MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS. (Hansard, 26 June 1882)

LORD STRATHEDEN AND CAMPBELL

, in rising to call attention to the affairs of Tunis, and to move for further Correspondence on them, said: My Lords, under ordinary circumstances, it would not have been improper to ask for further Papers about Tunis. We know nothing, officially, at least, of what has taken place during the autumn, although protracted struggles between the French and Arabs seem to have continued. We know nothing, from official sources, of the impression produced in France by the celebrated trial, in which M. Roustan and M. Rochefort were opponents. We are also wholly uninformed as to how late events are viewed by the Italian Government. After a series of Papers on Tunis, towards the end of last Session, one on Tripoli was issued. Since then reticence has followed. We are only led to think, by sounds and flashes which pass through it, that behind the curtain a drama has been actively proceeding. So much might have been said for further Correspondence upon Tunis under ordinary circumstances. But ordinary circumstances do not now present themselves. Night after night the two Houses of Parliament are agitated upon Egypt. The connection of Tunisian and Egyptian difficulties by those who have watched them both will hardly be disputed. It was long ago predicted that an Egyptian Question would arise from the Tunisian one. In the course of my remarks, I hope briefly to explain in what manner the subjects are related to each other. It may first be convenient to remind the House, although in a very perfunctory 352 manner, of the events which formed the Tunisian complication. We need not dwell upon the language of the noble Marquess opposite (the Marquess of Salisbury) to M. Waddington at Berlin, because, whether or not the circumstances justified it, it does not seem to have had any influence on subsequent proceedings. M. Waddington was deprived of power, and never acted upon any lesson which the noble Marquess had suggested. Beyond that, the system of M. Waddington in Tunis might have been wholly different from that which has been actually exhibited. We next have before us the unfortunate career of a British subject—Mr. Levy—violently driven from one tribunal to another. All recollect the measures of the Bey against the Kroumirs, and the marches of the French against the Bey, which ended in the Treaty of Bardo, and the astonishing compulsion of the Regency to accept as First Minister the Consul General of France, by whom the war had been promoted. At this stage authentic knowledge ceases. The prudent combination of the Government has been—on Egypt, slow and fragmentary light; on Tunis, sudden and unmitigated darkness. We are only led through journalists and travellers—particularly Mr. Wemyss Reid, to whom the best acknowledgments are owing—to believe that the French Protectorate was soon resented by a considerable body of insurgents; that Kerouan, the sacred city, has been occupied; that the Regency has been disturbed by intricate campaigns, by hard-fought battles, and by general confusion; and that the Bey—a virtual prisoner of France—has been compelled, ostensibly at least, to direct his arms and his resources against the loyal masses who were struggling to release him. It is only, too, through sources of that kind we are led to think that the origin of the war was investigated last December in a Parisian Court of Justice, and, after great forensic efforts on both sides, was attributed by a jury, whom no power could abash, to the intrigues and follies of the late Consul General. Such may be regarded as a chain of the events, if they are all confirmed—if none of them are fabulous. The conclusion they suggest, although they do no more, is that the true line of Great Britain would rather be to favour the departure of the French than sanction a Protectorate which de- 353 tains their forces in the territory they have occupied. I admit, again, that a conclusion of the kind is but suggested by the narrative in the possession of your Lordships. It requires more than such a narrative to vindicate it. However it may be sustained by this consideration, the best despatch writers of France have ineffectually laboured to establish that Tunis does not enter into the Ottoman Empire. They urge that France has not acknowledged its dependence. They might there be checked, as France on various occasions, and all through the Crimean War, acknowledged its dependence. Let it be granted that she never did so. Have other nations recognized its independent nationality? They have not. The doctrine, therefore, is that dependence is annihilated if one State refuses to acknowledge it; while independence may subsist, although a large majority of States refused to acknowledge it. But recognition or acknowledgment is more essential to independence than dependence. The only escape is that when the voice of France is in one scale, and that of Christendom, together with the Caliph, in the other, the voice of France ought to preponderate, and that of Christendom, together with the Caliph, to give way. Whether or not that ought to be so, the Foreign Office do at present hold that Tunis belongs to the Ottoman Empire, in the same way as Tripoli, or Egypt, or Bulgaria. The occupation is a blow, therefore, to the authority and prestige of the Sultan. Great Britain is perpetually seeking to control or influence the Sultan. At this very hour she is doing so in the midst of a most critical occasion. To restore the credit of the Sultan, so far as the Tunisian occupation has impaired it, would be consistent with her language, and auxiliary to her objects. There is something else to be considered. According to official phraseology, a French alliance ought to be guarded now as sedulously as it was before 1870. The principle is excellent. But when France occupies the territory of an Empire which we desire to maintain in its integrity, a strict alliance with her is not possible. If Governments attempted, national opinion would prohibit it. If no obstacle precluded it, all through the East it would be fatal to our objects. But there is a far more grave considera- 354 tion as to Egypt. I began by stating that the difficulties of Egypt and of Tunis were connected. It is here that the opinion ought to be supported. Until the subject is more thoroughly elucidated, the disastrous movement of Arabi Pasha can be ascribed to no more likely cause than to the spectacle which late events in Tunis have exhibited. It is a movement against the Egyptian status of the Western Powers, of which one has actively promoted the humiliation of the Sultan; the other silently acceded to it. The events in Tunis, cold, pre-occupied, and distant as we are, have made on our minds a shadowy impression. How far more serious has the impression naturally been on the Mahometans of Africa, who recognize the spiritual power of the Caliph? How much more deeply than ourselves must they have felt the quick surrender of the pretexts by which the expedition was defended; the rapid war, without a declaration to commence it, against a Potentate whose absolute supremacy was first ironically blazoned; the indignities by which the Treaty was extorted; the grasping stipulations it included; the enforced subserviency of the Bey to a foreign, hostile, and encroaching Representative; the accumulated miseries a neighbouring dependency has suffered? But, my Lords, we are not left to any speculative argument. An Egyptian journal, cited in the Papers now before us, has distinctly justified the movement on the ground that the population feared lest France should meditate in Egypt what in Tunis had already been effected. Mr. Blunt, who is a witness as to facts, although he may not be an arbiter of policy, who is, besides an organ of the movement, a negotiator for the rebel, a few days back, in a letter to The Times, advanced the same interpretation. To what opinion can we come, except that the departure of the French from Tunis is among the first conditions of establishing tranquillity in Egypt? Let me now endeavour to review, with the permission of the House, the modes of prosecuting a result observed on these conclusive grounds to be desirable. It will hardly be brought about by the sole exertions of Her Majesty's Government. It is true they never gave their sanction to the war, except in absolute reliance on the good faith of the assurances that it was directed only to secure the Fron- 355 tier of Algeria against incursion from the Kroumirs. It is true they might consistently protest against continued occupation. But the language of the Government after the Treaty of Bardo will hardly sanction any hope of their activity in this way. The despatch of May 20th informed France that the Treaty of Bardo, and the proceedings which it crowned, had not made "a favourable impression" on our public; but did not even venture to admit that the Government partook the feelings of the country it was acting for. No one who studies that despatch will rely upon the conduct of the Government as a means of extricating Tunis from the force which seems, at least, to be oppressing it. If Her Majesty's Government had influence to close the occupation, they would have had influence to guard against it. Again, if they desired to close the occupation, they would not so long have left the struggle of France and Tunis in obscurity. It is the very line by which the action of the former is protected. The authorities of Italy, no doubt, have strong convictions that the French ought to withdraw. But, in spite of strong convictions, they have looked on from the beginning to this moment. A great interpreter of Italy, Signor Gallenga, holds that she has not become a military nation. On that point he may be possibly mistaken. At least, Italy cannot, like France, look back to old traditions of success and many centuries of warfare. Italy might lend Great Britain important aid; but is not likely, by assuming an initiative, to direct or supersede her. The imaginary essence sometimes described as the European Concert—a term unknown to former annals of diplomacy—will hardly form the agency desired. Since the Crusades there never has been such an union. The existing Conference, indeed, may be thought to resemble one of the Crusades, since it has seized Constantinople, against the wishes of its Ruler, as a basis of the further struggles which it meditates. I only mention that in passing. The real fact is, that Europe has in later times been always balanced and divided. Even in 1815, when a greater number of Powers were drawn into a League than at any other moment—they are all enumerated in the life of Mr. Herries, who acted as their subsidizing patron—France, a large exception, was not in- 356 cluded in the system. The Concert now poetically fancied is not bound together by any Treaty whatsoever, a fact last year discovered to your Lordships. During the autumn the component parts have been in discord as to Egypt. It will be of no more value to deliver Tunis than it was of value to defend it. By these reflections, steadily pursued, we may be led to think that the influence of Germany is the only influence sufficient for the object. The position of Germany at Metz, if nothing else, secures a locus standi with French counsels. If Germany resolved that the Tunisian occupation ought to cease, although it lingered on, it would not be enduring. But as soon as an attempt is made to gain the influence of Germany, two objections are not unlikely to present themselves. The expenditure of France in Africa has been regarded as a barrier to any other war she might attempt. It might thus appear to be a sacrifice on the part of Germany to put an end to the embarrassments of Tunis. This argument, no doubt, admits of being replied to. It is unfortunately strengthened by another. When, in 1879, Germany had withdrawn herself from Russia at great risk, the year after—1880—Great Britain lent herself to Russia by submitting to a Prime Minister who had lately been the ardent champion of that Empire, and by submitting to him against all the usages, the pledges, and engagements which ought to have ensured a wholly different situation. An appeal to Germany would, therefore, be as unbecoming as it might be ineffectual. What alternative presents itself? To correct the Ministerial position by which Germany is well entitled to be alienated, and in regaining credit for ourselves to pave the way for the recovery of Tunis to the Sultan. I move an humble Address to the Crown for further Correspondence on the affairs of Tunis.