The King

30. England’s Surprise Move

London had been eyeing the southern province of Persia for a long time. In much of the brutally hot, uninhabitable south, the soil was so dark brown that everything seemed to have been rinsed in crude oil. The fact that the shah was still stuck in Herat worked out very well for the British.

The report of the attack on the south had reached the British officers in India. It took a whole week before the shah heard about it from a messenger. The exhausted courier fell to the ground at the shah’s feet and said, ‘The British have invaded the port of Bushehr.’

‘What did you say?’ cried the shah.

The man was too frightened to tell him the rest. From his inside pocket he took out a letter from the vizier sealed with red wax and handed it to the shah. With trembling hands the shah removed the sealing wax and read the letter. The British had left Herat for what it was and had invaded the country six thousand kilometres away.

‘Why there?’ cried the shah, utterly perplexed.

British warships had sailed into the Persian Gulf and occupied the Persian island of Kharg. The British seamen had bombed the port of Bushehr from their ships and had driven off the local population. Hundreds of soldiers from the Anglo-Indian army had occupied the abandoned city centre, where British flags were now flying.

Although the vizier felt his opponents breathing down his neck, he could not desert his country. He set out for the south without delay, and in his letter he wrote, ‘England has touched a nerve. The future of our homeland is in danger. It is essential that the shah return to Tehran.’

The shah promptly summoned his warlords and gave them the necessary instructions. He appointed a colonel as his deputy and let him know he was leaving. Early in the morning, when the streets were still dark, the shah left the city. Upon reaching the gate he got off his horse, picked up a handful of earth and put it in his pocket as a precious memory of Herat. He kissed the gate’s wooden door and, with tears in his eyes, began his journey back to Tehran, which would take almost a week.

While this was going on the British managed to defend themselves against local resistance in the port of Bushehr and to strengthen their position. England’s plan was to use the port as a military base in the Middle East and as their gateway to the Far East. They also had their eye on two important cities, Khorramshahr and Borazjan, suspecting there were large oil fields there.

Until five years before England had only been interested in India and had scarcely paid any attention at all to Persia. But now, although they couldn’t be certain, everything they were learning about the soil along the Persia — Iraq border pointed to the presence of enormous oil reserves there. It was a British state secret that had not yet been made public. To realise their plans the British would have to come to an agreement with the Russians, and the invasion of Herat was a perfect moment to begin those negotiations.

For decades Russia had been at war with the Ottomans around the Black Sea, and the British had always sided with the Ottomans. England proposed to terminate this support if Russia would withdraw its troops north of Afghanistan and leave the shah of Persia high and dry. The tsar, who had his hands full with domestic uprisings, agreed to the offer. Russia withdrew its troops from the steppes north of Afghanistan and gave England a free hand.

Nor had the vizier been sitting idle. He managed to raise an army in the city of Khorramshahr to guarantee the safety of the population. In Tehran it was thought that England had invaded the country by way of the Persian Gulf as a retaliatory action. The vizier was preparing to fight like a lion.

The British showed no mercy. The vizier was defenceless in the face of the British cannons, so he changed tactics. He pretended to be defending Khorramshahr, but at the same time he ordered his men to hide in the cellars and passageways below the city and to prepare for hand-to-hand combat. He wanted to let the British capture the city so they would blithely make their way through the streets as victors. Then he would strike.

Working in great haste he sent messages to the tribal leaders and nomads in the area around the city, telling them that their country urgently needed them. ‘Put down your glass and ride with your men to Khorramshahr.’

The tribal leaders joined forces. Following the tracks that had been left by the British horses, soldiers and war carts, they finally arrived at Khorramshahr.

The enemy was under the misapprehension that the Persian soldiers had abandoned the city via the side gate, so they raised their flags and began to ready their cannons for a possible counterattack. Suddenly the Persian soldiers popped out of their hiding places and opened fire on the intruders. The British soldiers sought shelter, but they were waylaid by sharpshooters. There was no other way to escape from the city.

The vizier tried to buck up his troops. He hoped that the tribal leaders would come to their rescue in time, and his hope was confirmed. Now the British found themselves between two fires. A real battle broke out, with the vizier spurring his men on. Suddenly a British officer recognised him, aimed his pistol and fired three shots. Two of the bullets hit the vizier. Someone managed to get him on a horse and move him behind the front lines.

The local tribal leader took command and pursued the enemy deep into the night past the fields of date palms. When the new day broke there wasn’t a single British or Indian soldier to be seen.

England then sent its ships to the important southern port of Bandar Abbas and stormed the harbour. No Persian soldiers had been stationed there. Two reports were sent to the shah, neither of them good: ‘The vizier has been fatally wounded, and England is in control of the Persian Gulf.’