Page 65 - Arabian Studies (V)

The British Government and the Khunnah Dispute 55
Husayn’s display of military weakness and ineptitude at
Turabah, and his stubborn refusal to submit the dispute to British
arbitration, created an unfavourable impression within the British
Government. In June 1919 Lord Curzon remarked that ‘he contem­
plated his [Husayn’s] complete disappearance, not only without
apprehension, but even with satisfaction’.72 The following month
he described the Sharif as ‘a pampered and querulous nuisance’.73
Finally, in November 1919 Curzon noted that ‘His Majesty’s
Government were being made to look rather ridiculous by the stub­
bornness of this sensitive old man, and he did not himself see why
he could not be brought to reason’. Curzon then inquired sceptic­
ally, ‘If his [Husayn’s] claim [to Khurmah] was so incontestable,
and his proofs so unanswerable, why did he not produce them?’74
Shuckburgh’s criticism was harsher. In July 1919 he argued that ‘If
the Sherif is not strong enough to maintain himself against the
Wahabis without constant foreign aid, he will have to go under;
and the sooner we make up our minds to it the better’.75 The
following month Shuckburgh aptly summarised the British attitude
towards Husayn in the wake of the battle of Turabah, ‘We offered
to send an officer (Mr. Philby) to induce Bin Saud to stop his
advance, and to pave the way for arbitration over the disputed
districts. King Husain refused to let our officer go through. We
then said to him in effect: “Very well; if you won’t let us help you
in our own way, we wash our hands of you. Settle with the Wahabis
as best you can”’.76
Thus the Khurmah crisis contributed significantly to the British
Government’s increasing disillusionment with Husayn over the
next few years. Coupled with the Sharif’s persistent refusal to
recognise the newly established French and British mandates in the
northern Arab lands, it partly accounts for the fact that when Ibn
Sa‘ud’s forces again threatened the Hijaz in 1924, Britain adopted a
strictly neutral position. In reality this policy favoured Ibn Sa‘ud,
since he was more powerful than Husayn. In 1919 the Sharif had
survived his confrontation with Ibn Sa‘ud only because he had
received British support. Five years later, forced to rely solely on
his own resources, Husayn was defeated overwhelmingly and
compelled to abdicate. In 1926 Ibn Sa‘ud absorbed the Hijaz into his
domains, and it remains today under the rule of his descendants.
The Khurmah episode did much to vindicate opposition of the
Indian officials to the suzerainty policy propounded by the Cairo
authorities. The Indian officials had emphasised continually both
the undesirability and impracticality of elevating a weak and
unpopular ruler like Husayn to a position of leadership and domi­
nance in the Arabian Peninsula. They had stressed that the other