C.O.&
Reference :-
.885
18 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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but in course of time this must be discovered by the populations concerned.
The question raised is not one of naval strategy upon which the Admiralty must remain the sole judge. It is a question of Imperial police. And although it is recognized that this function caunot be said to be a direct duty of the Navy, it is, nevertheless one which will have to be discharged by some Department of State, and which no Department except the Admiralty is capable of efficiently discharging. A single ship or regiment in a Colony or group of Colonies may be of no consequence in a war with a civilized Power. But its value is simply inestimable as a safe- guard against civil disturbances which in various portions of the Colonial Empire, and more especially in the West Indies, may at any moment attain serious dimensions, to the wide- spread destruction of both life and property, and to grave public and Parliamentary scandal.
It is thereforo considered essential that a man-of-war should always be available in West Indian waters; that the vessel should cruise frequently among the islands, and should be replaced by another whenever she is not in immediate readiness tó sail to any point at which her services may be required. Periodical visits by larger squadrons, if they can be arranged by the Admiralty in the ordinary course of training, are of undoubted advantage as tending to enhance the prestige and authority of British Government
and of the British flag among impressionable native populations; but such displays of occasional
force, however imposing and beneficial, can form no substitute for the daily presence, upon patrolling duty, of at least one suitable vessel of war, not necessarily armoured or heavily armed, but capable of providing strong landing parties of sailors or marines with Maxim guns and light field artillery, together with hospital and other stores.
IV. It is understood that it is considered very desirable by the Foreign Office that one of His Majesty's vessels should be kept in the Red Sen with headquarters at Port Soudan. Similarly it is very desirable that the Somaliland Coast should be from time to time patrolled by a ship of war, and that such a vessel should be always within easy reach in order to make control of the arms traffic into Africa effective and to put the
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The
British flag in evidence in these seas. process of establishing permanent peace and protection in Somaliland will undoubtedly be retarded or facilitated by the absence or presence of a ship of war.
Colonial Office,
July 20, 1907.
}
FRINTED AT THE FOREIGN OFFICE BY J. W. HARRISON,-22,7,1907.
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The process of establishing permanent peace and protection in Somaliland will undoubtedly be retarded or facilitated by the absence or presence of a ship of war.
British flag in evidence in these seas.
Colonial Office,
July 20, 1907.