 Thank you very much, Donald. Good afternoon, everyone. There's no audience more intimidating than one's predecessors. And there are several of my predecessors in the room. So that's another good reason to be short. But thank you so much for asking me to be a part of this conference. I suppose my presence here is an illustration of the difference between politics and history. Because some people are sometimes surprised to discover that it's not actually part of the British ambassador to Egypt's job to defend the actions of his forefathers. And I certainly don't think it's part of my job to try and defend what Britain did in Egypt 100 years ago. What I do think very strongly is part of my job is to encourage the serious study of Britain and Egypt's shared history. And that is why I was absolutely delighted to discover that this conference was in preparation. And I'm delighted that it's turning out to be the fascinating and important event that it's turning out to be. Because I do think that we should be talking in an open and friendly way about our shared history. And that's exactly what's going on today. Now, obviously the session Britain and Egypt was the one I was hoping to be able to take part in. Because I lived that subject 24 hours a day. We've heard that Richard Long can't be with us, but Peter Mackenzie Smith. Now I'm delighted that Peter, incidentally, is getting a speaking role since he played such a major part in the organisation of this conference. Peter's going to read out his text. But I'm delighted to introduce now Professor James Widen from the History Department at Acadia University in Canada. Again, like one of my predecessors, I won't go through his distinguished CV because it's in the papers that you will have in front of you. But I would only just say that I can think of no one better qualified to talk about Britain and Egypt during this period than Professor Widen. He's going to talk about the British in 1919 reaction, reform and regime restoration. I think amongst other things he wins the alliteration prize for this conference, perhaps every other conference. So without further ado, hand over to Professor Widen. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you very much. Thank you for inviting me. This is about British responses and particularly it's about British official responses. So the papers based upon a foreign office files and cabinet papers, which suggests that the British in 1919 could only envisage Egypt's future within a British legal geography or within a British constitutional framework. And that by that I mean either staying in the empire or dominion status or within the Commonwealth or finally, as it was worked out, a constitutional monarchy. But a constitutional monarchy very much in the British mould. This is the way, so I'm trying to get to how the British understood how they could respond to the revolution. And secondly, I should just say by regime restoration, what I mean to say is that the revolutionary government of the waft was replaced in 1924 by a palace administration. And so the revolutionary government of the waft was the manifestation of the revolution. That didn't really happen until 1924 and it lasted even less, stayed in power for less time than even the Morsi government. If we look at the sort of the fruit of the revolution as a constitution and elections and the coming to power of a new regime. So we go backwards in 1924 with the coming of the monarchist group controlling power. Nevertheless, the revolution provoked intense debates amongst British officials in London and Cairo and the distinction between the officials in London and Cairo I think is significant on the issue of the extension of British liberties. And again, that's the way they saw it, civil and political rights to the Egyptians. Liberal imperialists or reformist British policy makers imagined Egypt following a path already laid out in colonial locations like Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa where self-governing autonomy had already been attained. However, the electorate in all those examples was pretty much restricted to people of British descent. Nevertheless, that's the positive reading of the application of British liberties overseas. This idea that you could somehow fit into the Dominion status or Commonwealth. There's also a negative reading of this application actually of liberal principle overseas. And that was typical of British colonies in Egypt, in India and in Ireland. And those were the hotspots in 1919 of course, where it was argued that concessions to nationalists would not lead to liberty but to tyranny. This negative application of liberal principle is evident in the initial reaction in 1919 that is the British reaction, which was to dismiss the revolution as an anarchic expression of religious and racial intolerance manipulated by an irresponsible national leadership and irresponsible because they were unrepresentative. That's basically the argument the officials were making. And this was an old colonial doctrine readily available to deny the extension of liberal reform to Egypt to say self-governing institutions. The doctrine was based on the theory of an imperial duty to protect the philahim, the world population of farmers. A population that the British had always imagined as segmented into regional, village, tribal or religious communities exploited by the elite. So this is from a satirical journal in Egypt. And it satirizes the artificial character of the political activist, the offendi. This is just a term they normally apply to the political class except for the very top elite groups suggesting that the language of nationalism was meaningless to the common Egyptian, the philahim, a group as it suggests steeped in religious culture. The British applied the language of the French Revolution to this situation describing the revolutionaries as Jacobin, formerly Girondist, a critique of Egyptian nationalists introduced by Lord Cromer. In this reading of events, moderate or liberal nationalism following constitutional precepts had been superseded by revolutionary terror. The Waf represented the sort of radicalism associated with the prewar Watani party which British analysis viewed as the origin or inspiration of political activists who were described as like idle cafe dwellers, members of underground cells, parties, in short, the misguided offendi. British reports decoded the revolutionary political language. This is all in the FFO files. In 1919, as evidence that the revolutionaries rejected political compromise, pluralism, religious freedom and freedom of expression. For instance, observers were quick to identify revolutionary language such as the phrase sacred union. It's a Had Mucadus. Or as we see here, patriotism is our religion with French republicanism evoking all the excesses of the French Revolution, which is quite typical of British conservative thinking, of course. The French Revolution has that symbolic meaning. Also, so-called orientalist interpretations were overlaid onto the radical revolutionary threat to liberty. British observers carefully recorded that the sacred qualities of the cause, the national cause, were used to castigate the moderates, those ministers willing to accept office after March 1919. So the moderates at Leacan, et cetera, Rushdie, were described as dissidents or infidels. Thus, the revolutionaries did not represent political principle according to the British or political community or polity, as we heard earlier today, only the intolerance of a religious collective. The revolution was inspired by tales of heroes and martyrs from Islamic history where the motives for political action were honour and shame. This analysis demonstrated for the British official that the revolutionaries could not play by constitutional rules. Conservative imperialists took all this to prove that the revolution was a millenarian movement typical of oriental societies, capitalised on by the offendy, the national leadership. Those educated in modern theories of national politics but not fully removed from traditional cultures. As Lord Curzon, and of course Curzon was the foreign secretary at this moment, as Curzon reported to the House of Lords on 24th of March 1919, peasant revolts targeted communications, he means here telegraphs, railway lines, and this is a quote, with a system and method that seemed to indicate a carefully planned organisation, and he went on to paraphrase him. Tenants had risen against landlords, the Bedouin, as he said, lawless element plundered, but these acts followed a plan that showed the hand of the offendy organiser. Curzon condemned the revolutionary and he called it a movement for its disorder, violence, and unwillingness to compromise, appraising instead the moderates. When Edmund Allenby arrived in Cairo the following day, so that's on the 25th of March, he endorsed what he called the party of order. The Milner mission, of course Lord Milner, who was a colonial secretary, was sent out to investigate, as we've heard already, from late 1919 offered concessions designed to appeal to these moderates, eventually advising the end of the protectorate and the formation of a self-governing Egyptian authority under a constitutional monarchy to extend liberal principle to Egypt to the Philaheim, who, again, were going to get the vote. When they say Philaheim, they really mean more than 90% of the population, of course. As Milner proposed to do this, to extend the franchise to the Philaheim, was a major shift in imperial thinking and therefore shocked conservative opinion, which was led by Winston Churchill at this time. Liberal imperial reform, so to move from reaction to reform. Liberal imperial reform came to appreciate that the base of the revolution was not essentially religious, but national, that is, organisation was not primordial when a family, clan, sect or class, but associational, one of institutional and professional associations intersecting with family, clan and religious groups. Liberal imperialists campaigned for a constitutional reform in Egypt from early 1920 in anticipation of the Milner report. So, for example, Valentine Cheryl in the Times asked if it was the intention of the government to repeat, as he said, fatal blunder of the veiled protectorate, which of course is a reference to pre-protectorate, actually before 1914, to repeat the fatal blunder of the veiled protectorate when Gorst and Kitchener chose to placate the ex-Hadith at the cost of the support of the, quote, best elements of the nationalist party. From late 1920, Liberal imperialists represented the Milner report in this light as an extension of the principles of British liberty against the powers of an Oriental despot principle shared with Liberal nationalists in Egypt. The argument was strongly advanced by British officials in Egypt. So, again, a lot of this sort of argument, this call for reform does emanate from the actual man on the spot, as I like to say, in imperial studies. Liberal reform came to appreciate the basis of the revolution was not essentially religious. For instance, an alternative reading of this relief, which of course depicts Zagwil in treaty, this is from November 1918, right? This is from the Zagwil monument in Alexandria. In treaty, in this case, it's Reginald Wingate, who's a High Commissioner at that time. Of course, you see the role of soldiers in the background. There's an obvious resonance this has from the nationalist perspective. Here's the British Army and the sort of pro consul on his throne, resisting this in treaty for representation at Versailles. The alternative reading, which I think Dr Long would have spoken to if he were here today, was that the High Commissioner Wingate was willing to entertain the demands of the nationalists, which, to his credit, gave those demands legitimacy, but also led the British cabinet to dismiss him from his post as High Commissioner. So again, you see these two tracks amongst the British officials, some willing to make concessions and others not. In 1921 and 1922, the argument for concessions was led by advisers to the Egyptian ministries. Of course, it was the British officials who acted as advisers to the various ministries. One of these, Morris Amos, a legal expert, reported that the British government should support a policy of concessions as outlined in the Milner report. Amos rejected the colonial doctrine of the society divided between rural majority, and he used the term falahim, and educated minority, the Afandi. By arguing that Egypt was divided only by opinion. Firstly, there was the moderate party of, as he said, educated and older members of the professions. Secondly, the revolutionary party consisting of students at religious and state schools. It's significant that he points to both these groups, both traditional and modernized sectors of society coming together, shakes and defendies coming together. Students are a key thing here. Students coming from both the religious schools. And from the modern professional schools, particularly the law school, was one of the most important focal points of revolutionary activity from the first day. This illustration depicts the combination of Afandi and Falahim in the Wath Party, if you like, with Zaglur here pictured educating the uneducated Falahim in the principles of constitutional politics. Again, it's satirical, but nevertheless it does show that combination within the Wath Party. In other words, Egypt formed one political society with the Afandi its leaders. This is a riposte to the conservative, the reactionary kind of description. As Amos argued in his memoranda to the Foreign Office, the educated classes had various means to shape public opinion, and even if influenced by European languages and cultures, translated these ideas into local idioms through the mediums that represented the old and new types of political practice. A religious, a millinarian is often the kind of ways depicted, a millinarian movement as well as political party ideology. Rather than isolated communities of village, quarter, clan and sect, Amos suggested that networks of press and telegraph, mosque and café, enable the building of informed political constituencies. Nationalism was not a foreign intrusion indecipherable to the average person, but rather was current and posed a real threat to those groups in Egypt or Britain, unable to respond and speak that language. Amos enveloped Egyptian nationalism within British legal geography by asserting the legitimacy of the nationalist leadership and its constitutional demands. That the revolutionaries were representative of Egyptian national opinion, demanded constitutional reform, comparable to reform in the settler colonies. By highlighting politics, that is contesting groups or parties, rather than social or cultural essentials, you know, Effendi, Sheik, Filahin, Bedouin, those analysis marked a major break with the old colonial doctrine. This liberal policy had, however, to be forced upon a reluctant cabinet, and it was in Allenby, again to his credit, it was instrumental in forcing this change in policy through. So after much persuasion from Amos backed up by Allenby, a reluctant cabinet made the unilateral declaration of Egyptian independence 22nd of February 1922. So where we're at now is you've had this sort of liberal turn in terms of British policy. And then so how do you get from that liberal turn to regime restoration? That's just how I'm going to finish up here. By 1922 it seemed the revolution had inaugurated a liberal era. Indeed one result of the 1919 revolution was the strength in the hand of the Egyptian liberals, and we've heard earlier today about the liberal elite, right? So it has strengthened the hand of the Egyptian liberals against the ruling family. So the Muhammad Ali dynasty, right? Which had been there for over 100 years in power. The liberals bid to change the balance of political forces in Egypt through constitutional reform, meant that the king harassed them from 1922. Hadith Sultan became king with a unilateral declaration in 1922. The king harassed the liberals from 1922. Using techniques, modern techniques such as a press campaigns that malign the liberals as colonial agents and enemies of the nation. So again he's adopting nationalist kind of language. The waft similarly, so at the same time harassed the liberals in the press, in the nationalist press. By other means as well. The liberal government challenge from the right and the left fell in late 1922, replaced eventually by a royalist cabinet. Also the constitutional commission, so a commission was formed to write the constitution in 1922, which again the new constitution was published in 1923. So this commission then became another battleground between liberals and monarchists. So it's important to remember that the revolutionaries, I mean the waft, did not participate in this commission. So sitting on it, the revolutionaries were excluded. They boycotted it in essence. Indicating that the British government, however, sought a reformed administration. Its agents there on the ground in Egypt helped the liberals check the monarchists on the commission and established a sovereignty of parliament in the constitution. The strengthening of the liberal position with British support meant that the monarchists worked parallel to the waft party to destroy the liberal constitutional party in the 1923 elections. So the liberals formed as an actual party, the liberal constitutional party, and those are the main two parties that contested the first elections, liberal constitutionals on the waft. The liberal constitutions were regarded by the waft as the greatest threat to the revolution. They had British support. They represented some of the most powerful families with a long history of state service and control over provincial fiefdoms. The ruling family also regarded the liberals as a threat to its powers. As I've already said, the liberals wanted to limit the powers of the king. So what you have there therefore in effect is an alliance between an unofficial and declared alliance between the revolutionaries and the monarchy against the liberals. The waft defeated the liberal constitutions in the 1923 elections. It was a surprising result for the British. Indeed, between 1923 and late 1924, the British seemed at an impasse committed to a liberal order that unexpectedly delivered a revolutionary government. It was the emergence of the monarchy as an openly political organization contesting a parliamentary party for control over the parliament that opened the way for regime restoration. The king took centre stage at the opening of the elected parliament in 1924. The monarchists, and basically you do have a royalist party emerging by this point, so the monarchists, the followers of the king, found various means to challenge the waft government. The king forced Zaglu, which you see here, the king forced Zaglu to read the speech from the throne that recognised, in effect, the autonomy of the Sudan, the separation of the Sudan from Egypt. It's just rhetorical at this moment, but the nationalists don't want things to go in that direction. The king rejected civilian oversight of his appointments to ministries and religious institutions, and this was unconstitutional. So the constitution was premised on the idea that there'd be civilian oversight for all these kinds of things. So already the constitution is starting to break down. The royalist's funded press savaged the waft's negotiations with the British in 1924. These are treaty negotiations. And monarchist rallies confronted revolutionary demonstrations in the streets. But the turning point was the assassination of Sir Lee Stack, the military chief, the Siddhar, in the Sudan. So he's the military officer, the leader, the top military officer, and the British officer in the Sudan. And this happened in November of 1924. The British blamed the waft in a series of reports. Again, so this is all documented, foreign office files. The British agents blamed the waft for this assassination in a series of reports that documented the violent revolutionary language of the offending leadership in the run-up to the assassination. The assassins were also described in the press, both here in London and in Cairo, as offendies. So offendies basically code for a kind of radical revolutionary as our untrustworthy political agent. In other words, the British observers, for British observers, constitutional reform gave way to revolutionary terror. A more thorough investigation over the subsequent years indicated that the assassins were close to monarchist agents, not waftists. So in other words, it's more likely that the monarchists assassinated stack than the nationalists did. Nevertheless, the waft government fell in late 1924, forced out by Allenby, who switched to change his tack then. And it was succeeded by a royalist cabinet with a few of the less prominent liberals sitting in that cabinet. Most liberals refused to join the palace administration. The king dominated the political arena for the next 10 years. You have the coincidence of the appointment of the arch-imperialist Lord Lloyd at the same time, as you have a conservative government coming to power here. So that kind of cemented what I'm going to call regime restoration. Because as I see it, the liberal order, the system is still there, it's largely broken down, and you're going something really back to pre-1914 where you have the fiction of Egyptian autonomy and independence, but in reality you have some sort of colonial administration. So just to conclude, conservative imperialists seized the opportunity to stall the revolutionary bid for complete independence, and as it turned out, limited the scope of liberal reform. The case to include Egypt within the orbit of a reformed empire as initiated in the settler colonies was maligned according to the old doctrine that Egyptian self-rule amounted to misrule. The authoritarian elements in Egypt, and there were lots of those, lined up behind the king. That result was welcomed by conservative imperialists here, but lamented by British liberals. Particularly a lot of these colonial agents, and really an entire colonial administration was disbanded in 1925 and forced into other posts. All those colonial agents who had argued for reform were moved away, and Lord Lloyd adopted a very obstructionist policy in his relationship with the Waft. So to conclude, arguably the British did not determine this outcome, but maneuvered to manage a complicated political party contest in Egypt, a contest that was won by the monarchists. Thank you. So no very fixed ideas. The High Commissioners and the Egyptian Nationalists. After the British occupation in 1982, 1882, Egyptian nationalism was encouraged to one extent or another by the UK's Agents and Consuls General, commonly known as Residents. Sir Evelyn Bering, who became Lord Croma, included Saad Zaglul in the Cabinet from 1906 to 1912. Sir Eldon Ghorst gave backing to the Nationalists until he lost support at home, and in a manner habitual in the next two decades was replaced. Lord Kitchener fostered the emergence of the Nationalist leaders of 1918. His five successors were removed from their posts by the governments that sent them. All were handicapped by statements about independence incautiously voiced by leading British officials after Istanbul's 1914 declaration of war. General Maxwell, the army commander, promised that Egypt, still theoretically ruled by an Ottoman viceroy, the Fideev, would attain self-government at the peace. Wingate told Prime Minister Hussain Rushdiepasher that the question of independence will be considered then, and Oriental Secretary Ronald Stores spoke in identical terms to Rushdie, who consequently expected that it would be discussed immediately after the Armistice. When Istanbul decided to ally with Germany in the war, Egypt would become a protectorate, Khadib Abbas Hilmi was deposed and replaced with the title of Sultan by Hussain Kamel, and Sir Henry McMahon, accredited in January 1915, was named High Commissioner. Responsible for the politics of the Arab Vault, his relations with Hussain Kamel were poor, and the Sultan claimed that for over a year he had no contact with the residents. McMahon was summarily dismissed when foreign secretaries to Edward Grey aspired a dream substitute. This was Sir Reginald Wingate, who for 17 years had been Governor General of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, and Sirdar of the Egyptian Army, 65% of whose strength was based in the Sudan. Wingate had not visited Egypt for two years, and within a week of his move, most of those who had urged his transfer realised that it had been a mistake. He laboured under multiple hindrances. The greatest was a complete absence of guidance from London as to its Egyptian policy. CS Jarvis, a British official with long experience in Libya and Egypt, wrote that the Foreign Office never had any very fixed ideas on the subject, and Valentine Chirol, foreign editor of the Times, believed that the British government had never had an Egypt policy and was too busy to conceive one, if true, shocking in a country that had seized another without having any idea of what he wanted to do in it. London displayed no contrition about its failure to provide the guidance which Wingate sought throughout its period of office. After Ronald Graham, a Foreign Office assistant under secretary, told him in March 1917 that no one here has any very clear idea about an Egypt policy, on several occasions he asked him to be made acquainted with the policy of the government in regard to the future of Egypt, sought some light as to the policy which His Majesty's government intend to pursue after the war, and said, it is vitally important to me to know how far I can indicate to the sultan what is in the government's mind. After Rushdie had sought clarification of UK intentions and Wingate had referred in a letter to Foreign Office permanent under secretary Lord Harding to whatever policy the British government may eventually decide to adopt in regard to Egypt, he received no acknowledgement. He informed Harding that he had no conception of the plans and ideas of the British government, and after Harding admitted that he could not enter into the large question of what our future policy in Egypt may be, prosthetically stated that he was sure that when it is possible to give any sort of indication of how the cat is going to jump, you will help me if you can, so as to enable me to shape my course. The Foreign Office failed to respond to his request for some indication of the view of His Majesty's government regarding the future of Egypt of a more definite nature than I have yet received. Unsurprisingly, the waft account of the critical 13th of November 1918 meeting quotes Wingate as admitting he had no conception of London's plans. The spectacle of a High Commissioner pleading for guidance from a government which has no plans for a country it has taken the trouble to send him to is even making allowances for war and wartime preoccupations extraordinary. From early in his posting, Wingate had drawn attention to the activities of nationalists, including the Khadif, and had been sympathetic towards them. He had told Graham that our Egyptian friends are all out for his complete autonomy as they can get. The Sultan hoped that Egypt would be granted full autonomy in due course. Believing that it was only just that the Sultan, his ministers, and the Egyptians generally should be told how they stand, he had advised Harding that he could not be a more favourable time than the present to settle once and for all the future of Egypt and warned him to expect a very frank expose of national aspirations when the war is over. In August 1918, Wingate forecasted to Graham that the Sultan and his ministers were likely to open their mouths wide when the war is over and suggested to a contemptuous foreign office that the Sultan might find courting the nationalists post-war an attractive way of bolstering his image and position. In October, he informed Harding that President Wilson's stance on self-determination had taken a strong hold on Fuad, who was all for home rule. He cautioned his government to expect a movement in this direction on the part of certain sections of this country after the war. Next day, in connection with the Franco-British Declaration, he told the foreign office that it was not unlikely that the self-determination policy may have its repercussions among Egyptian nationalists who will no doubt desire similar treatment for Egypt. On the 13th of November, Wingate reported that Zaglul, Abdelazizbe Fachmi and Ali Pasha Shawawi of his al-Uma, with whom the Sultan was in alliance, had called on him to inform him that they would be demanding representation at the peace discussions to make the case for either a much larger share in the government of Egypt than they now have, or even complete autonomy as the reward for their loyalty in the war. Wingate assured them that there was no serious likelihood that objection would be made to the wish of these members of Hisblaw Waft, as they were thereafter known, to place their views before the authorities and the British people. He gave support for them in a letter to Harding, warning that there is going to be a very determined all-round attempt to raise the Egypt question and, if possible, get it settled once and for all. I repeat my own conviction that the present appears to me to be a favourable time to grasp the nettle and have it seriously tackled. He reported at a foreign office that a committee led by Zaglul was seeking to obtain the absolute independence of Egypt and risking London's irritation, reiterated, I still think it advisable that a hearing should be given to any Egyptian politicians who wish to address themselves directly to the foreign office. On 15 November, a telegram from Kersen contained the breathtaking generalisation that we have had up to now no indication of such native aspirations nor of form they are likely to take. This was a serious misrepresentation of facts since, from the start of his posting, Wingate had frequently and repeatedly alerted the foreign office to nationalist stirrings, as noted, only for his advice to be persistently disregarded or not taken seriously in Whitehall. On 5 November, after he had granted Zaglul an interview, Wingate found himself blamed by the foreign office for boosting nationalism. After his 13 November reception of Zaglul and his colleagues, which was fully in line with Cromer's policy that the residents should be accessible to all classes of men, Graham said that Wingate had weakly accepted the delegation's claim to speak for Egypt. Foreign Secretary Belford added, no useful purpose would be served if nationalist leaders were allowed to come to London and advance immoderate demands. Graham charged that Wingate should have turned them down in much firmer language than he seems to have used, and that he ought never to have received the extremist leaders. In December, Belford claimed that they are exploiting the fact of your having received them at the residency, which was unfortunate. And in January, Graham wrote that the agitators were claiming that their movement had the approval of the residency. In a minute in January, he labelled irregular Wingate's holding what he now called private interviews with the nationalists and accused him of forming an alliance with the resurgent nationalists of the Umar party, which he should have thwarted. The tide quickly turned. In March 1919, Allenby said he wished Wingate's advice had been taken that respectable Egyptians, whatever their views, should be allowed to travel when he first advocated it. The UK refusal was unfortunate. With the revolution underway on 18 March, Belford was agreeing with Wingate and declaring himself now ready to discuss the grievances of the Egyptian ministers, even in company with persons qualified to represent the nationalist case, even in its extreme form. George V's private secretary, Lord Stan Fordham, admitted to Wingate later that I really don't see how the government will excuse themselves for the utter vault fuss about allowing the ministers and nationalists to come to Europe. In June, Belford admitted to Cersun that Wingate gave specific advice on a difficult problem, warning us that if his advice was not followed, trouble would ensue. Thereupon, we practically tell him that he's not the man most competent to deal with the situation thus created and that somebody else must be put in his place. He confessed that the story was not one very easy to clove in attractive flesh and blood. After Cersun gave him the news in July 1919 that he was to be removed of his post because of the perceived inadequacies of his performance, Wingate rightly insisted that he had repeatedly warned the government of the recrudescence of nationalism in Egypt and the probability of a determined effort by the nationalist party to obtain their demands on the cessation of hostilities. Some of the reasons given by London for Wingate's downfall were not without validity. One was Graham's analysis on the 25th of November that the root of the whole trouble was the fact that the residency and the palace were not working in as close harmony and contact as they ought to be. Another was his complaint in January 1919 following Wingate's abandonment of the intelligence expertise of stores that Zaglul and his friends should have, at least so it appears, concerted their action with the sultan and probably Rushdie Pasha if not others of the ministers and then have come to see you as a deputation without your having any previous knowledge of the objects and aims of the visit. While the March 1921 Milner commission report charged unconvincingly that Wingate's wiser councils about the nationalist threat were not listened to, perhaps because they were not urged with sufficient insistence, the persistence with which he pressed London over matters that disfavoured was an irritant. So when the sultan declined to act on a foreign office suggestion that he'd tell the nationalist leaders that their agitations were rendering a real disservice to Egypt, Wingate's advice that Fuad's failure to comply may involve sacrifice of his own position, which, like his hint that he should be enabled, was rejected as above his pay scale by an irritated foreign office. Wingate was suspended in January 1919. The revolution began on the 10th March in reaction to Sharjad Affair's Cheatham's deportation of Zaglul, future Prime Minister's Ismail Sidgi Pasha and Mohammed Mahmood, and future Waft Vice President Hamid Pasha El-Bazil to Malta. It was largely contained by the 20th. The same day, Balfa announced the posting to Cairo of General Sir Edmund Allenby, the Egyptian Army Commander, who in the war had occupied Palestine and Syria, he was appointed as Special High Commissioner with full civil and military powers to restore normality. He arrived in Cairo on the 25th. At a meeting of leading citizens, he demanded a return to law and order, and with breathtaking naivety said, I cannot believe that any of you will not assist me in every way. He called for responsible Egyptians to submit a statement showing what steps they considered necessary to restore tranquility and content, and announced his intention to issue passports to any respectable Egyptians who may wish to visit Europe without reference to the colour of their requirements. In April, he proposed to receive an extremist deputation. Prime Minister Lloyd George cabled him his complete support. Although on the 3rd of April, nine people had been killed and 60 wounded and rioting, four days later Allenby released Zaglul, provoking claims that he had given into violence. Harding accused him of ignorance, even with the best intentions, rated him quite unfit to cope with the Egyptians, and claimed that he had granted the extremists everything that they had asked for. Whereas Wingate had vis-a-vis Whitehall being tentative and timid, Allenby, with no diplomatic experience, saw no reason, however, why he should couch out of London in decision-making. He was unable to take advantage of the inertia or distractions of the Foreign Office to record two major events in modern Egyptian history, the 1922 declaration and the 1924 ultimatum. In November, he made a declaration of British policy which he had extracted by difficulty from the government. Despite its promising stress on Egyptian autonomy under British protection, self-government in the constitutional system managed by the Sultan, ministers and elected representatives on the 30th of November, the campaign of violence, resumed. On the 7th of December, the Milner Commission of Inquiry arrived for a three-month stay. It was largely boycotted by the Waft, the Sultan and ministers, but Zaglul and seven Waftists now accorded all facilities met Milner in London. Milner's Zaglul agreement followed, but supplementary negotiations were fruitless. In March 1921, the Commission's report recommended that the protectorate be replaced by a treaty of alliance, awarding Egypt full internal self-government and the right to conclude international treaties. Further talks in London break down over Britain's determination to preserve its imperial communications, its defence of Egypt, its protection of foreign residents and the Sudan as inviolable reserved matters. On the 22nd of December, provoking three months of violence throughout the country, Alanbyd deported Zaglul to the Seychelles for refusing to give up his political activities and with him five other Waftists, including his closest allies, Mustafa Nahas, Macramau and Macramau Bade. Next month, Milner having been shelved, he briskily demanded of Cursan authorisation to send to Fouad without delay and without notification a letter composed for him astonishingly and perhaps unwordedly by Prime Minister Adlupasha Yakan and Minister of Finance Sidki after negotiations with Minister of the Interior Abdul Khalil Tawat Pasha with whom he admitted he was committed and compromised. It proposed that the UK, retaining the reserved matters, should unilaterally abolish the protectorate and by treaty recognise Egypt as an independent state. When the cabinet found its proposals unacceptable, Alanby informed Cursan that the advice he had given was his final considered opinion and would he claim prove to be the basis of a lasting settlement. He insisted that not to take it would throw away all chance of a friendly Egypt in our time. In a very insulting telegram, the cabinet called him home for consultations. Arriving in London on the 10th of February, Alanby delivered a 29-page dispatch to the Foreign Office in which he denied that his political reporting had been inadequate. In a famous exchange on the 20th of February, understandably impatient, he said, I have waited five weeks for a decision and I can't wait any longer. I shall tell Lady Alanby to come home. Lord George's rejoinder was, you have waited five weeks, Lord Alanby, wait five more minutes. In remarks about an ambassador inappropriate in the Foreign Secretary, Austin Chamberlain unforgivably misled the House of Commons by claiming that it was Alanby who had surrendered. On his 28th of February returned to Cairo however, Alanby announced that the cabinet had agreed to his demands which resulted in the 1922 declaration to Egypt. Drawn up in London to his specification, it retained the reserve points, but terminated the protectorate, the country becoming in a diplomatic fiction an independent sovereign state. Cywet formed administration, the Sultan became King Fuad and Alanby had triumphed over London. In March 1923, he freed Zaglul unconditionally from Gibraltar whether he had been moved. On the 19th of April, a new constitution based on the declaration was enacted providing for an elected chamber of deputies and a senate with two thirds of its membership to be nominated by the King who thus received the lion's share of legislative power. Zaglul returned to Cairo in September. Under the first constitutional democratic elections in January 1924, he became prime minister of a people's ministry when the waft won 179 of the 211 seats. It was ominous that in parliament he said that Egypt was not bound by the 1922 declaration, that for the Egyptian army to have a British commander was objectionable and that he would continue to demand a complete independence of both Egypt and the Sudan, which was an integral part of the Egyptian kingdom. In talks in London in September and October with his British counterpart Ramsey MacDonald who had insisted that there was no question of the UK abandoning the Sudan, Zaglul concentrated his demands on the reserve matters and was utterly unyielding and intransigent. He returned home in October. On the 19th of November, Sir Lee Stack, Wingate's successor in Cartoon and a close friend of Alan Biz were shot in Cairo Street. Zaglul rushed round to express deep regret and agreed immediately to offer a £10,000 reward for information and urged the doctors to save Stack and the police to catch his assailants. Alan Biz told him that this is your doing. 36 people were arrested and nine months later, seven were executed and one was sentenced to penal servitude for life. Stack died next day. After his funeral, the 22nd of November, Alan Biz went with a heavy military escort to Zaglul's office to read him an ultimatum on which he ignored London's comments. He gave Zaglul 24 hours to comply with its nine points. Although labelling Alan Biz's reaction of vulgar expression of defiance or contempt, Chamberlain upheld it. Once more, London had backed down. On the 23rd of November, the Egyptian Chamber accepted the first three demands of the ultimatum, a sincere apology, punishment for the murderers and the banning of all popular demonstrations, but voted against an increase in the Sudan's share of Nile water, the replacement of the Egyptian units in the Sudan by the Sudan Defence Force, and the retention of the British Financial and Judicial Advisor posts. Alan Biz went ahead with them nonetheless and after protests, the Senate and the Chamber agreed under pressure from him to comply. Zaglul resigned on the 24th and he was succeeded by the pro-British moderate, Ahmed Ziwa Pasha. Alan Biz's action since the assassination of Stack had lost him in the Foreign Office's residual trust. It queried whether our Cairo reports faithfully represent the state of affairs in Egypt and Chamberlain offended him by sending him a Deputy and Minister of Plenipotentiary, Neville Henderson, as a crisis manager. Alan Biz resigned, but remained at post for the next seven months. Before his departure, he softened his hard line, advising the Sudan not to implement the Nile water clause if means could be found to safeguard Egyptian's interests and now endorsing Zaglul's proposal on the urgency of the Egyptian Army should be in Egyptian. He also, however, took measures without Foreign Office authority to keep Zaglul out of office. Accordingly, after March elections in which the waft won most of the seats and Zaglul was elected President of the Chamber, Fuad, known for his implacable hostility to parliamentary government, refused an offer from Ziwa to resign, lifted an immediate dissolution and suspended the constitution. Alan Biz gave Ziwa the task of diluting Egypt's democracy in order to crush the waft, as in April, to Alan Biz's satisfaction, the king prepared to rule without a parliament through his own iti had. Alan Biz, the vanquisher of Zaglul, departed on 14 June 1925. He had, however, by no means destroyed the waft, which remained a governing party struggling with Fuad and Farouq for most of the period until 1952. His successor, the Arch-Imperialist Lloyd, considered something of a danger to Egypt, was removed by Chamberlain. He was the second of the residents discussed to be removed while on home leave. The third was Sir Percy Lorraine, who, starved of guidance, inquired if it was a great offence for an agent to ask what the principal once done. After being accused of being too involved in Egypt's inter-party struggles and internal affairs, Lorraine was demoted and posted to Ankara from Cairo to the proconsular graveyard. Thank you so much, Peter. Obviously, through you, thanks to Richard Long, for a, I find, a rather gripping narrative. I didn't want to interrupt it. Now, it hasn't, though, meant we've only got ten minutes or so, probably, for comments or questions. So who wants to go first? Obviously we have Professor Wooden here, so I suppose the pressure's on you rather. I'm in response for what's happened since September 2018. Anyone want to? Yes, you had your hand up first and then the lady. Sir. You mentioned in your talk that the British Government was caring for the Falahyn in Egypt. How sincere was that? Did they want them to take part in parliamentary representation or just to be helped with their work? I was just going to suggest, may we take two or three questions together? I think that will give an opportunity for more people to speak and then Professor Wooden can think up the replies. The lady at the back first and then the gentleman in the blue. Thank you very much for both presentations. My question is really an extension of the first question, but in a much more general sense that I found is always very difficult to measure as an academic. Is there anyway a scientific or social scientific way to measure the degree of independence of a movement like nationalism from, for example, British, what the British policy is, from the point of view a person who's studying it now, the past, how can we measure it? Is it just archival documents that you very kindly shared with us or are there other things? I mean maybe it's not possible 100% how shall we do it? Thank you. Let's just have a third question. It is for you, Mr Ambassador. I note that you were smiling when there was nothing coming back from London. I repeated the question. How unlike are you? Professor Wooden. On the philahin. I described it as a colonial doctrine. This idea that the British were guardians of the philahin was based on the idea that the Egyptian elite could not be given political responsibility for the population because that would just lead to misrule. That's the initial justification for the British occupation. It was sincere in the sense that many British officials regarded their work as for the benefit of the majority of the population, but they did see that as part of this evolutionary process over a long period of time and illiterate and uneducated population, which is basically what they meant by the philahin. There's also this opposition between the indigenous Egyptians and then the more Ottoman ruling class. I can answer yes, they were sincere, but basically it was used as a justification for depriving the Egyptians of self-government. That's what is the main purpose of that doctrine. Secondly, I didn't quite follow it. Your question again. Can you summarise it in a sentence? Have you got a comment on that? What I tried to show was there were liberal imperialists and there were conservative imperialists. The liberal imperialists bought into this idea, which had evolved over a period of time, and colonised people could attain self-government and self-rule. Conservative imperialists like Lord Lloyd did not believe that, and so there's a strong racial content, for instance, but it's also civilisational. With the belief amongst conservative imperialists that the British really were the only group capable of governing these societies, which goes back to that kind of evolutionary view of civilisational progress. That's kind of how I see it, that moment in history, there were Britons who believed that the Egyptians were capable of self-government, others didn't. So you had a political conflict. It doesn't line up liberal Conservative Party, liberal party, but it's quite specific about colonial policy. Let's take a few more questions from the floor. Dr Magdym. Does the lack of British policy or strategy about Egypt ring a bell for us about the lack of the policy or strategy was to break it, or break it? Let's take one or two other. Was that a question or a comment? A gentleman there in the black top. It's a question, of course. You were talking about the foreign occupation of a country like Egypt without the occupier knowing what to do with it later, too. Does it ring a bell or is there some kind of peril to modern times Afghanistan or Iraq or whatever? Or is there no comparison at all? Any other from the flawed lady here that hasn't spoken before? It's just a comment. I just find it very, very, very difficult to find documents because I was researching through the archive about Sanafir and Tirana. I found it ever so difficult, the communication between the foreign office and the British authority in Egypt. Exactly the same like we face today. Is that something inside the foreign office missing or just denying the facts? Just to say, actually because it relates to a question I'm often asked, some people think that in that building we have piles of papers which we are full of awkward secrets. The truth is that all official British papers are in the National Archive and that's the only place they are. If they were retained, they'll be in the National Archive. If they exist, they'll be in the National Archive. I promise you, I promise. Good, well then they don't exist. I don't have them, honest. Let's take some more. Lady there, that's it. Wilson's comment on self-determination has been mentioned in passing. How far do you think that has overstepped its usage in the last hundred years or so? And how far does it apply really in the question of local determination versus nationalist determination? Let's take a couple more comments and then maybe Professor Whiddon will have a comment on that. Was it you who used it or was it Richard? It was Richard. Okay, well you still might have a comment. Anyway, one or two more people who might want to say something. Sorry, lady there. My question is for Professor Whiddon. First of all, thank you very much for the paper and thank you for bringing in a perspective that is often lost, the perspective from what was going on in Britain at the time, the change in government, especially the change from liberal to conservative government and how that impacted policy in Egypt. So you use the term offenders, which we can find in the Arabic documents a lot. I use it very often in the foreign office papers. I always find that the term pashas, bachas, bachawit, is used as a blanket term to refer to all of those belonging to the educated class as opposed to the 90% or alleged 90% or the 90% of the population of the phallahin. So you refer to Morris Ames' memo, memorandum, where he actually questions that distinction and says, actually we have two groups within the educated class. So we have those that are represented by Zagalul. The younger members of the professions, the students, the Azharite. And then we have those that we may say are represented by Adliyakan. And these represent the older members of the profession. And of course, you know, the aristocracy in a sense, right? So you have the educated aristocrats and then you have the other educated younger members of the professions like Zagalul, who are themselves have phallahin or rural roots, the gentrified educated class, if you will. So of course, you know, to me, the latter are the offenders and the former are the pashas, but I don't find that distinction in the foreign office papers. So when you make that distinction, is that actually a reflection of what you have read or is that something that you yourself have brought into your reading of events? First one. So it was kind of hard to follow exactly by going with what I think you're asking. So in the foreign office papers, Effendi is definitely a category that they regard. That's a specific category and that represents the younger professionals coming out of the more modern schools. There is the pashas or the bachawad. And so you can sort of see those distinctions as an aristocratic party. Some in the British can work with when they talk about the pashas and the affendi. And so Zagalul, by this point, is a pasha. He sort of comes from an older generation, but the people around him are largely affendi. So that's why I don't think it's really necessarily helpful to use these kind of categories like pasha, affendi, phallah, et cetera. So for me, Moros Amos' analysis kind of makes more sense. Because basically what he's saying is that, again, to a large degree, if we want to understand the revolutionary party, they tend to be younger. But we can't say that there are all people with a modern education, because many of them are also, as you say, as alright or whatever. So is that kind of answering your question? I don't think I'm inventing these categories. I pretty much see them there. So it goes back really to the turn of the century, where the affendi, Lord Cromer, you can read his reports. And he talks about the educated Egyptian. And really he's talking about the educated phallah, right? Is that idea that if you're of Egyptian origin, you're phallah? They're untrustworthy, because it's very racist really, in the sense that this is a group of people who aren't really capable of adopting modern political ideologies. So it's almost like a distorted group, very untrustworthy. And so that's why that label, affendi, is something that they apply to the revolutionary party led by Zagul. And so they didn't very much see it therefore. That's why they use this. And they use the concept of Girondes and Jacobin as well. They use the example of the French Revolution. So they see Zagul as someone who's gone from a sort of Girondes position, moderate to a Jacobin, to a revolutionary one. I hope that answers your question. Thank you very much. I'm working to know, to ask, are we all right for time? Or is there time for one more round of... Time for one more round then of two or three. Sir, in the ghetto time. Sorry, yes. Question to your ambassador. Carol, I'm really surprised that there is like a skism, or there is division between the foreign office and the ambassador in Egypt, which I can't understand. My question is, what is the base of this skin? Is there a difference or just strategic policy? And does this carry on with you? Very good question. I was going to say to everyone who has tried to tempt me into talking about current affairs, all I would say is I've only been an ambassador in Cairo for six months, and I have every intention of doing about three or four years. So purely in the interest and the preservation of my career, I don't want to be tempted by some of those down the road. But may I just say, no, you've asked a question, which I can say something about, which is that I would say, my colleagues will have views about this, there's an intrinsic tension and always is in every country and at all times between the views of the man or woman on the spot and headquarters. It's just essential, and sometimes that tension can be creative, sometimes less so, but there's a reason for it. Is that if you are an ambassador, as I've been several times in a country, that's your whole life. You devote all your energy into that country. But if you are sitting in London, which I've also done, you're looking at the whole world. So it's a question, it's about competing tensions and priorities. And I think that's the heart of what I would describe as an intrinsic tension, which I don't think we should be surprised at. I think the text you read expressed, well, this is horrifying and surprising. Actually, it's completely normal, and I don't think surprising at all. So that's my comment. We had a question about the Wilson quote, presumably President Wilson you were talking about, who was referred to. Did you have a comment on that? Well, you could say that, you know, the waft is a glue, was a bosonian, right? He was living in that bosonian moment, and so you just wanted complete independence. But whether I was trying to say in terms of we have to sort of view the British through their own prism and their concept of a kind of British legal geography, that's why I use that term. They didn't really buy into that, the Wilsonian idea. So they still viewed colonised peoples having to somehow come within the framework of empire. Not certain that answers your question. Thank you for that. Now we will take one positively final round of people. Professor Khaled Fahmi. I didn't mean my question to be on your comment, but in a sense it will be. Because I was wondering if any of the panellists can tell us more about who else in London, apart from the foreign office, can have a say in or did have a say back then. I mean, would the India office be involved or the colonial office or the war office in shaping policy towards Egypt, and what would the relationship be just to complicate the picture a bit further? Absolutely, I'm sure Professor Whitham will have a comment about that. Let's just take, there was someone right at the back there, he pointed to that. Sir, a friend of yours is pointing at you all the time. I think they wanted to say something. Thank you. So we've basically had two accounts. These papers take the same line and it's just been elaborated on by his excellency, the ambassador, and even if there are various conflicts within the making of foreign policy about Egypt. But among our presence here, as Eugene Rogan, for example, who's sort of treated a similar period and talked about decision overload, that is to say that the complex time of 1919, 1924, and all that was going on, whether the Russian Revolution, the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, and on and on it goes. And yet, in these papers, we don't get any sense of decision overload. Egypt is sort of factored out of the context in which decisions are being made about UK foreign policy at the time. So I'm wondering if you could speculate about how much decision overload is a problem in focusing upon Egypt by the decision makers who Wingate is trying to appeal to and who do not respond to him. Was there anyone else who's dying? One user who's not spoken and then the last word, because he wants another word, for the man in the blue jersey. How much was the policy towards Europe, towards Egypt, what you described, Freudian slip? Exactly. Was part of a global vision on the whole post-Ottoman settlement, the installation of the Hashemites, Abdullah and Faisal in Iraq, and Jordan. Was that a part of total vision or were they tended to look at individually? Very good. Very two words. It's actually the fact that it's always divided and ruled and normally you divide Egypt between Christians and minorities and whatever against the Muslims. In 1919, based on what I heard now, that was not easy to do so therefore they went into classing as you were describing. This is true. What I'm saying, they didn't because there was a kind of unity in the streets between Muslims and Christians, the strategy diverted from the natural way of minorities right and we defend them is to fallahi'n or whatever. First word. Okay, so, to respond to this idea of other government bodies, colonial office wasn't really involved much in this, but the war office was. I think that the way to look at this puts it in a larger context. This goes to this question of other rivalries and other departments. The war office is the key one because the first world war in the Middle East was one on the Egyptian front. You have an army of occupation in Greater Syria, British army there. The war office all of a sudden realizes that Egypt is a key post that needs to be held on to. Between 1919 and 1924, the Air Force is building new bases just on the perimeter of Cairo. When it comes right down to the nitty gritty in terms of the cabinet making decisions I think it's the war office that steps in and says we really don't want absolute independence because we need to know that Cairo is secure. That fits into this as some of the other questions pointed to a larger perspective that the British Empire wasn't simply Egypt but it was holding on to the empire so they're here thinking about India and the Suez Canal etc. Also, you can think of the content I mentioned earlier that there's Ireland as well. Again, to make concessions to nationalists in Egypt then when you're confronting a kind of rebellion in Ireland at the same time that's also a concern I think. Did you want to say something? Peter, I had a comment. I was asking about was there a vision to what the British were trying to do after the First World War and it's quite coincidental really. I came across in the archives a 15 page foreign office memorandum intriguingly dated about the 8th of November 1918 that is to say before the Armistice which sets out the considerations for what to do in the whole of the Middle East and the Ottoman Empire it details what treatise are we bound by what objectives do we have what is the impact of President Wilson's self-determination policy. I don't have the reference with me but I'd be glad to take a note of anyone who would like me to follow up on it but it is a remarkable vision for the next 20 years. I think we should close that session now so can I thank you all very much indeed for your participation can I particularly thank Professor Whitten for a brilliant talk can I thank you Peter for reading out and please pass our thanks to Richard Long for extremely stimulating and I thought a riveting account.