Page 23 - Arabia the Gulf and the West

10 Arabia, the Gulf and the West

rulers they constituted for the tribesmen the chief source of patronage, largesse
and, most important of all, protection. They objected to being recast in an
unfamiliar mould, and they expressed their objection in the way that they had
always expressed it - by armed uprising.
Wisely the Colonial Office took the hint and accepted that any further
interference with traditional and tribal institutions should be tempered with
patience and discretion. It also accepted that, while the aggression from the
Yemen was undoubtedly impelling the protectorate states towards some kind
of association for purposes of mutual defence, any move towards a formal
union would have to be made by the rulers of the states themselves, and the
actual form of the union dictated by their own experience and traditions. Yet
federation, even in prospect, automatically raised the question of Aden’s
continued status as a colony and its future relationship with the federated
states. Any alteration in Aden’s status, i.e. towards full self-government,
depended in turn upon consideration of its place in existing British strategic
calculations. The colony functioned as a staging post on the military air routes
to Malaya, Australia and the Far East, as a dispersal point for V-bombers, and
as an operational base and acclimatization area for troops who might have to be
used in defence of British interests in the Persian Gulf. Too much was at stake,
it was concluded in Whitehall in the spring of 1956, for direct British rule over
Aden to be relinquished for some time to come. Lord Lloyd, the under­
secretary of state for the colonies, visited Aden in May 1956 to announce the
decision to the Aden legislature. ‘For the foreseeable future’, he told its
members,
it would not be reasonable or sensible, or indeed in the interests of the Colony’s
inhabitants, for them to aspire to any aim beyond that of a considerable degree of
internal self-government.... Her Majesty’s Government wish to make it clear that the
importance of Aden both strategically and economically within the Commonwealth is
such that they cannot foresee the possibility of any fundamental relaxation of their
responsibilities for the Colony.

It was as inept a decision as it was untimely. To quote one experienced
observer:

As a statement of policy it was already verging on the unreal, for the planning of a
federation of South Arabia was under way and was firmly fixed in many minds as the
next stage of development. It was hardly possible that a federation could exist without
Aden, and it was equally unlikely that Aden could remain a colony or constitutional
*
advance be unduly delayed if it joined.
Contrary to much that has been written on the subject, both at the time and
since, there was no great opposition in Aden or the Western Protectorate to a
merger of the two. The seeds of dissension lay rather in the differing views of
the form the merger should take, the area it should embrace, and the distribu-
• Tom Little, South Arabia, p. 35.