THE LETTERS OF A RETIRED REAR ADMIRAL TO HIS SON IN THE NAVY
By Rear Admiral A.P. Niblack, U.S.N.
Letter No. 10.
TANGIER, "THE INTERNATIONAL WAIF."
"Hope Farm,"
Long Island, N. J.,
November 1, 1922.
Dear Son:
I am glad you are getting a little gunboating in the Mediterranean. To be sure you are in a destroyer, but most of the cruising done by destroyers away from the fleet is merely gunboating. This is because we are getting to be a real power in the world and have not enough gunboats and cruisers to keep up with our international peace obligations, requiring us to use destroyers instead, and a good thing too it is. They are well adapted to showing the flag as every one of them costs over $1,000,000, which you only have to go aboard to see why. When the average foreigner learns we have over 300 of them, exactly alike, it has a tendency to make him sit up. Then, too, it is not so expensive in personnel to have a destroyer do diplomatic work, and, with most of our cruisers and gunboats in the banana squadron, it helps make good on recruiting posters which invite young men to see the world through an air port.
Your description of Tangier amuses me. It is not the old Tangier because it is slowly starving to death commercially. You complain of the danger of landing there. Some day there will be a breakwater, but not yet because the Powers cannot agree even on letting a private company build one. The prospect for the moment, however, seems that they may at least agree on that much. Curiously enough there was a small breakwater or mole there built by the British about 1664 during their occupation, but which was very laboriously destroyed by them when they unfortunately withdrew from Tangier in 1684 for reasons of economy. International jealousies have now very nearly strangled the life out of this international waif. It is tragic but has its cynical side.
The average American is puzzled by European diplomacy because he sees the various complications in Europe without knowing the secret intrigues which have brought them about. It requires an expert to sit in a game where secret understandings make all agreements reached as eventually futile as the secret understandings themselves.
A short time ago one of our cruisers visited Tangier and very properly saluted the port with the flag of Morocco at the main. Calls were made on the Sultan's representatives on shore and the usual other courtesies complied with. On arrival, the boarding officer from a cruiser of one of the Powers came on board and extended a "Welcome to Our City" in so many words. Now it is an amusing fact that with all the various aspirants to take Tangier away from the Sultan of Morocco through agreement of the Powers, by either giving it to some one Power or really internationalizing it, the United States has just as much right to a say in the matter as any other Power, as we have been thoroughly mixed up in this question from the very start. Yet we are so immodestly not claiming anything from Europe on account of the war (except, perhaps, the re-payment of money belonging to American taxpayers which our Government kindly loaned abroad to other governments as if it was really its own money) and we are so timidly flirting with Europe without apparently any intentions, that we are actually encouraging Europe to ignore us in our real international interests and to call upon us only to sweep up after their messes and to feed their starving women, children, old men and even young ones, due to international situations which we had no hand in creating.
As to a breakwater for Tangier, when a commercial company, backed by the French Government, recently got a concession from the Sultan to build a breakwater and execute much-needed harbor works, the British and Spanish interests were up in arms because of the overwhelming preponderance of French capital in the scheme. We have just as much right to share financially in the creation of a free port at Tangier as any one else and also to participate in international committees to govern the port. Our Shipping Board certainly ought to have the opportunity to share in the advantages of this port without our being accused of mixing up in European affairs, for the "Algegiras Pact" still holds as far as we are concerned. If ever a port is constructed at Tangier, the next step will be for passenger cars and freight trains to be ferried across from Spain to connect by railroad with Dakahr, thus shortening the route from Europe to Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Ayres by some ten days. As Europe is now much nearer to South America than we are this would place us at a still greater disadvantage. Of course Great Britain will never consent to a great commercial port being built at Tangier unless guaranteed of its neutrality in case of war because of its proximity to Gibraltar, just across the Strait, and with modern aviation and submarines so close to the entrance to the Mediterranean and on the route to India.
You know we have a Consul General at Tangier who is also the Diplomatic Agent. You speak of the recent surrender of Raisuli, the Moroccan bandit who has held forth so long in Northern Morocco. I remember very well in 1904 when he captured Perdicaris, who was living just outside of Tangier, and got himself in the newspapers by demanding $40,000 ransom. That was very slick of Raisuli. He had not reckoned with President Roosevelt, who sent a squadron to Tangier and on June 22, 1904, sent a telegram to the Sultan of Morocco demanding "Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead." As the Republican Convention happened to be in session at the time and Mr. Roosevelt was nominated for a second term, you may be interested to know, as a by-product, that Perdicaris was released but not until the Sultan of Morocco had paid the $40,000. However, no person in Northern Morocco was in good standing unless captured by Raisuli and ransomed. It was a good deal like having appendicitis. It showed you were rich enough to afford the operation. To me, one of the most curious phases of the whole question was that the Flag Officer in our navy who went to Tangier in the flagship New York on that occasion got his first real insight into European intrigues, which profoundly influenced his career afterwards. A great many other Americans got their ideas of Morocco from this incident. But where we really got interested and tied up with Morocco was in the Madrid Convention, in 1880, to which we sent delegates. Nearly every country had made commercial treaties with the Sultan of Morocco, leading to great inequalities as to international privileges, and the Convention effected mutual agreements as to equitable trade relations by which all countries were placed on an equal footing, and certain abuses of international privileges were to be corrected. It is a curious fact that today Great Britain and the United States are the only two countries which have not renounced the capitulations of the early treaties with regard to the rights of our citizens in Morocco. Immediately subsequent to the Madrid Conference an international agreement was added to the Convention with regard to the status of Tangier, as an international port, and we were a party to it.
Of course, you have found Tangier delightful socially and you have played tennis and golf and gone to dances, for there is a charming European colony there and the diplomatic corps is extremely active. It reminds me of an eddy inshore of a strong current. It spins around rapidly but does not get anywhere, as there is no solution to the Tangier problem unless we cut it with an axe. While you may be fascinated with the roulette wheel and the good-looking young ladies, I think that the most fascinating chapter in recent diplomatic history has been the acquisition by France of its Protectorate over French Morocco. You are, of course, too young to be interested in history and I do not want to bore you, but at the beginning of this new century, France, through her colonial ventures in Madagascar, Cambodia, Algeria and Tunisia, had come to realize the special value of Morocco. Delcasse, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, in 1901-2, quietly began the acquisition of French Morocco by negotiating for a secret understanding with Spain. Great Britain, however, was too alert and brought both France and Spain to her own terms, which were somewhat as follows:
What France wanted was a free hand in Morocco, but before she could come to an understanding with Spain she had to satisfy Great Britain, so, on April 8, 1904, the numerous outstanding differences between France and Great Britain, in various parts of the world, Newfoundland, Senegambia, Siam, Madagascar, New Hebrides, Morocco, and Egypt, were simultaneously settled by a series of special diplomatic agreements. The two governments, "equally attached to the principle of freedom of commerce in Egypt and Morocco," agreed to maintain economic equality in both countries, but there were to be no fortifications of the coast of Morocco west of Melilla. It was on these conditions that France entered the Entente. The agreement pledged both governments not to alter the status of Morocco—but (1) France was to make a special treaty with Spain, and (2) secret articles were signed which provided, in case of the destruction of Morocco's independence, Spain and not France should get the territory bordering on the Mediterranean and Atlantic entrance thereto. This secret clause was not published until November, 1911. This Anglo-French Declaration was signed on April 8, and shortly afterward, October 3, 1904, a Franco-Spanish Declaration was signed, in which both governments remained "firmly attached to the integrity of Morocco," but secret articles arranged for its partition along the lines provided in the Anglo-French Declaration. Thus for its relief from French incubus in Egypt and other sources of friction, England paid France with something she did not own in Morocco, and secured thereby the real point of importance, viz., that France should be excluded from the Mediterranean and North Atlantic Coast of Morocco about the Straits of Gibraltar in favor of the weaker power, Spain.
On March 31, 1905, the German Emperor spent two hours ashore at Tangier, Morocco, and by a few remarks brought on the Conference of the Powers at Algegiras, whose declarations were signed April 7, 1906, the United States being a signatory power. By this the nationality of Morocco was to remain intact, and all the Powers were to be on an equal footing, while Tangier was to be internationalized, and joint arrangements were made for police, finances, public works, and the joint development of Morocco by the Powers. England, Spain and France, during the Conference, knew of the secret agreements, but certainly neither Germany nor the United States did. These agreements, in effect, nullified the pact of Algegiras, because both England and Spain secretly recognized France's dominant interests in Morocco, but pretended to agree to internationalization. In other words, we sat in a poker game with the cards stacked against us.
France has now, as we all know, established a protectorate over Morocco. The Franco-Spanish treaty of November 27, 1912, following a treaty which Germany practically forced on France on November 4, 1911 (which I will tell you about sometime), has caused active diplomatic friction between France and Spain, complicated by the fact that, in 1914, France, Great Britain and Spain drafted an agreement allotting to each nation that part of the government of the city each one was to undertake. The war came on and the agreement was not signed. This has tied things in a hard knot. France wants Tangier under her protection. By royal decree the King of Spain, in 1920, has affirmed that Tangier is assimilated with the Spanish-Moroccan ports of Cueta and Melilla, with the privileges of exports under existing treaties. Spain does not admit that Tangier has ever been under the authority of the Sultan of Morocco as "protected" by France. Great Britain does not propose to have any one Power build up a port at Tangier. Meanwhile the diplomatic corps at Tangier revolves dizzily on its own axis and gets nowhere. One minute Tangier is to be French, then Spanish, then England appears to intervene, and America is appealed to on account of having been a party to all the agreements. Spanish reverses in Morocco have further complicated the question. The amusing thing about the whole situation is that no one has ever suggested that the various treaties in connection with the port of Tangier be carried out. Diplomacy has almost reached that stage that the law has in the United States. No sooner is a law passed or an agreement made than everyone gets busy to see how they can beat it. That is the reason why we have so many lawyers in the United States and so many diplomats in Europe. No wonder we get the reputation for "shirt sleeve" diplomacy when we get so often done in the eye from the scraps of paper flying about.
Meanwhile it is interesting in Tangier to see the city recognizing the authority of the Sultan of Morocco, with Moorish, French and Spanish police and British, French and Spanish post offices, banks, hotels, cafes, shops, etc. Only the gambling houses are international. It is not improbable that the next generation will witness the construction of a tunnel under the Straits of Gibraltar in the vicinity of Tarifa, Spain, on one side and Tangier on the other. An amusing feature of this will be the custom house at Tarifa. The word "tariff" comes from the tribute levied at Tarifa on traffic in the Straits of Gibraltar by the pirates of Tarifa. From the language used at our custom house by ladies I should judge the duties are still regarded as piratical.
By what I have said you will gather that we have the same rights and interests in Tangier as any other Power if we choose to exercise them. We have not renounced the capitulations in Morocco nor any of the treaties in which we have participated. We are in a position to drive any bargain we may choose to make which will safeguard our legitimate interests. In renouncing all compensations for our share in the war we have created the impression in the world that we have no rights, and only the privilege of helping. If we are afraid of Tangier as involving us in European affairs, let us consider it an African question with something to do about Liberia. Of course what I have said may seem to reflect somehow on somebody but it is like the man who said to another, "I did not say you took my golf ball. I only said I would have had a better chance of finding it if you had not helped me look for it."
Affectionately,
Dad.
(To be continued)