Page 60 - Arabian Studies (V)

50 Arabian Studies V
The decision of the Conference was forwarded to Baghdad on 12
March 1919. Arnold Wilson, however, claimed not to have learned
of it until May, when he returned to Mesopotamia after a journey
to Cairo and London for consultations. By this time he apparently
had readoptcd his former friendly attitude towards Ibn Sa'ud.
Wilson therefore ignored the instructions of the conference and
continued to pay lbn Sa‘ud his full subsidy of £5,000 per month.59
' Thus in the spring of 1919 Ibn Sa‘ud was not completely aware of
the extent to which he had incurred the displeasure of the British
Government, and his subsequent actions in part may be explained
by this factor.
Ibn Sa‘ud’s followers remained at Khurmah. Husayn, pleased by
the British decision in his favour, sent a sizeable army of about
5,000 men under the command of his son, ‘Abdullah, to seize the
disputed territory. The imminent outbreak of serious hostilities in
Arabia alarmed the British Government, and the Interdepartmental
Conference discussed the Najd-Hijaz dispute again on 28 May
1919.60 The Conference had before it for consideration a telegram
of 27 May from General Allenby, Special High Commissioner in
Egypt.61 Like most of the British officials in Egypt, Allenby
favoured Husayn in his quarrel with Ibn Sa‘ud. He warned that
‘Instant action is necessary to prevent a decisive battle between
Abdulla and Bin Saud. If battle takes place and latter wins his men
will probably enter Mecca.’ Allenby recommended that the British
Government order Ibn Sa‘ud ‘to withdraw with all his forces into
Nejd proper [i.e., east of Khurmah] with a warning that if he failed
to comply his subsidy will be immediately stopped ... and that His
Majesty’s Government will sever all relations with him’.
Philby opposed this position. He did not think that the message
suggested by Allenby would have the desired effect. On the
contrary, Philby believed that ‘no threat would of itself be suffi­
cient to induce Ibn Saud to withdraw [from Khurmah]’, because
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‘He had to think of his position in Arabia, and was more nearly
concerned with his local prestige than with his status vis-a-vis His
Majesty’s Government’. Philby’s view proved correct, but at the
conference he was isolated. Even the India Office representatives,
his usual associates in defending Ibn Sa‘ud, were largely silent,
apparently having acquiesced in the pro-Husayn policy. Others at
the conference were more extreme than Allenby in their hostility to
Ibn Sa‘ud. G.J. Kidston of the Foreign Office, for example,
suggested that ‘blockade measures in some form appeared to be the
best means of bringing pressure to bear on Arab chiefs in the
interior of Arabia’. And Lieutenant-Colonel H.W. Gribbon, War
Office representative, recommended sending tanks to the Hijaz to

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