CONFIDENTIAL.
170
Annexe to Foreign Office Memorandum in connexion with
Item 3 of the Terms of Reference of the Royal Commis-
sion of Enquiry into Private Manufacture of and Trad-
ing in Arms.
Considerations taken into account in giving or withholding
assent to the issue of licences for the export of war material
from the United Kingdom.
1. When dealing with applications for licences for the
export of war material from the United Kingdom consideration is
given in the Foreign Office, amongst other things, to the condi-
tions obtaining in the country to which the arms are to be exported.
The following cases are illustrative of this principle:-
Revolution in Nicaragua, 1926.
2. Messrs. B.S.A. Guns Limited applied to the Board of Trade
in September 1926 for a licence to export rifles to a government
which had been set up in Nicaragua as the result of a revolution.
The Board of Trade were informed that the then existing government
in Nicaragua had not been recognised by His Majesty's Government
and that as there would be an inconsistency in sanctioning the
export of arms to it, the Foreign Office were not disposed to agree
to the export of arms to Nicaragua until a government was in power
which had been recognised by His Majesty's Government.
Iraq-Nejd frontier disturbances of 1928.
3. In February 1928 Messrs. Gellatly, Hankey & Company, Ltd.,
applied for a licence to export 2,000,000 cartridges to the Hejazi
Government. The issue of the licence was at first authorised, but
events on the Iraq-Nejd frontier and the possibility of the ammuni-
tion being used against British airmen resulted in the Air Ministry
instructing.