Page:Turkey, the great powers, and the Bagdad Railway.djvu/125

 *pressions of opinion. Rails for the Bagdad line were ordered in Germany from the Steel Syndicate (Stahlwerksverband). Transportation of materials from Europe to the Near East was arranged for through German steamship companies. German engineers were given the executive positions in the construction and operation of the railway. Important subsidiary companies were formed for the construction of port and terminal facilities, for the building of irrigation works, and for other purposes incidental to the railway proper. German banks established branches on the ground in order to take advantage of other opportunities for the profitable investment of surplus funds.[25]

There was much evidence, however, to indicate that the preëminently German character of the railway was not preserved. An English observer, after a trip over the Anatolian lines in 1908, wrote that he noted a great predominance of Turkish, Greek, and Italian employees over the Germans. "The fact is," he maintained, "that the people who run the line, though Germans, care first for their own pockets and next for Germany. They buy or employ what is cheapest and most suitable and do not care a finger-snap for the origin of an article or a servant. Patriotism occupies a small place in the calculations of promoters. The tendency to deal with the Fatherland must always be strong, but it is founded chiefly on the fact that the German knows the goods available in his own country better than the goods of other countries and that credit and banking facilities are more easily obtained at home. The master impulse in every German engaged in business in Turkey, as in business men of every other nationality, is to make money for himself as soon as possible." This same observer pointed out that there was an astonishing absence of German employees in even the more responsible positions of the Anatolian Railway and