Page 12 - Records of Bahrain (7) (ii)_Neat

402 Records of Bahrain
CONFIDENTIAL
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moans a necessity'. Shaikh Sulmau can therefore the more easily
influence the root of his family now than cun Shaikh Khalifa since
he controls all their money. The fact that we have not opposed
Shaikh Isa's uppoinUncnt must indicuto to Shaikh Khulifa, us to
everybody else, that v/e are not prepared to intervene on his
behalf and thio wau indeed made clour to him by you yourself
when you told him, when he made his protest, that our general
practice was not to intervene in these matters whichvoro boot

settled within the family. We then accepted the result. In thio
case there had been no upparent opposition from the family und
it would therefore have been difficult for us to object. In
any case the praetice was now growing up of nominating an heir as
was shown by the example of Suudi Arabia. It may v/e 11 be that
Shaikh Khalifa was oeeking more to make his own position clctir’ to
us than to indicate an intention to work actively to oust Shaikh
Isa. I am sure, however, that it would have been unwise, and
even dangerous for our position in Bahrain to have hesitated to
express approval of the appointment here. Hesitation would have
been taken to mean that we had leunings towards one of the other

two supposed claimants and, in particular, towards Shaikh Khalifa
bin Mohained,
It must be remarked thut Shaikh Salman consulted neither
Your Excellency nor myself before appointing his eldest son to
be his heir. Thio is in marked contrast to his father's and
his grandfather's actions when they made similar appointments
of which the circumstances must be well enough known to Shaikh
Salman. I do not consider that this betokens any lack of
confidence in us or any coolness on the part of the Shaikh ao
regards Her Mujesty's Government. Shaikh Salman has on many
occasions in recent months both to you and to me expressed his
wish and indeed determination to work in full accord and
/consultation .........
CONFIDENTIAL