Free Bagdad

In odoriferous Bagdad last week Sir Francis Humphrys, British High Commissioner, courteously received a gladsome group of Iraq Cabinet Ministers who entered beaming in their beards.

Two pens scratched. In the name of His Majesty King George V, in the name of His Majesty King Feisal I of Iraq a treaty was signed and sealed with red wax splotches. By its terms the British mandate over Iraq will automatically expire when this little Arab State is accorded its scheduled admission into the League of Nations in 1932.

In the decade since Mother Britain adopted Iraq as a mandate from the League the expensive foundling has cost her more than -L-200,000,000 or roughly one billion dollars--a tribute to U. S. wisdom in not accepting a mandate over Armenia (which has since become a Soviet republic). Other mandates held by Britain are: Palestine, parts of German East Africa, Togoland and the Cameroons, Southwest Africa (held by the. Union of South Africa), German New Guinea (held by Australia), the Nauru and Samoan Islands (held by New Zealand).

French mandates are Syria & Lebanon plus the rest of Togoland and the Cameroons.

Belgium holds the rest of German East Africa. Japan's mandate is usually described as "the Caroline Islands etc." Italy, who did not get a mandate after the War is still clamoring for one.

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