ABSTRACT
THE OCCUPATION OF Baghdad in March 1917 by a British Military Expedition marked the culmination of a process which began in the autumn of 1914 with the despatch of a military force from India to protect British interests in the Persian Gulf. Occupation necessitated an examination of the means by which Britain, in accordance with the Sykes-Picot Agreement, might exercise a predominating influence in the Baghdad Vilayet.1 Accordingly, in March 1917, the War Cabinet created an interdepartmental committee to consider this question and that of the administration of the Basra Vilayet, in which, by virtue of the correspondence between King Hussein and Sir Henry McMahon, Britain was to exercise a permanent influence.
