“The Prime Minister made statements, about the future of Mesopotamia which require further elucidation. He said that when the Treaty of Peace with Turkey has been finally decided, the British Government would ‘claim the right’ to be the ‘mandatory Power’ for Mesopotamia, including the vilayet of Mosul.... “Judging from some passages in his speech, even Mr. Lloyd George himself has never grasped the full and dangerous significance of the adventure he now advocates.... “The Prime Minister’s reply conveyed the impression that he has only the very haziest idea about what he proposes to do in this region, which has been the grave of empires ever since written history began.” After pointing out the dangers of a British mandate over Mesopotamia, including the vilayet of Mosul, _The Times_ thought, as had been suggested by Mr. Asquith, that England should confine her direct obligations to the zone of Basra, and pointed out that it was only incidentally and almost in spite of himself that Mr. Asquith had been driven in 1915 to occupy the larger part of Mesopotamia. “Mr. Asquith says—and he is entirely right—that if we hold a line in the mountains of Northern Kurdistan we shall sooner or later be driven to advance to the shores of the Black Sea, or even to the Caspian. His view is in complete accord with every lesson to be derived from our history as an Empire. We have never drawn one of these vague, unsatisfactory frontiers without being eventually compelled to move beyond it. We cannot incur such a risk in the Middle East, and the cost in money and the strain upon our troops are alike prohibitive factors.”[27] The next day, in a similar debate in the French Chamber, M. Millerand, being asked to give information about the leading principles of the French Government in the negotiations that were being carried on in regard to the Turkish treaty, made the following statement, which did not throw much light on the question: “First of all the Supreme Council deems it necessary to organise a Turkey that can live, and for this purpose—this is the only resolution that was made public and the only one that the British Government disclosed in the House of Commons—for this purpose it has seemed fit to maintain a Sultan in Constantinople. “The same principle implies that Turkey will include, together with the countries inhabited mainly by Moslems, the economic outlets without which she could not thrive. “In such a Turkey France, whose traditional prestige has been enhanced by victory, will be able to exercise the influence she is entitled to by the important moral and economic interests she owns in Turkey.