority, began to put pressure on the Persian Government, and so created the nationalist feeling which last year made the position of the Allies in Persia so difficult. There is little doubt that the German Government, being willing to connive at anything in retiu'n tor concessions, might have obtained a dominating position both in Am a Minor and Persia. The Baghdad railway would have been linked up with another line from Teheran to Khaniken on the Persian frontier, which was to have been built with German money, and Baghdad would have been on the Highway to India. llie real importance of tlie Potsdam agreement vanished on the outbreak of w:;r, or, at all events, when the Prince of Reuss and hio bodyguard were driven out ot Persia. But unquestionably the Germans

have counted en roum ng tlii.-, field for th >ir enterprise after the war. They bargained for their ngi.t to build the Baghdad railway, to (name its offshoots and to send ihe goods carried Oil tnese line; into Xi.rthern Persia it a low tariff. Whntevi r peace Tur-

key may make, all th.se concessions ire now lost to Germany. The new treaty will define the arrangements on wh:ch Rusia and Great Britain will develop these field-, j.d will definitely put an end to the attempt made by the Potsdam agreement to make u-'eel tin 1 financial and commercial enterprise of the German nn n-hanls a- a lie :>ns of forwarding the militaiy ambitions ot the Government." Tli's, of eeinse, is all ba.sed upon the assumption 111■,t in agreement has really been negotiated. In any eas«, at this stage any opin'on as to the terms of the agreement tiiij-t be purely speculative, al-

though it may i>e eafe to assume that it will involve not inconsiderable coneessions to I»n.ssia, including the full and unrestricted use of the Dardanelles in t mes of peace and war.