The War
status of the Egyptian Government had been definitely
changed for the worse by the establishment of a British
Protectorate. Something of the sort was probably in-
evitable. There had been no great difficulty either in
form or in fact in keeping Egypt a neutral, de facto,
during the Tripoli and Balkan wars, even though as an
Ottoman province it was, de jure, a belligerent. But with
Constantinople and Cairo respectively strong points in
lines of communication vital to Germany on the one side,
and to Great Britain on the other, and with the British
and German peoples in a death grapple, there was, in
technical terms, a derogation of Ottoman sovereignty
that swept away the fictions veiling our occupation of
Egypt. The ten years' old bargain with France by which
we had surrendered our rights in Morocco in return for
a recognition of our rights over Egypt, and the more
recent bargain with Russia by which we surrendered our
rights in Constantinople for a similar recognition, may
have been in themselves good or bad business. But in
any case, they removed any possibility of an objection
from our Allies to a proclamation of a British protectorate
over Egypt. As for our antagonists, there was a distinct
advantage in removing Egypt both from any inclusion
in the peace negotiations as a make-weight and from any
interference in them as a marplot. While, in view of
these completed transactions, and in view of the secret
partitions of the Ottoman Empire already contemplated
between the Allies, a simple substitution of Great
Britain for Turkey as suzerain of Egypt could not be
considered as a breach of their self-denying ordinance
not to anticipate the general peace by any particular
annexations. Therefore, the proclamation of a British
protectorate (December 18, 1914) does not seem to
deserve the criticisms it has encountered' in so far as