Page:Turkey, the great powers, and the Bagdad Railway.djvu/82



agree upon a uniform tariff for the two companies; a junction of the two lines was to be effected and maintained at Afiun Karahissar for reciprocal through traffic.

3. In order to assure the faithful execution of the agreement between the Anatolian and Cassaba railways, each of the companies was to designate two of its directors to sit on the board of the other.[5]

4. French proposals for the construction of a Euphrates Valley railway were to be withdrawn.

5. The French and German bankers were to use their best offices with their respective governments to secure united diplomatic support for the claims of the Deutsche Bank to prior consideration in the award of the Bagdad Railway concession.

This agreement temporarily removed all French opposition to the Bagdad Railway. M. Constans, the French ambassador at Constantinople, joined Baron Marschall von Bieberstein in cordial support of the new "Franco-German syndicate."[6]

Competition had arisen, however, from a third source. During the summer of 1899 British bankers, represented in Constantinople by Mr. E. Rechnitzer, petitioned for the right to construct a railway from Alexandretta to Bagdad and the Persian Gulf. The terms offered by the British financiers were considered more liberal than any heretofore proposed,[7] and they were endorsed by the Ministry of Public Works. Mr. Rechnitzer enlisted the aid of Mahmoud Pasha, a brother-in-law of the Sultan. He secured the assistance of Sir Nicholas O'Connor, the British ambassador. He attended to the niceties of Oriental business by sending the Sultan and his aids costly presents.[8] He engineered an effective press campaign in Great Britain to arouse interest in his project. Just how much success Mr. Rechnitzer's plan might have achieved on its own merits is an open question. It definitely col