ary has not been followed. But comfort yourself with the
reflection that the programme which Kaiser Bill propounded to _his_
work-party has not been followed either.

Your Balkan programme, or rather Bob's, does not at present show much
more sign of fulfilment than the one you propounded to Auntie's
work-party, I'm afraid.

As usual nothing whatever has happened here. Elaborate arrangements
have been made to have a battle to-morrow 120 miles up the river at
Kut. It ought to be quite a big show: the biggest yet out here. As the
floods are gone now it may be possible to walk right round them and
capture the lot. If we pull off a big success the G.O.C. is very keen
to push on to Baghdad, but it is a question whether the Cabinet will
allow it. It means another 200 miles added to the L. of c.: and could
only be risked if we were confident of the desert Arabs remaining
quiet. Personally I see no solid argument for our going to Baghdad,
and several against it (1) the advance would take us right through the
sacred Shiah country, quite close to Karbala itself (Karbala is to the
Shiah Mohammedans--and the vast majority of Indian Mahommedans are
Shiahs--what Mecca is to the Sunnis; and Baghdad itself is a holy
city). It would produce tremendous excitement in India and probably
open mutiny among the Moslem troops here if they were ordered up. (2)
Surely Russia wouldn't like it. (3) We can't expect to hold it
permanently. Everything, so far as I can see, points to portioning
this country into a British sphere and a Russian, with a neutral belt
in between, on the Persian model, except that the "spheres" may be
avowed protectorates. The British one must come up far enough to let
us control the irrigation and drainage of Lower Mesopotamia properly:
and stop short of the holy cities: say to the line Kut-el-Amarah
(commonly called Kut)--Nasiriyah, along the Shatt-al-Hai. The Russians
would, I suppose, come down to about Mosul.

This campaign is being conducted on gentlemanly lines. When we took a
lot of prisoners at Nasiriyah we allowed the officers to send back for
their kits. In return, last week, when one of our aeroplanes came down
in the enemy's lines and the two airmen were captured, they sent a
flag of truce across to us to let us know that the prisoners were
unhurt and to fetch their kits.

I just missed Sir Mark Sykes who cruised through here two days ago. I
have written to him in the hope of catching him on his way back.