Soleimani assassination only one of many (and not the most consequential) US acts of war against Iran

January 5, 2020
By Stephen Gowans
While the assassination of an Iranian general by a US drone attack in Iraq has been construed in some quarters as a consequential act of war, it is only one, in a long series of US actions, that constitute de facto acts of war by the United States against Iran that have caused considerable harm to the country.
Ever since Iranians overthrew the US puppet ruler, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, in 1979, Washington has pursued an unceasing campaign of aggression against the sovereign state with the aim of returning Iran to its orbit. Since 2018, US aggression has intensified. In a stepped up effort to topple the independence-minded government in Tehran, Washington has undertaken campaigns of destabilization on top of information-, cyber-, and economic-warfare—significant aggressions against which the assassination of Major General Qassem Soleimani is but a minor act.
Press TV
The roots of anti-Iranian US hostility can be summed up in one sentence: Tehran rejects the hegemony of the United States and its allies over the Middle East and the Muslim world. [1] This is consistent with the view of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. Iran, they testified before the US Congress in 2017, seeks to “counter the influence of the U.S. and our Allies.” [2] Accordingly, the Iranian government has been declared an enemy of the United States. In short, Washington insists on imposing its will on the Middle East, and Tehran refuses to submit to US despotism. A former Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, once expressed the Iranian position this way: “We tell [the United States] that instead of interfering in the region’s affairs, to pack their things and leave.” [3] Insisting there should be no limit to its global influence, Washington targets for elimination any force that insists limits must be imposed. Advocacy of local independence and national assertiveness, in the US view, is an act of war against the United States, and must be met by aggression. That, at its base, explains Soleimani’s demise, and explains the character of US foreign policy—thuggery in the service of an international dictatorship.
The immediate goal of Washington’s campaigns of destabilization and information- and economic-warfare “is to spur uprisings in Iran that would lead to the overthrow of the cleric-led government,” according to The New York Times. [4] Washington is using economic tools to destroy the Iranian economy, along with US influence over media to mislead the Iranian population into attributing the collapse of their economy to government mismanagement, and therefore to view the solution to their misery as the overthrow of their own government.
Acts of war I: Economic terrorism
To destroy Iran’s economy, Washington has acted to cut Iran’s oil exports to zero. Additionally, by “sanctioning many of the country’s largest banks, including its central bank, it has severed most of Iran’s financial ties to the world. Other major non-oil sources of revenue have also been targeted—including the auto, aluminum, and petrochemical sectors—and insurers are prohibited from covering Iranian shipments,” according to The Wall Street Journal. [5] The sanctions, in the words of US president Donald Trump, are “massive.” [6] Indeed, the United States has used its economic weight and pressure on other countries to impose a total embargo on Iran, adding the Islamic republic to the list of countries now facing a total US embargo, including Venezuela, North Korea, Syria and Cuba. [7] Significantly, all of these countries share a single thing in common: refusal to submit to US domination.
The “massive” sanctions are hardly limited, surgical, or targeted—that is, restricted to government figures with exemptions for the civilian population. On the contrary, as the Iranian diplomat Majid Takht-Ravanchi explained to the United Nations Security Council in June,
The sanctions are basically designed to harm the general public, particularly those who are vulnerable, such as women, children, the elderly and patients. The sanctions harm the poor more than the rich, the ill more than the healthy and infants and children more than adults. In short, those who are most vulnerable suffer the most. For instance, patients who have severe conditions and therefore need scarce and expensive medicines and advanced medical equipment, which in most cases must be imported, suffer the most. [8]
“Sanctions aren’t an alternative to war,” tweeted Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif in June. “They ARE war.” [9] Indeed, if we define war as the use of harm to achieve political ends, then harmful coercive economic measures are acts of war. As Takht-Ravanchi told the Security Council,
The United States is weaponizing food and medicine against civilians, which is a clear manifestation of the collective punishment of an entire nation, amounting to a crime against humanity and thus entailing international responsibility. [10]
Terrorism is the deliberate harm of civilians to achieve political goals. Economic warfare is terrorism. Washington’s anti-Iranian sanctions program has a clear political aim: to topple the independence-minded government in Tehran in order to re-assert US hegemony over the country. And there is no question it is aimed at civilians. US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, acknowledged the terrorist nature of the US economic warfare campaign when he said “The Iranian leadership has to make a decision that they want their people to eat.” [11]
“These days, the biggest, baddest weapon in the American arsenal isn’t a missile, or a tank, or a fighter jet. It is America’s economic clout,” remarked Gerald F. Seib, a columnist with The Wall Street Journal. [12] Patrick Cockburn, the veteran Middle East correspondent with The Independent, echoed Seib:
Because the media and much of the political establishment in Washington and western capitals are so viscerally anti-Trump, they frequently underestimate the effectiveness of his reliance on American economic might… At the end of the day, the US Treasury is a more powerful instrument of foreign policy than the Pentagon for all its aircraft carriers and drones. [13]
The US drone strike on Soleimani killed a handful of soldiers, people who had devoted their lives to local independence and national assertiveness. The Treasury Department’s sanctions have harmed vastly more people—of a different category: civilians, the victims of the United States’ crazed drive to extend its dictatorship over as many countries as will bow to US coercion.
Pompeo’s threat to starve Iranians unless Tehran capitulates to US demands was anticipated by Martinique-born Algerian revolutionary Frantz Fanon, author of The Wretch of the Earth. ”’When a colonial and imperialist power is forced to give independence to a people, this imperialist power says: ‘you want independence? Then take it and die of hunger.’ Because the imperialists continue to have economic power,” remarked the late Italian philosopher Domenico Losurdo, “they can condemn a people to hunger, by means of blockades, embargoes, or underdevelopment.” [14]
Acts of war II: Information warfare
Annihilating the Iranian economy is easily within the Treasury Department’s power, but misleading tens of millions of Iranians into understanding their misery as originating in their own government’s mismanagement, rather than US economic terrorism, is a task of an altogether different sort. In an effort to “win over the Iranian public” Washington has launched “an information campaign blaming the country’s economic hardship on its leaders and discrediting those who oppose the White House’s policies,” according to The Wall Street Journal. “The campaign aims to erode public support for the leadership in Tehran with hashtags, YouTube videos and traditional pro-U. S. media outlets broadcasting in the Middle East.” [15]
To this end, Washington “has helped anti-Iranian government hashtags to trend on Twitter, including #40YearsofFailure that coincided with the 40th anniversary of the country’s revolution. It has used Persian-language social media to blame deadly floods … on government mismanagement, tapping into a complaint many Iranians have made.” Additionally, Washington relies on its formal propaganda apparatus, the Voice of America, to beam messages aimed at discrediting the Iranian government to 14 million residents of Iran. [16] The propagation of lies to discredit a state in order to destabilize it and bring down its government is every bit as much an act of war as the assassination of Soleimani.
And when Washington isn’t using its influence over information media to try control the minds of Iranians, it’s acting to silence those who present an opposing point of view. Last year, Instagram cancelled Soleimani’s account, after Washington designated him the head of a foreign terrorist organization—an act of stunning hypocrisy, considering that the US government is targeting the entire Iranian population with harm in order to achieve its political goals, i.e., is practicing terrorism. What’s more, US terrorism is carried out on a massive scale, far in excess of anything the insurgents Washington labels as terrorists could ever hope to emulate. Additionally, Washington moved to discredit expatriate Iranians who contested the US war on Iran by dubbing them as propagandists for the Iranian government. According to The Wall Street Journal, “an online platform funded by the State Department, the Iran Disinformation Project, spearheaded a campaign to discredit Iranian journalists and scholars living in the U.S. and Europe, accusing them of being mouthpieces for the Iranian regime.” Their offense was to support the 2015 nuclear deal. [17]
Acts of war III: Covert CIA action
The total embargo of Iran is the principal means by which Washington intends to destabilize the country. But Washington is also relying on CIA covert action to help foster political instability. In 2017, The New York Times, citing multiple US defense and intelligence officials, reported that the Trump administration intended to use US “spies to help oust the Iranian government.” [18] The CIA destabilization program would be led by Michael D’Andrea, nicknamed “the Dark Prince”, who led the hunt for Osama bin Laden. In the years after 9/11, D’Andrea was “deeply involved in the detention and interrogation program,” which resulted in the torture and deaths of a number of prisoners. [19]
Citing a former US military commander, The New York Times reported that “there was a range of options that the Pentagon and the C.I.A. could pursue that could keep Iran off balance but that would not have ‘crystal-clear attribution’ to the United States.” [20] These included putting a bounty “on Iran’s paramilitary and proxy forces” to encourage “mercenary forces to take on Hezbollah and other Iranian proxies.” It could also include spreading “information, either embarrassing truths or deliberate false rumors, aimed at undermining the support that Tehran’s elites have for Iran’s leaders.” Additionally, Washington could provide assistance to Iran’s labor movement to make its protests against the government more effective. [21]
Acts of war IV: Cyber options
On top of these acts of war, Washington has carried on an ongoing campaign of cyberwarfare against the Iranian state. According to The New York Times, “The head of United States Cyber Command, Army Gen. Paul M. Nakasone, describes his strategy as ‘persistent engagement.’” According to a senior US defense official, US operatives “are carrying out constant low-level digital attacks.” [22] One of the most ambitions campaigns of cyberwarfare ever launched, namely, the Stuxnet virus, was developed jointly by the United States and Israel to disrupt Iran’s entirely legal uranium processing activities.
Of the multiple means Washington has used to try to impose its will on Iran and negate the country’s sovereignty—from total embargo, to the deliberate spreading of lies, to the suppression of alternative voices, to aid to dissidents, to persistent harassment of the Iranian state through cyber-operations—the assassination of the Quds Brigade commander has been the least significant in producing harm to Iran and perhaps the most likely to backfire and harm the United States.
Fighting back
What measures may a state legitimately take, in a de facto or de jure state of war, to protect itself from an aggressor? In 1939, the British authorities rounded up and jailed members of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists. While Mosley’s followers were not accused of crimes, [23] their loyalty was deemed to be questionable. Accordingly, they posed a credible threat to national security during a period of acute crisis, and were duly incarcerated. Few people today would challenge the British government’s decision to lock up British fascists while the country was at war with a fascist state. Neither would they question the decision to suspend elections and confer extraordinary powers on the prime minister, that is, to establish a totalitarian state, while the country was at war.
There is no question that Iran finds itself in a state of emergency and a de facto state of war, arising through no fault of its own, but through Washington’s unceasing efforts to project its influence over the entire face of the globe and negate the sovereignty of other states. Whatever political police state measures Tehran takes to protect itself from US despotism are fully justified under the standards invoked by leading Western democracies during two world wars and other national emergencies.
I make this point because there is a principle that lies at the heart of Iran’s struggle against US tyranny—the principle of independence and local sovereignty, one which partisans of the tradition of equality, liberty, and international solidarity must defend. Defending this principle, however, can be difficult. Witness Washington’s attempts to discredit expatriate Iranians who have spoken out against the de facto US war. To avoid such difficulties, some seek an escape route. A favored tactic is to eschew support for states deemed official enemies of the United States on the grounds that they are police states, or authoritarian, or have abridged human rights. Of course, all of these descriptions fit. But if official enemies are police states, it is because they have been made so by US actions, in the same way the crises of world wars made leading Western democracies into robust police states. If we’re genuinely concerned with human rights, political openness, and political democracy, the way to make these institutions flower is to stop Western governments from poisoning the soil in which the institutions thrive.
Deciding one’s attitude to targets of US aggression on the basis of whether they’re police states sets an impossible standard. It mandates that countries attacked by the West must deny themselves the same defenses their own countries have taken in times of emergency to merit our support. In this view, our solidarity and assistance are available only to those who allow themselves to be victimized, while those who act in the real world, in realistic and consequential ways in defense of laudable principles and aims, are shunned, deplored, ostracized, and excoriated. The consequences of this for the preservation of the principles of democracy on an international scale, for self-determination, and for equality, are not difficult to discern.
Conclusion
While the US assassination of Qassem Soleimani was an act of international barbarity, emblematic of the thuggish nature of US foreign policy, it was neither the only de facto act of war the United States has undertaken against Iran, nor the most harmful. Indeed, against the total embargo Washington has imposed on Iran with the intention of starving Iranians into submission or inducing them to overthrow their government, the killing of Soleimani is a act of little consequence, even if its significance in provoking widespread outrage and galvanizing opposition to US aggression is undoubted.
1. Said K. Aburish, The Rise, Corruption and Coming Fall of the House of Saud, Bloomsbury, 2005, p. 137.
2. Posture statement of 19th Chairman of the joint Chiefs of Staff before the 115th Congress Senate Armed Services Budget Hearing, June 13, 2017.
3. Howard Schneider, “Iran, Syria mock U.S. policy, Ahmadinejad speaks of Israel’s ‘annihilation’”, The Washington Post, February 26, 2010.
4. Edward Wong, “U.S. Turns Up Pressure on Iran With Sanctions on Transportation Firms,” The New York Times, December 11, 2019.
5. Ian Talley and Rebecca Ballhaus, “Trump imposes sanctions on Iran’s supreme leader, others,” The Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2019.
6. Michael R. Gordon, Ian Talley and Laurence Norman, “US plans new Iran sanctions as Europe tries to defuse tensions,” The Wall Street Journal, June 23, 2019.
7. Vivian Salama, “US expands sanctions against Venezuela into an embargo,” The Wall Street Journal, August 5, 2019.
8. Takht Ravanchi (Islamic Republic of Iran) 8564th meeting of the United Nations Security Council, 26 June 2019.
9. Laurence Norman and Stacy Meichtry, “Iran threatens to pull out of nuclear treaty, like North Korea,” The Wall Street Journal, June 27, 2019.
10. Takht Ravanchi.
11. Mike Pompeo, November 7, 2018, quoted in ”Iran letter to the UNSG and UNSC on Pompeo provocative statement,” Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran, November 30, 2018.
12. Gerald F. Seib, “The risks in overusing America’s big economic weapon,” The Wall Street Journal, May 13, 2019.
13. Patrick Cockburn, “Europe doesn’t have the power to be much more than a spectator in the escalating US-Iran conflict,” The Independent, May 11, 2019.
14. Domenico Losurdo, “The New Colonial Counter-Revolution,” Revista Opera, October 20, 2017.
15. Sune Engel Rasmussen and Michael Amon, “US aims a megaphone at Iranian public as part of pressure campaign,” The Wall Street Journal, July 25, 2019.
16. Rasmussen and Amon.
17. Ibid.
18. Matthew Rosenberg and Adam Goldman, “CIA names the ‘dark prince’ to run Iran operations, signaling a tougher stance,” The New York Times, June 2, 2017.
19. Ibid.
20. Julian E. Barnes, Eric Schmitt and Thomas Gibbons-Neff, “White House is pressing for additional options, including cyberattacks, to deter Iran,” The New York times, June 23, 2019.
21. Ibid.
22. Julian E. Barnes, “US cyberattack hurt Iran’s ability to target oil tankers, officials say,” The New York Times, August 28, 2019.
23. David A. Price, “’Agent Jack’ review: Tell it to Hitler.” The Wall Street Journal, November 8, 2019.
Reference:  https://gowans.blog/
***************************************
Background on Iran etc. :

The Project Gutenberg eBook, History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8), by Procopius, Translated by H. B. Dewing

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Title: History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8)
The Persian War
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PROCOPIUS

HISTORY OF THE WARS,
BOOKS I AND II



WITH AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY

H.B. DEWING



LONDON
WILLIAM HEINEMANN LTD
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS

HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS

MCMLXXI


First printed 1914



HISTORY OF THE WARS




INTRODUCTION


Procopius is known to posterity as the historian of the eventful reign of Justinian (527-565 A.D.), and the chronicler of the great deeds of the general Belisarius. He was born late in the fifth century in the city of Caesarea in Palestine. As to his education and early years we are not informed, but we know that he studied to fit himself for the legal profession. He came as a young man to Constantinople, and seems to have made his mark immediately. For as early as the year 527 he was appointed legal adviser and private secretary[1] to Belisarius, then a very young man who had been serving on the staff of the general Justinian, and had only recently been advanced to the office of general. Shortly after this Justinian was called by his uncle Justinus to share the throne of the Roman Empire, and four months later Justinus died, leaving Justinian sole emperor of the Romans. Thus the stage was set for the scenes which are presented in the pages of Procopius. His own activity continued till well nigh the end of Justinian's life, and he seems to have outlived his hero, Belisarius.
During the eventful years of Belisarius' campaigning in Africa, in Italy, and in the East, Procopius was moving about with him and was an eye-witness of the events he describes in his writings. In 527 we find him in Mesopotamia; in 533 he accompanied Belisarius to Africa; and in 536 he journeyed with him to Italy. He was therefore quite correct in the assertion which he makes rather modestly in the introduction of his history, that he was better qualified than anyone else to write the history of that period. Besides his intimacy with Belisarius it should be added that his position gave him the further advantage of a certain standing at the imperial court in Constantinople, and brought him the acquaintance of many of the leading men of his day. Thus we have the testimony of one intimately associated with the administration, and this, together with the importance of the events through which he lived, makes his record exceedingly interesting as well as historically important. One must admit that his position was not one to encourage impartiality in his presentation of facts, and that the imperial favour was not won by plain speaking; nevertheless we have before us a man who could not obliterate himself enough to play the abject flatterer always, and he gives us the reverse, too, of his brilliant picture, as we shall see presently.
Procopius' three works give us a fairly complete account of the reign of Justinian up till near the year 560 A.D., and he has done us the favour of setting forth three different points of view which vary so widely that posterity has sometimes found it difficult to reconcile them. His greatest work, as well as his earliest, is the History of the Wars, in eight books. The material is not arranged strictly according to chronological sequence, but so that the progress of events may be traced separately in each one of three wars. Thus the first two books are given over to the Persian wars, the next two contain the account of the war waged against the Vandals in Africa, the three following describe the struggle against the Goths in Italy. These seven books were published together first, and the eighth book was added later as a supplement to bring the history up to about the date of 554, being a general account of events in different parts of the empire. It is necessary to bear in mind that the wars described separately by Procopius overlapped one another in time, and that while the Romans were striving to hold back the Persian aggressor they were also maintaining armies in Africa and in Italy. In fact the Byzantine empire was making a supreme effort to re-establish the old boundaries, and to reclaim the territories lost to the barbarian nations. The emperor Justinian was fired by the ambition to make the Roman Empire once more a world power, and he drained every resource in his eagerness to make possible the fulfilment of this dream. It was a splendid effort, but it was doomed to failure; the fallen edifice could not be permanently restored.
The history is more eneral than the title would imply, and all the important events of the time are touched upon. So while we read much of the campaigns against the nations who were crowding back the boundaries of the old empire, we also hear of civic affairs such as the great Nika insurrection in Byzantium in 532; similarly a careful account is given of the pestilence of 540, and the care shewn in describing the nature of the disease shews plainly that the author must have had some acquaintance with the medical science of the time.
After the seventh book of the History of the Wars Procopius wrote the Anecdota, or Secret History. Here he freed himself from all the restraints of respect or fear, and set down without scruple everything which he had been led to suppress or gloss over in the History through motives of policy. He attacks unmercifully the emperor and empress and even Belisarius and his wife Antonina, and displays to us one of the blackest pictures ever set down in writing. It is a record of wanton crime and shameless debauchery, of intrigue and scandal both in public and in private life. It is plain that the thing is overdone, and the very extravagance of the calumny makes it impossible to be believed; again and again we meet statements which, if not absolutely impossible, are at least highly improbable. Many of the events of the History are presented in an entirely new light; we seem to hear one speaking out of the bitterness of his heart. It should be said, at the same time, that there are very few contradictions in statements of fact. The author has plainly singled out the empress Theodora as the principal victim of his venomous darts, and he gives an account of her early years which is both shocking and disgusting, but which, happily, we are not forced to regard as true. It goes without saying that such a work as this could not have been published during the lifetime of the author, and it appears that it was not given to the world until after the death of Justinian in 565.
Serious doubts have been entertained in times past as to the authenticity of the Anecdota, for at first sight it seems impossible that the man who wrote in the calm tone of the History and who indulged in the fulsome praise of the panegyric On the Buildings could have also written the bitter libels of the Anecdota. It has come to be seen, however, that this feeling is not supported by any unanswerable arguments, and it is now believed to be highly probable at least, that the Anecdota is the work of Procopius. Its bitterness may be extreme and its calumnies exaggerated beyond all reason, but it must be regarded as prompted by a reaction against the hollow life of the Byzantine court.
The third work is entitled On the Buildings, and is plainly an attempt to gain favour with the emperor. We can only guess as to what the immediate occasion was for its composition. It is plain, however, that the publication of the History could not have aroused the enthusiasm of Justinian; there was no attempt in it to praise the emperor, and one might even read an unfavourable judgment between the lines. And it is not at all unlikely that he was moved to envy by the praises bestowed upon his general, Belisarius. At any rate the work On the Buildings is written in the empty style of the fawning flatterer. It is divided into six short books and contains an account of all the public buildings of Justinian's reign in every district of the empire. The subject was well chosen and the material ample, and Procopius lost no opportunity of lauding his sovereign to the skies. It is an excellent example of the florid panegyric style which was, unfortunately, in great favour with the literary world of his own as well as later Byzantine times. But in spite of its faults, this work is a record of the greatest importance for the study of the period, since it is a storehouse of information concerning the internal administration of the empire.
The style of Procopius is in general clear and straightforward, and shews the mind of one who endeavours to speak the truth in simple language wherever he is not under constraint to avoid it. At the same time he is not ignorant of the arts of rhetoric, and especially in the speeches he is fond of introducing sounding phrases and sententious statements. He was a great admirer of the classical writers of prose, and their influence is everywhere apparent in his writing; in particular he is much indebted to the historians Herodotus and Thucydides, and he borrows from them many expressions and turns of phrase. But the Greek which he writes is not the pure Attic, and we find many evidences of the influence of the contemporary spoken language.
Procopius writes at times as a Christian, and at times as one imbued with the ideas of the ancient religion of Greece. Doubtless his study of the classical writers led him into this, perhaps unconsciously. At any rate it seems not to have been with him a matter in which even consistency was demanded. It was politic to espouse the religion of the state, but still he often allows himself to speak as if he were a contemporary of Thucydides.
The text followed is that of Haury, issued in the Teubner series, 1905-1913.



CONTENTS

BIBLIOGRAPHY


The editio princeps of Procopius was published by David Hoeschel, Augsburg, 1607; the Secret History was not included, and only summaries of the six books of the work On the Buildings were given. The edition is not important except as being the first.
The Secret History was printed for the first time separately with a Latin translation by Alemannus, Lyon, 1623.
The first complete edition was that of Maltretus, Paris, 1661-63, reprinted in Venice, 1729; the edition included a Latin translation of all the works, which was taken over into the edition of Procopius in the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae by Dindorf, Bonn, 1833-38.
Two editions of recent years are to be mentioned: Domenico Comparetti, La Guerra Gotica di Procopio di Cesarea; testo Greco emendato sui manoscritti con traduxione Italiana, Rome, 1895-98; 3 vols. Jacobus Haury, Procopii Caesariensis Opera Omnia, Leipzig, 1905-13; 3 vols. (Bibl. Teub.).
Among a number of works on Procopius or on special subjects connected with his writings the following may be mentioned:
Felix Dahn: Procopius von Cäsarea, Berlin, 1865.
Julius Jung: Geographisch-Historisches bei Procopius von Caesarea, Wiener Studien 5 (1883) 85-115.
W. Gundlach: Quaestiones Procopianae, Progr. Hanau, 1861, also Dissert. Marburg, 1861.
J. Haury: Procopiana, Progr. Augsburg, 1891.
B. Pancenko: Ueber die Geheimgeschichte des Prokop, Viz. Vrem. 2 (1895).
J. Haury: Zur Beurteilung des Geschichtschreibers Procopius von Caesarea, Munich, 1896-97. 1971. The Teubner edition in 4 volumes by J. Haury (1905-1913) has been re-edited by G. Wirth.
[1]
ξύμβουλος, Proc. Bell. I. xii. 24. He is elsewhere referred to as πάρεδρος or ύπογραφεύς.

another book :
The Project Gutenberg EBook of Persia Revisited, by Thomas Edward Gordon
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Title: Persia Revisited
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Produced by Karen Lofstrom and PG Distributed Proofreaders. Produced from images provided by the Million Book Project.

PERSIA REVISITED

[Illustration: H.I.M. Nasr-ed-Din, The Late Shah, on the steps of the Peacock Throne]
* * * * *
PERSIA REVISITED
(1895)
WITH REMARKS ON H.I.M. MOZUFFER-ED-DIN SHAH, AND THE PRESENT SITUATION IN PERSIA
(1896)
BY
GENERAL SIR THOMAS EDWARD GORDON
K.C.I.E., C.B., C.S.I.
Formerly Military Attaché and Oriental Secretary to Her Majesty's Legation at Tehran.
Author of 'The Roof of the World'
ILLUSTRATED
* * * * *

PREFACE

On revisiting Tehran last autumn, I was struck with the evidence of progress and improvement in Persia, and on returning home I formed the idea of publishing a short account of my journey, with observations and opinions which are based on my previous experiences, and have reference also to what has been recorded by others. In carrying out this idea, I have made use of information given in the well-known books on Persia by Malcolm, Fraser, Watson and Curzon.
'Persia Revisited,' as first written, comprised up to Chapter VI. of the book; but just as I had finished it for publication, the sad news of the assassination of the Shah, Nasr-ed-Din, was received. I then saw that my book, to be complete, should touch on the present situation in Persia, and accordingly I added two chapters which deal with the new Shah and his brothers, and the Sadr Azem and the succession.
The illustrations are from photographs by M. Sevragine of Tehran, with the exception of the likeness of H.I.M. the Shah Mozuffer-ed-Din, and that of H.H. Ali Asghar Khan, Sadr Azem, which latter, by Messrs. W. and D. Downey, of Ebury Street, London, is published by their kind permission.
T.E. GORDON.
May, 1896.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.

—London to Baku
—Oil-wells and works
—Persians abroad
—Caspian steamers
—Caspian salmon
—Enzelli lagoon
—The Jews in Persia
—Resht trade
—'My eye'
—Russian road
—The tobacco 'strike,' 1891
—Collapse of Tobacco Régie
—Moulla opposition

CHAPTER II.

—The late Shah's long reign
—His camp life
—Habits
—Appearance
—Persian Telegraph Intelligence Department
—Farming the revenues
—Condition of the people
—The shoe question
—The Customs
—Importation of arms
—Martini-Henry rifles
—Indo-European telegraph

CHAPTER III.

—Kasvin grapes
—Persian wine
—Vineyards in Persia
—Wine manufacture
—Mount Demavend
—Afshar volcanic region
—Quicksilver and gold
—Tehran water-supply
—Village quarrels
—Vendetta
—Tehran tramways
—Bread riots
—Mint and copper coin

CHAPTER IV.

—Religious tolerance in Tehran
—Katie Greenfield's case
—Babi sect
—Liberal opinions
—German enterprise in Persia
—Railways in Asia Minor
—Russian road extension
—Railways to Persian frontiers
—The Karun River
—Trade development
—The Kajar dynasty
—Life titles
—Chieftainship of tribes
—Sanctuary
—The Pearl cannon

CHAPTER V.

—The military tribes and the royal guard
—Men of the people as great monarchs
—Persian sense of humour
—Nightingales and poetry
—Legendary origin of the royal emblem
—Lion and Sun
—Ancient Golden Eagle emblem
—The Blacksmith's Apron the royal standard

CHAPTER VI.

—The Order of the Lion and the Sun
—Rex and Dido
—Dervishes
—Endurance of Persian horses
—The Shah's stables
—The sanctuary of the stable
—Long-distance races
—A country of horses
—The gymkhana in Tehran
—Olive industry near Resht
—Return journey
—Grosnoje oil field
—Russian railway travelling
—Improved communication with Tehran

CHAPTER VII.

THE SITUATION IN PERSIA (1896).
I.
—Shrine of Shah Abdul Azim
—Death of Nasr-ed-Din Shah
—Jemal-ed-Din in Tehran
—Shiahs and Sunnis
—Islam in Persia

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SITUATION IN PERSIA (1896).
II.
—The Shah Mozuffer-ed-Din
—His previous position at Tabriz
—Character and disposition
—His sons
—Accession to the throne
—Previous accessions in the Kajar-dynasty
—Regalia and crown jewels
—Position of the late Shah's two sons, Zil-es-Sultan and Naib-es-Sultaneh
—The Sadr Azem (Grand Vazir)
—Prompt action on the death of the late Shah
* * * * *
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

H.I.M. NASR-ED-DIN, THE LATE SHAH, ON THE STEPS OF THE PEACOCK THRONE

FEMALE PIPE-BEARER OF THE ANDERUN
PERSIAN LADY AT HOME
ARMENIAN MOTHER AND CHILDREN
THE PRESENT SHAH (WHEN VALI-AHD) ENTERING HIS CARRIAGE
PERSIAN TURK OF THE MILITARY TRIBES
A MENDICANT DERVISH OF TEHRAN
A DERVISH STORY-TELLER OF TEHRAN
H.I.M. MOZUFFER-ED-DIN SHAH
H.H. ALI ASGHAR KHAN, SADR-AZEM
* * * * *

INSCRIPTION ON THE SEAL OF THE LATE SHAH, SHOWN ON THE COVER.

'El Sultan, Bin el Sultan, Bin el Sultan, Bin el Sultan. El Sultan, Nasr-ed-Din Shah, Kajar.'
'The King, Son of the King, Son of the King, Son of the King. The King, Nasr-ed-Din Shah, Kajar line.'
* * * * *

PERSIA REVISITED

CHAPTER I.
—London to Baku
—Oil-wells and works
—Persians abroad
—Caspian steamers
—Caspian salmon
—Enzelli lagoon
—The Jews in Persia
—Resht trade
—'My eye'
—Russian road
—The tobacco 'strike,' 1891
—Collapse of Tobacco Régie
—Moulla opposition.
The Persians, as a people still nomadic in their habits, and much given to long pilgrimages, have good knowledge of the ways and means of making a journey pleasant. Their saying, 'Avval rafîk, baad tarîk' (First a companion, then the road), is one which most travellers can fully appreciate. Accordingly, when planning a trip in the autumn of 1895 to the Land of Iran, I cast about for a companion, and was fortunate enough to meet with two friends, both going that way, and who, moreover, like myself, had previously journeyed in Persia.
We decided to take the Odessa route to Batoum, and we went by Berlin, Oderberg, and Lemberg. At Odessa we found that a less expensive, and more comfortable, though perhaps half a day longer route, lies by Warsaw. On that line there are fewer changes, and only one Customs examination, whereas by, Oderberg there are two examinations, Austrian and Russian. Moreover, through tickets are issued viâ Warsaw, a convenience not provided viâ Oderberg—fresh tickets and re-booking of luggage being necessary there, and again both at Pod Voloczyska and Voloczyska, on the Austrian and Russian frontiers. We came in for a crowded train of first-class passengers going from the Vienna direction to Jalta, a favourite seaside place in the Crimea, which has two fashionable seasons—spring and autumn. These people were making for the accelerated mail-steamer, which leaves Odessa for Batoum every Wednesday during the summer service, touching at Sebastopol, Jalta, and Novorossisk. We were making for the same steamer, and found crowded cabins. The mass of luggage to be examined at Voloczyska caused much confusion and delay, and it was only by discreetly managed appeals to the working staff that we were able to push our way and pass on, without anything being left behind. There appeared to be orders for very special examination of books and papers at Voloczyska, and these were carried out in a foolishly perfunctory manner. In my luggage, the man who searched passed over a bulky tourist writing-case, but carried off to a superior a Continental Bradshaw, a blank notebook, and a packet of useful paper, notwithstanding my open show of their innocence. The man soon returned with another official, who smiled at the mistake, and good naturedly helped to close up my baggage.
We began our journey well by a rapid run to Odessa, arriving there on the day of departure of the fast boat, and landing at Batoum in six and a half days from London. The steamers on this service are about 2,500 tons, 2,400 horse-power, with large accommodation for passengers. The cabins are comfortable, and the saloons excellent and well served, and all are lit with the electric light. These boats are, I believe, Tyne-built. They are broad of beam, and behave well in bad weather. Novorossisk is a growing great port, situated in a very pretty bay. It has lately been joined by railway to the main trunk line connecting with Moscow, and passing through Rostov. This connection enables it to attract considerable trade from the Don and the Volga, and also to take much from Rostov and Taganrog, when the Azov approaches are closed with ice. A very fine sea-wall, to give effectual protection to the railway loading-piers, and the shipping generally, is now being completed at a total cost of £850,000. Novorossisk is said to have the biggest 'elevator' in the world. The scenery all along the coast, from the Crimea to Batoum, is very fine, and in autumn the voyage is most enjoyable.
We left Batoum on the night of the day of our arrival. The departure of the through train to Baku had been changed from morning to night, and this allowed of travelling by day over that part of the line which before used to be passed at night. We had previously seen Tiflis, and therefore did not break our journey. The weather was warm, but not such as to cause discomfort. As we approached Tiflis the carriages and buffets became crowded to excess, with townspeople returning from Saturday-to-Monday holiday, the fine weather having enticed them out to various places along the line. The railway-carriages on the Batoum-Baku line are very comfortable, and the refreshment-rooms are frequent and well provided, so travelling there is made easy and pleasant. The journey occupies thirty-two hours.
We reached Baku on September 16, the ninth day from London, and arranged to leave for Enzelli, on the Persian coast, the port for Tehran, at midnight the next day. Through the kindness of a member of the Greek house of Kousis, Theophylactos and Co., we were shown over the oil-wells and refineries belonging to M. Taghioff, a millionaire of Persian origin (the name probably was Taghi Khan). The story goes that, on becoming wealthy through the oil industry in its early days, he presented the young township with a church, school-house, and hospital, and, in recognition of his generous public spirit, the Government gave him a grant of the waste land on which his works now stand, and out of which millions of roubles have come to him from oil-springs. Our visit had the appearance of bringing him luck in the form of a new fountain rush. We had seen all the works and wells; none of the latter were flowing, and the usual steam-pumping was going on. We were about to leave, when a commotion at the wells attracted our attention, and we saw the dark fluid spouting up from two to three hundred feet through the open top of the high-peaked wooden roof erected over each of the wells. On hurrying back, we saw the great iron cap, which is swung vertically when the pump is working, lowered and fixed at some height over the mouth of the well, to drive the outward flow down into the hollow all round and out into the ditch leading to the reservoirs. The force of the gush was shown by the roar of the dash against the iron cap, and the upward rush had the appearance of a solid quivering column. The flow was calculated at fifty thousand gallons an hour. The business of refining is generally in the hands of others than the producers; but some of the larger firms—notably the Rothschilds, Nobel Brothers, and Taghioff—are both producers and refiners. This means of course, the employment of very, much larger capital.
There is a great dash of the gambling element in the oil-well business at Baku. Large sums are spent in boring operations, and success so often stands off that all available capital is sunk in the ground and swallowed up. Even with good signs, it is impossible to foresee the results or the extent of production, and there is also an extraordinary irregularity in the outcome of the separate naphtha-bearing plots. An instance was mentioned to me of a peasant proprietor who had made enough money on which to live sumptuously, but he hungered for more, and engaged in further boring operations. He was on the verge of losing everything, when oil was suddenly struck, and he made a fortune. He laboured hard himself, and literally went to sleep a poor working man, and awoke to find his dream of riches realized.
Baku has been immensely improved in every way of late, and now has good streets, hotels, and shops. Water, which was a great want before, is well supplied from condensers which belong to the town. The rise in the value of house property and building sites within the last ten years has been enormous, and great part of the money thus made has gone to native owners, Persians (or Tartars, as all Mohammedans are called here), and I was told of a plot of building ground with a small house on it, which had been originally bought for 600 roubles, being lately sold for 30,000. The town is growing in size, and new buildings are rising, which give an appearance of prosperity and increasing trade. The harbour is crowded with steamers and sailing vessels, and the wharfs present a busy sight. The loading and unloading is quickly done by steam-cranes and powerful porters, who come in numbers from the Persian districts of Khalkhal and Ardabil. I watched with much interest a gang of these men at work. They were wonderfully quick, quiet, and methodical in their ways, and showed great capacity for handling and carrying heavy weights.
Baku swarms with Persians, resident and migratory. They are seen everywhere—as shopkeepers, mechanics, masons, carpenters, coachmen, carters, and labourers, all in a bustle of business, so different from Persians, at home. Climate or want of confidence produces indolence there, but here and elsewhere out of Persia they show themselves to be active, energetic, and very intelligent. They are in great numbers at all the censes of trade in the adjoining countries—at Constantinople, Damascus, Aleppo, Baghdad, Tiflis, Askhabad, and other towns. Most of the new buildings in Tiflis were built by Persians, and thousands were engaged in the construction of the Trans-Caspian Railway. The permanent workmen now employed on it are largely Persians, and Askhabad has a resident population of over twelve thousand. There were said to be twenty thousand Persians, from the provinces of Azerbaijan and Hamadan, working last summer on the new railway from Tiflis to Alexandropol and Kars, now being built, and doubtless many of them will permanently settle on the line.
It is said that there are half a million thus located and working out of Persia, but I think that this is an exaggerated estimate. Most of them retain their nationality, for while they grumble loudly in their own country, yet when away they swear by it, and save money steadily to enable them to return home. Their nomadic character is the cause of this readiness to seek employment abroad. I was told that in 1894-95 twenty thousand Persian passports were issued from the Embassy in Constantinople. This would include pilgrims as well as home visitors. It is this love of country (not in the sense, however, of patriotism as understood in the West) which makes a Persian cling to his national representative abroad, and willingly pay for frequent registration as a subject who is entitled to protection and permission to return home whenever he may choose. As a rule, the Persian abroad always appears in the distinctive national dress—the tall black lambskin cap and the coat with ample skirt of many pleats.
I have mentioned the Persian porters who are seen at Baku; they are also to be found at Petrovsk and Astrachan, and are generally preferred to the local labourers, who, in common with their class in Russia, take a long drink once a week, often unfitting them for their work the following day. The Persians are of sober habits, and can be relied upon for regular attendance at the wharfs and loading-stages. They have learnt, however, to take an occasional taste of the rakivodka spirit, and when reminded that they are Mohammedans, say that the indulgence was prohibited when no one worked hard. These porters are men of powerful physique, and display very great strength in bearing separate burdens; but they cannot work together and make a joint effort to raise heavy loads, beyond the power of one man. Singly, they are able to lift and carry eighteen poods, Russian weight, equal to six hundred and forty-eight pounds English.
In the newspaper correspondence on the burning Armenian Question, I have seen allusion made to the poor physique of the Armenian people; but as far as my observation goes in Persia, Russian Armenia, and the Caucasus, there is no marked difference between them and the local races, and on the railway between Baku and Tiflis Armenian porters of powerful form are common, where contract labour rates attract men stronger than their fellows.
Though much of the wealth which has come out of the Baku oil-fields has been carried away by foreign capitalists, yet much remains with the inhabitants, and the investment of this has promoted trade in the Caspian provinces, and multiplied the shipping. There are now between one hundred and eighty and two hundred steamers on the Caspian, besides a large number of sailing craft of considerable size, in which German and Swedish, as well as Armenian and Tartar-Persian, capital is employed. The Volga Steam Navigation Company is divided into two companies—one for the river, and the other for the Caspian. The latter owns six large steamers, with cargo capacity of from sixty to eighty thousand poods, liquid measurement, for oil-tank purposes, equalling nine hundred to twelve hundred tons. They have German under-officers, and Russian captains. It is likely that the German officers come from the German colonies on the Volga, and probably some of the capital also comes from that quarter. This Volga Steam Navigation Company was established over fifty years ago by a Scotchman, named Anderson, and some of the vessels first built are still used on the river as cargo-boats.
Many of the best steamers on the Caspian are officered by Swedes and Finns, most of whom speak English, acquired whilst serving in English ships sailing to all parts of the globe. The Mercury Company, which runs the superior steamers and carries the mails on the Caspian, has Swedish and Finn officers, but it is said that they are now to be replaced by Russian naval officers as vacancies occur. This company's vessels are well appointed, have good cabins, and are fitted with the electric light. But the best of Caspian mail-boats are most uncomfortable in rough weather for all but those whom no motion whatever can affect. Owing to the shoal water on all the coast circumference of this sea, the big boats are necessarily keelless, and may be described as but great barges with engines, and when at anchor in a rolling sea their movement is terribly disturbing.
We embarked in the Admiral Korneiloff, one of the Mercury Company's best boats, on the night of September 17, and arrived at Enzelli on the morning of the 19th. I was amused on the voyage to hear the sailors' version of the story how the Caspian became a Russian sea, on which no armed Persian vessel can sail. The sovereignty of this Persian sea was ceded to Russia by the Treaty of Gulistan in 1813, and the sailors say that on the Shah being pressed over and over again to consent, and desiring to find some good excuse to do so, a courtier, seeing the royal inclination, remarked that Persia suffered sorely from salt soil and water, which made land barren, and that sea-water was of no use for irrigation, nor any other good purpose. The Shah on this asked if it were really true that the water of the Caspian was salt, and on being assured that it was, he said the Russians might have the whole of it.
We found an improvement at Enzelli in the form of a hotel kept by a Greek, with accommodation good enough to be very welcome. We had excellent fresh salmon at breakfast, which reminded me of the doubt that has often been expressed of the true salmon being found in an inland sea. The Caspian fish is a genuine salmon of the same habits as the marine species known in Europe, with the one sad exception that it will not look at nor touch fly or bait in any form or shape, and therefore gives no sport for the rod. The trout in the upper waters of the streams that the salmon run up, take the fly freely and give good sport, but all attempts by keen and clever fishermen to hook a salmon have failed. The fish are largely netted, and same are sent to Tehran packed in ice, while a good business is done in salting what cannot be sold fresh. The existence of salmon in this inland salt sea, which lies eighty-four feet below the level of the ocean, is supposed to be due to its connection with the open sea having been cut off by a great upheaval in the prehistoric time.
After breakfast we were confronted with a functionary new to us in Persia, one charged with the demand for passports and their examination. He is prepared to provide passports for those arriving without them, and to visé when this has not been previously done. Considering the practice in force with Persia's near neighbour, and the crowd of deck-passengers always coming and going, it was not likely that this formality as a source of income would fail to be adopted. The linguistic educational qualification for the post is evidently confined to Russian, for on finding that I spoke Persian, the officer asked me for the information he pretended to seek from the English passports. He acknowledged the farce he was called upon to play, and we proceeded without any farther inquiry. The day was warm, but not oppressively so; the sea-breeze helped the boat across the lagoon and up the Pir-i-Bazaar stream, and the weather being dry, we reached Resht in carriages By the Mobarakabad route, without the splashing plunging through a sea of mud which is the general disagreeable experience of the main road.
The Enzelli Lagoon is a swarming haunt of numerous kinds of wild-fowl and fishing birds. Conspicuous among the waders in the shallows and on the shore are the pelican and the stork. The place is a paradise to them, teeming with fish and frog food. One of my companions described what he had witnessed in a struggle with a wounded stork in the shallow water of this lagoon. He and a friend were out after wild-duck, and his friend, desiring to bag a giant stork, which looked splendid in his strongly contrasted pure white and deep black plumage, fired, and wounded the bird. His Persian servant, with thoughts intent on cooking it, ran, knife in hand, to cut its throat in the orthodox manner, so as to make it lawful for a Mohammedan to eat. The bird, on being seized, struggled hard with its captor, and, snapping its elongated bill widely in wild terror, by accident got the man's head jammed between its mandibles. The keen cutting edges of the long strong beak scarified the man's cheeks, and made him scream with pain and with frantic fear that it was his throat which was being cut. His master went to his assistance and released him by wrenching open the stork's bill, but he was so occupied with supporting his swooning servant that time was given for the wounded stork to hurry away in safety, flapping its long wings and snapping its powerful beak, as is the habit of this voiceless bird, with all the appearance of triumph.
Enzelli is becoming the port of entry, for the North of Persia, of tea from India and China. Till within a very short time most of the tea for Persia, Trans-Caspia, and Russian Turkistan so far as Samarkand, passed up from Bombay by the Persian Gulf ports. The late reduction in Russian railway charges, and the low sea-freights from the East in the oil-steamers returning to Batoum, have brought about this change. Arrangements have been made for transit to Baku of Russian-owned tea consigned to Persia on special terms of Customs drawback, and it is now sold cheaper in Resht than in Baku, where it has a heavy duty added to the price. The thin muslin-like manufactures of India, in demand in Central Asia for wear in the hot dry summer, and which found their way there from the Persian Gulf, are now following the same route as the tea. Thus, steam and waterway are competing still more with the camel, to make the longest way round the shortest one in point of time, and the cheapest to the customers' homes.
As with tea, so Russian beet-sugar is cheaper at Enzelli-Resht than at Baku, owing to the State bounty on export. The consumption of tea and sugar, already large in Persia, is certain to increase in the North through this development of Russian trade. French beet-sugar continues to compete by way of Trebizond to Tabriz, but if the experiment now being tried of manufacturing sugar in the vicinity of Tehran from beet succeeds, the Persians will benefit further by competition.
The Russian trade in Persia is mostly in the hands of Armenians, some of whom have amassed considerable wealth. It is only in the West that the Jew is regarded as the sample of superior sharpness in the walks of life that call for the exercise of the qualities most necessary in the operation of getting the better of one's neighbour. In the East both the Greek and the Armenian are ahead of him in this respect, and the popular saying is, 'One Greek equals two Jews, and one Armenian equals two Greeks.' But, to the credit of the Armenian traders, it should be said that they are bold and enterprising in a newly-opened country, as well as clever in an old one. It may be here mentioned that there is no opening in Persia for the native Jew; he is there refused the facilities which lead to wealth, and is strictly confined to the poorest occupations. It is not unlikely that the severe treatment of the Jews in Persia has its origin in the hatred inspired by the conduct of Saad-u-Dowleh, a Jewish physician, who rose to the position of Supreme Vazir under the King Arghoun Khan, in 1284. This Minister owed his advancement to his pleasing manners and agreeable conversation, and he gained such an ascendancy over his weak royal master as to be allowed to remove all Mohammedans from places of trust and profit, and even to carry his persecution to the length of commanding that no one professing that faith should appear at Court. The Eastern Christians were then much more prominent and numerous than they afterwards became, and Saad-u-Dowleh sank his people's dislike of the Nazarene in his greater hate of the Mohammedan, so that he employed the former to replace the followers of the Arabian Prophet whom he dismissed from office and banished from Court. The penalty of death was exacted for this persecution, for Saad-u-Dowleh was murdered almost at the same instant that his sovereign master expired.
The silk trade of Resht, which has suffered so much for many years from the disease that attacked the silkworms in the Caspian provinces, and spread to all the Persian silk districts, is now recovering. The introduction of cellular seed has been attended with much success, and there is a rapidly-increasing export of cocoons. The fresh start in this old industry has given an impetus to mulberry-tree cultivation, and waste land is in considerable demand for planting purposes.
An attempt is now being made to grow tea on the low hills near Batoum. It is not yet known what may be the ultimate chances of success, but already what is being done there is having the effect of suggesting a similar experiment near Resht. The conditions of the soil on many of the wooded hill-slopes in the Persian Caspian provinces, where every gradation of climate and atmosphere can be met with, appear to be well adapted for the tea-plant. The cart-road to Kasvin, now being constructed by a Russian company, will pass through some of these well-favoured parts, and this will help to draw attention to natural resources which have hitherto been unnoticed.
As old Persian travellers, we were at once reminded of our return to the land of complimentary address and extravagant phrase by the frequent reply 'Chashm' (My eye!), the simple slang expression known in our country, and which 'Trilby' has made better known by its introduction on the stage. The word is an abbreviation of 'Ba sar o chashm' (By my head and eyes! May my eyes be put out, and my head taken off, if I obey not!). We also heard the similar but less formal reply Chira? Why?—meaning, why not? why should I not do as you desire? i.e. you will be obeyed.
We travelled to Kasvin, halfway to Tehran, over the execrable road which leads from Resht. For the first forty miles the landscape was lovely from wooded slopes, green growth and clear running water. The post-houses are just as they were—ill-provided, and affording the very smallest degree of comfort that it is possible for a 'rest-house' to give. They had been in some way improved for the reception of General Prince Karaupatkin, and his suite, who visited Tehran to announce to the Shah the accession of H.I.M. Nicolas II.; but no effort to maintain the improvement had been made, except in one place—Menzil. The on dit in Tehran was, that the successful launching of the Russian cart-road enterprise, now fairly well in hand, is entirely due to Prince Karaupatkin's strong representation on his return to St. Petersburg. He is said to have taken the opportunity of telling the Shah, in answer as to his journey up, that he was greatly surprised to find the road leading to the capital such a very bad one; whereupon his Majesty remarked that the blame lay with his own countrymen, who, after begging for a monopoly concession to construct a good road, had held on to it and done nothing, and they had the right, so long as the contract time allowed, to prevent others from making the road. The Russian press, which interested itself in the matter, pointed out that what was wanted to give an impetus to their trade in North Persia was good roads, not bounties, and it may be that the interest which is believed to be guaranteed by the Government on the road capital will take the place of trade bounties. The money subscribed is sufficient to provide a solidly-built road, and the idea is that it will be aligned so as to be fit for railway purposes in the future. The existing cart-road from Kasvin to Tehran is but a track, lined out fairly straight over a level bit of high-lying country, with a few bridges over small streams. The distance, ninety-five miles, is comfortably covered in fourteen to eighteen hours in carriages drawn by three horses. The nature of the ground makes this road a good fair-weather one, and as the Russian company has rented it from the Persian concessionnaire, we may expect to hear of considerable improvements, so as to encourage an increase of the Persian waggon traffic which already exists on it. The completion of a system of quick communication between the Russian Caspian Sea base and the capital of Persia must attract the practical attention of all who are interested in Persian affairs.
Many of the Moullas, in their character as meddlers, are always ready to step forward in opposition to all matters and measures in which they have not been consulted and conciliated. So the Russian road from Resht was pronounced to be a subject for public agitation by the Tabriz Mujtahid, Mirza Javad Agha, who, since his successful contest over the Tobacco Régie, has claimed to be one of the most important personages in Persia. This priest is very rich, and is said to be personally interested in trade and 'wheat corners' at Tabriz, and as he saw that the new road was likely to draw away some of the Tabriz traffic, he set himself the task of stirring up the Moullas of Resht to resent, on religious grounds, the extended intrusion of Europeans into their town. The pretence of zeal in the cause was poor, because the Resht Moullas are themselves interested in local prosperity, and the agitation failed.
A change is coming over the country in regard to popular feeling towards priestly interference in personal and secular affairs. The claim to have control of the concerns of all men may now be said to be but the first flush of the fiery zeal of divinity students, fresh from the red-hot teachings of bigoted Moulla masters, who regret the loss of their old supremacy, and view with alarm the spread of Liberalism, which seems now to be establishing itself in Persia.
The unfortunate episode of the Tobacco Régie in 1891 gave the Moullas a chance to assert themselves, and they promptly seized the opportunity to champion a popular cause of discontent, and the pity of it was that the enterprise which raised the disturbance was English. This tobacco monopoly had been pictured as a business certain to produce great gains, and the people were thus prepared for the reports which were spread of high prices to be charged on what they regard as almost a necessary of life. The conditions of the country were not fully studied before the monopoly powers were put in force. A suggestion was made that the company's operations should be confined at first to the foreign export, which would have returned a good profit, and that afterwards a beginning should be made at Tehran, to prove to the people that the monopoly would really give them better tobacco, and not raise prices, which the company claimed would be the result of their system. But everything was planned on an extensive scale, and so were prospective profits. The picture of a rapid road to fortune had been exhibited, and it was therefore decided that the full right of monopoly should be established at once. An imprudent beginning was made in exercising the right of search in a manner which alarmed some people for the privacy of their homes, a dangerous suggestion in a Mohammedan community.
The suspicions and fears of all—buyers, sellers, and smokers—were easily worked upon by the priests, ever ready to assert the supremacy of the Church over the State. And then the biggest 'strike' I know of took place. Mirza Hassan, the High-Priest of Kerbela, the most sacred shrine of the Shiah Mohammedans, declared tobacco in Persia to be 'unlawful' to the true believer, and everyone—man, woman, and child—was forbidden to sell or smoke it. The 'strike' took place on a gigantic scale, a million or two certainly being engaged in it, and steps were taken to see the order from Kerbela carried out rigorously. 'Vigilance men,' under the Moullas' directions, made raids on suspected tea-shops, to find and smash the 'kalian' pipes which form part of the stock-in-trade of these places of refreshment. The Shah was faced with the sight of silent and forsaken tea-shops as he passed through the streets of Tehran, and he saw the signs of the censuring strike in the rows of empty benches, on which his subjects used to sit at their simple enjoyment of pipes and tea. The interdiction reached the inner homes of all, and even in the anderuns and boudoirs of the highest (all of which are smoking-rooms) it was rigidly obeyed. The priestly prohibition penetrated to the palaces, and royalty found authority set at defiance in this matter. A princely personage, a non-smoker, is said to have long urged and entreated a harem favourite, too deeply devoted to tobacco, to moderate her indulgence in it, but to no effect. On the strike being ordered, she at once joined it, and his Highness is reported to have said, 'My entreaties were in vain, my bribes of jewels were refused, yet the priest prevails.' And this was at a place where not long before Moullas had been at a discount.
[Illustration: PIPE BEARER IN A PERSIAN ANDERUN]
There are now signs of the people resenting the arrogant assumption or power by the Moullas, and freeing themselves from their thraldom. There has always been great liberty of opinion and speech in Persia, and six hundred years ago the poets Khayyam and Hafiz took full advantage of this in expressing their contempt for the 'meddling Moullas.' Not very long ago the donkey-boys in one of the great towns would on occasion reflect the popular feeling by the shout 'Br-r-r-o akhoond!' (Go on, priest!) when they saw a Moulla pattering along on his riding donkey. Biro is Persian for 'go on,' and, rolled and rattled out long and loud, is the cry when droves of load-carrying donkeys are driven. The donkey-boy in Persia is as quick with bold reply as he is in Egypt and elsewhere. There is a story that a high Persian official called out to a boy, whose gang of burden-bearing donkeys obstructed his carriage, 'Out of the way, ass, you driver of asses!' and was promptly answered, 'You are an ass yourself, though a driver of men!'
As a finish to this reference to the Tobacco Régie in Persia, I may mention it is believed that, had the company started as ordinary traders, they, having the command of ready money, would have succeeded well. The commencement made in the centres of tobacco cultivation impressed the peasant producers most favourably; they appreciated the advantages of cash payments, and regretted the cessation of the system, and the governors benefited by the readiness with which the taxes were paid. But the explanation of monopoly, a word which was then unknown in Persia, raised the fears of the people, and those who had the money to spare laid in a supply of tobacco before the concession came into force. This was regarded by the poor as proof of the coming rise in price, and they therefore hailed the Moullas as their deliverers from the threatened calamity of dear tobacco.
The only public debt of Persia is that of a loan contracted in order to pay the compensation for cancelment of this concession, and the expenses which had been incurred; but the sale by the Government of the foreign export (part of the cancelled concession) very nearly provides for the loan. The Société de 'Tombac' of Constantinople, which bought the monopoly of export, has had difficulties to contend with, caused by a Persian combination to buy from the cultivators and sell to the foreign agents. A prominent Moulla was named as interested in this business, which was in reality at direct variance with the principles on which the priesthood had declared the original concession to be 'unlawful.' This interference with the free trade conditions existing when the Constantinople company made its contract led to a dispute, which ended with a fresh agreement, in which there is said to be a stipulation that, should the Persian Tobacco Régie in its original form be revived at any time, French subjects are to have the first offer.
After disposing of the Tobacco Régie, the triumphant Moullas desired to extend their prohibition to all foreign enterprise in Persia, and they pronounced against the English Bank, which was doing its work quietly, and without detriment to the business of others. But the Shah gave them clearly to understand that their pretensions would be permitted no further, and that they were to cease from troubling. They then made an attempt to establish the impression of their power in a visible sign on all men, by commanding discontinuance of the Persian fashion of shaving the chin, so that the beard should be worn in accordance with Mohammedan custom. Again they talked of organizing coercion gangs, to enforce the order on the barbers, under threat of wrecking their shops. At this time a foreign diplomat, during an audience of the Shah, on being asked by his Majesty, according to his wont, what news there was in the European quarter of the town, mentioned this latest phase of Moulla agitation as tending to unsettle men's minds. The Shah passed his hand lightly over his shaven chin, and said, with a touch of humour and royal assurance: 'See, I shave; let them talk; they can do nothing.'
It is wrong to suppose that the people of Persia are dead to all desire for progress, and that their religion is a bar to such desire. It is not so. Many of the Moullas, it is true, are opposed to education and progress. One frankly said of the people in reference to education, 'They will read the Koran for themselves, and what will be left for us to do?' The country is advancing in general improvement, slowly, but yet moving forward; not standing still or sliding back, as some say. The Moulla struggles in 1891-92 to gain the upper hand produced a feeling of unquiet, and the most was made of all grievances, so as to fan the flames of discontent. Pestilent priests paraded the country, and did their utmost to excite religious fanaticism against the Government. These agitators spoke so loudly and rashly that the ire of the old religious leaders, the higher Moullas, men of learning and tranquil temper, who had not joined the party of retrogression, was roused. The knowledge of this emboldened the sober-minded to speak out against the arrogance and conceit of the new self-elected leaders. Open expression of opinion led to the criticism, 'These priests will next desire to rule over us.' The Nomads, who have always declined to be priest-ridden, also showed that they were ready to resist any attempts to establish a religious supremacy in temporal affairs; and then, by judicious management of rival jealousies and conflicting interests, the Shah succeeded in his policy of complete assertion of the royal power. It may be that the Moullas were made to understand that, just as the Chief Priest had risen at a great assembly before Nadir Shah, and advised him to confine himself to temporal affairs, and not to interfere in matters of religion, so similar sound advice in the reverse order was given for their guidance.

CHAPTER II

—The late Shah's long reign
—His camp life
—Habits
—Appearance
—Persian Telegraph Intelligence Department
—Farming the revenues
—Condition of the people
—The shoe question
—The customs
—Importation of arms
—Martini-Henry rifles
—Indo-European telegraph