Trade and Industry

Iraq’s trade is essentially parasitic. The country has its agricultural products and (now) its oil, but its import trade has largely been an entrepôt trade, and its purchasing power, now that the British have gone, is sinking to something like its former low level. During the years of the Occupation, the British spent money like water. Instead of finding their houses or stores requisitioned for the incoming troops, the inhabitants found that fair and even generous prices were paid, while the purchases by the troops themselves and the high wages offered for all classes of workers led to the circulation of money on a scale of which neither Arab nor Christian nor Jew had ever dreamed. Rupees became so common that the women of the coolie classes would string them round their necks as ornaments; the fils, let alone the rupee, ¹ now takes some earning. Brokers and contractors made fabulous profits, which only the wiser or luckier among them still retain. When the war ended, there was all over the world a rush to fill markets that had been starved for four years. In Iraq there was added to this a sudden boom in various mechanical devices of the West which had hitherto been unknown. Persia, too, had been starved during the war years, and with Russia so completely disrupted the only way of entry to Persia was through Iraq. Thus it happened that in the years that immediately followed the war there was unheard of prosperity among the people of Mesopotamia and the idea became prevalent that the Golden Age had returned. Politicians spoke of Iraq once again becoming the granary of the world. They saw a great country emerging out of the British conquests, with a contented peasantry, wealthy mineral resources, and prosperous trading. The old-established trading firms made profits the like of which they had not known: new concerns grew up like mushrooms. Many British traders are, to their regret, so deeply involved in business commitments in Iraq that they have 213openly regretted the optimism which misled them into starting. But the early figures seemed to justify their optimism.