Page 20 - PERSIAN 8 1912_1920

10 PERSIAN GULP ADMINISTRATION REPORT

there is every hope that before long a satisfactory understanding with Hia
Majesty’s Government and the Sultan will be reached. Meanwhile the public
seem to have accepted the fact thAt the warehouse arrangement has come to
stay and that the days of the smuggling traffic on which they have fattened for
so many yeara past are numbered.
There is, of course, a considerable stock of arms in the public and in private
warehouses in Maskat which has to be got rid of, and the publication of the
notice regarding the warehouse scheme naturally caused manufacturers at ho mo
to endeavour to dump at Maskat the supplies which they already had on hand
but it will be 6een from the Political Agent’s report that towards tho end of the
year imports began to fall off in a marked way. It has been decided to con­
tinue blockade operations until the negotiations with Franco have been
brought to a head, but it is found that the smuggling fraternity no longer risk
transporting large consignments and have resorted to passing the arms over in
driblets which are jettisoned on the approach of a man-of-war.
This development has made the task of His Majesty’s Navy all the more
laborious and heart-breaking, as comparatively few large captures have
rewarded the elaborate search of a large number of native oraft
From the public point of view, however, it matters little whether the arms
are jettisoned by the smugglers themselves or consigned to the deep after capture
by His Majesty’s Ships ; in either case the object of their labours is achieved.
For the present their chief attentions are still mainly centred in the upper part
of the Gulf.
The Arms Traffic question having continued to monopolize the time and
energies of the Sultan and the Political Agent, the pursuit of other important
problems connected with Maskat have necessarily remained in abeyance, but
one or two items call for brief mention. Firstly, the application of the Indian
Pilgrim Ships Act of 1895 to Maskat and to the Persian Coast and Islands was
made operative somewhat hurriedly at the beginning of the pilgrim season, and
the bulk of work in connection with its enforcement will fall upon Maskat,
which is now a compulsory port of call for Pilgrim Ships.
At the end of the year, in connection with the comprehensive scheme of
lighting and buoying undertaken by the British Government, the question of the
precise site for a lighthouse at the
Lighting and Buojing.
entrance to the Gulf was under lively
consideration, there being some divergence of opinion as to whether tho point
should be decided on purely navigational grounds or in connection with the
strategic necessities of our position at the mouth of the Upper Gulf; the matter
was undecided at the end of the year, but the trend of opinion was in favour of
the selection of Little Quoin.
The general situation of this coast has altered little from last year, and no
Trucial Oman. measures on the part of Government,
either for the introduction of the telegraph
or for the strengthening of our position in any other way, have yet taken
shape.
Meanwhile death has been busy among the ruling Shaikhs, the Chiefs of
Abu Dhabi and Debai both having died unexpectedly in the prime of life after
short periods of rule.
The coast has achieved unpleasant notoriety during the year in connection
with the Arms Traffic, rather, it is considered, owing to the non-possumus atti­
tude of the Shaikhs chiefly affected than to any deliberate wish to encourage the
trade. The reason for this development is that the effective measures taken to
blockade the Mekran Coast and to deal with dhows carrying arms up the Gulf,
coupled with the anxiety of arms traders to get rid of their stocks in view of the
negotiations proceeding with France, had the effect of sending the bulk of the
trade by land via Baraimi to the deserted parts of the Trucial Coast, from
whence a dhow-borne traffic to Katr proved a comparatively safe enterprise,
owing to the difficulty experienced by His Majesty’s 8hips in operating effectively
in the shoal waters intervening between these two coasts.
and
The ruling chiefs have been constantly urged by pressure, persuasion
threat to endeavour to put a stop to the use of their ooast for this purpose, but