That is why the control of the Straits, as well as the dominion
over subject peoples, must be taken from the Ottoman Turks in the
_reorganisation of Europe, guaranteed by a stable settlement_, which
is the aim of the Allies. But neutrals, rightly anxious for a peace as
speedy as may be compatible with the attainment of the essential objects
at stake, may ask whether either or both of the objects essential to
the settlement of the Turkish Empire are not attainable by less drastic
measures than a redrawing of frontiers and a transference of territorial
sovereignty. Cannot the liberation of the subject peoples be effected,
without impairing Turkey’s territorial integrity, by some system of
devolution or local autonomy, under external guarantee and supervision?
Is not this a field where the chief belligerents on either side, with
the addition of the United States, might work together in concert? The
answer is that this was precisely the solution attempted during the
19th century, and that through the present war it has finally broken
down. During the 19th century the Concert of Europe did actually bring
Turkey under a certain tutelage. The Ottoman tariff was regulated by
treaty; the customs and other branches of revenue were managed by an
International Administration of the Ottoman Debt, representing Turkey’s
bondholders. There were various experiments in local autonomy; Crete
and the Lebanon enjoyed self-government under foreign guarantee; there
was an attempt to cure the anarchy deliberately fomented by the Turkish
government in Macedonia, by forcing the government to accept foreign
gendarmerie-inspectors with definite spheres of supervision; there was a
promise of reforms in the Armenian Vilayets, exacted from Turkey at the
International Congress of Berlin, but never carried beyond the stage
of paper schemes. It is unfortunately true that this joint European
tutelage was illusory, that it failed to remove or even mitigate the
_murderous tyranny_ that has always characterised Turkish government, and
that the Young Turks have used the opportunity of the War to repudiate
it altogether. The British people have not lightly or inconsiderately
accepted this conclusion—as they have, by implication, accepted it in
framing this joint Note in conjunction with their Allies. They advance
these two aims with regard to the settlement of Turkey—_the liberation
of the subject peoples_ and _the expulsion of Turkey from Europe_—in
the absolute conviction that they are necessary and right. But this
conviction is in itself a very bitter confession of failure. It marks
the reversal of a policy pursued for a century past; for during the
whole of the 19th century Great Britain was the chief advocate of the
policy which aimed at the settlement of Turkey by the preservation of
her territorial integrity subject to the active tutelage of the Concert
of Europe. British diplomacy was constantly exerted on this behalf, and
British belief in this policy was so sincere that half a century ago
Great Britain embarked in pursuit of it on a bloody war with one of her
present allies. If Great Britain is now a convinced adherent of the
alternative and more drastic settlement, it is because the system of
joint European control, after a century of experiment which perpetuated
and aggravated the ancient tyranny, bloodshed and despair, has been made
finally impossible by the present War.