SYRIA: THE LAND LINK OF HISTORY'S 



CHAIN 



By Maynard Owen Williams 



Author of "Russia's Orphan Races," "The Descendants oe Confucius — Toilers of Shantung," 

 "Between Massacres in Van," etc. 



WHAT the Syria of the future 

 most lacks is a past — some 

 crucible of events that would 

 have served to fuse her many races and 

 religions. Various parts of Syria have 

 had noble moments, but as a whole it has 

 never been more than a subject land, 

 without the unity or nationalism which 

 once burned so brightly in the breasts of 

 Phoenicians and Israelites, Hittites and 

 Amorites. 



Syria, unlike Poland and Czecho-Slo- 

 vakia, now rehabilitated, must test the 

 practicability of a self-determination of 

 peoples, not because of an unwillingness 

 on the part of the world to recognize her 

 rights, but because of an inability on the 

 part of the varying factions in Syria to 

 assert them. 



Syria needs good government, now that 

 the power of the hated Turk is curtailed, 

 in order that this oppressed land of latent 

 wealth and mighty promise may realize 

 its twentieth-century destiny. 



Outside powers seek direction in Syrian 

 affairs 'not solely from selfish motives. 

 The growing demands of world com- 

 merce are lifting this land into a position 

 of paramount importance and good gov- 

 ernment, security and favorable condi- 

 tions for economic development are nec- 

 essary to the new world. 



TWIN GATEWAYS TO SYRIANS FUTURE 



Syria closes the east end of the Med- 

 iterranean and is bounded on the north 

 by the Taurus Mountains. The Syrian 

 and Arabian deserts limit further settle- 

 ment to the east and south. But in con- 

 nection with world commerce it has al- 

 ways been closely related to the fertile 

 valleys of the Nile and the twin Mesopo- 

 tamian rivers, and its commercial life of 

 tomorrow cannot be divorced from that 

 of Mesopotamia. 



The future of Syria depends upon the 

 development of two ports and upon who 

 controls these strategic centers of politics 

 and commerce. Alexandretta and Haifa 

 will attain new importance as soon as the 

 Dardanelles are internationalized and free 

 passage, open to all nations, cuts across 

 what Germany was forging as a Berlin- 

 to-Bagdad route, all but 300 miles of 

 which, between Nisibin and Tekrit, a few 

 miles above Samarra, is now complete. 



This new line of traffic from Alexan- 

 dretta past Aleppo to the Euphrates River 

 at Jerablus, connecting the oldest routes 

 of international commerce, also separates 

 two important lingual groups, for Turk- 

 ish is generally spoken to the north of 

 the railway and Arabic to the south. 



WHERE ARGOSY MET CARAVAN HUGE 

 LINERS SOON WILL DOCK 



Whatever political adjustment is made 

 between England and France, Italy and 

 Greece, Arabia and Syria, conservative 

 Mecca and liberal Beirut, Zionist and 

 Greek Orthodox, Christian and Moslem, 

 Maronite and Druse, the line of division 

 between the Turkish and Arabic tongues 

 will be significant, for language differ- 

 ences as well as those of race exert a pro- 

 found effect on political life in the Levant. 



The Haifa Railway separates northern 

 Syria from the southern part, which has 

 long been called Palestine. Haifa is of 

 importance because it is the southern- 

 most Syrian harbor capable of large de- 

 velopment and is the terminus of the rail- 

 way which is becoming the key to Jeru- 

 salem as well as the more important line 

 to Damascus and Mesopotamia. It is the 

 real prize of the Near East, for once 

 more it is to become the greatest port of 

 the eastern Mediterranean littoral, as it 

 was when it served as the chief landing 

 place of the Crusaders and the transship- 



437 



