Identifier: stranglingofpers00shus (find matches)
Title: The strangling of Persia; a story of the European diplomacy and oriental intrigue that resulted in the denationalization of twelve million Mohammedans, a personal narrative
Year: 1912 (1910s)
Authors: Shuster, W. Morgan (William Morgan), 1877-1960
Subjects: Eastern question (Central Asia)
Publisher: New York, The Century Co.
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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les, and the Banque dEscomptehas the valuable privilege of fixing each month the rate of ex-change at which the Customs revenues collected in Persiantumans shall be applied to the purchase of roubles. It is safeto assert that, in exercising this arbitrary right given it underthe loan contract, the Russian Bank takes care not to loseanything on the exchange. One of the large fixed charges included in the above totalsecured upon the Customs is the expense of maintaining inPersia the notorious Cossack Brigade. This amounted, duringthe time that I was in Teheran, to a regular monthly demandof 30,000 tumans, plus an unknown and indefinite sum whichthe colonel of the brigade or the Russian Legation might de-mand from the Persian Government On the ground of extraor-dinary expenses, costs of expeditions, etc. In one yearthese additional demands amounted to more than 70,000 tumans.This famous organization was created in 1882, in the reignof Nasirud-Din Shah, under a Russian colonel named Char-
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NASIRUD-DIN SHAH. He succeeded to the throne on September 17, 1848, and was assassinated on May 1, 1896, by Mirza Muhammad Rlza, a fanatic of the town of Kirman. REORGANIZATION OF THE FINANCES 293 kovsky, who was appointed by the General Staff of the Caucasusfor this work, assisted by a number of commissioned and non-commissioned officers of the Russian army. The idea of Na-sirud-Din Shah, or of his Russian advisers, in establishing thiscorps of foreign mercenaries was, of course, to protect him-self against any acts growing out of the just indignation of hiscruelly oppressed subjects. The brigade brought into beingunder such questionable auspices has more than once lived upto its evil standards, and it has constantly been, as it is to-day,the chief weapon of Russian intrigue and oppression in Persia.It is supposed to consist of 1500 or 1600 men, and the paymentsrequired to be made by the Persian Government for its up-keepare based upon the enrollment of the maximum number. Asa matter

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