 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Aden Protectorate" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(January 2010) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Aden Protectorate محمية عدن | |||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1872–1963 | |||||||||||||||||||
 Location of the Aden Protectorate on theArabian Peninsula. | |||||||||||||||||||
| Status | Self-ruling sultanates, emirates and sheikdoms underBritish protection | ||||||||||||||||||
| Capital | Various | ||||||||||||||||||
| Common languages | Arabic (Yemeni Arabic,Judeo-Yemeni Arabic) Persian English Ottoman Turkish | ||||||||||||||||||
| Religion | Islam Judaism Christianity | ||||||||||||||||||
| Demonym | Adeni | ||||||||||||||||||
| History | |||||||||||||||||||
• Initial treaty | 1872 | ||||||||||||||||||
| 11 February 1959 | |||||||||||||||||||
• Disestablished | 18 January 1963 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Currency | Thaler,Rupee | ||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||
| Today part of | Yemen | ||||||||||||||||||
TheAden Protectorate (Arabic:محمية عدنMaḥmiyyat ‘Adan) was aBritish protectorate insouthern Arabia. The protectorate evolved in thehinterland of the port ofAden and in theHadhramaut after the conquest of Aden by theBombay Presidency of British India in January 1839,[1] and which continued until the 1960s. In 1940, it was divided for administrative purposes into the Western Protectorate and the Eastern Protectorate.[2] The territory now forms part of theRepublic of Yemen.
The rulers of the Aden Protectorate, as generally with the other British protectorates and protected states, retained a large degree of autonomy: their flags still flew over their government buildings, government was still performed by them or in their names, and their states maintained a distinct 'international personality' in terms of international law, in contrast to states possessed directly by the British Empire, such asColony of Aden, where the British monarch was the sovereign.[3]
What became known as the Aden Protectorate began with informal arrangements of protection with nine states in the immediate hinterland of the port city ofAden, namelyAbdali,Alawi,Amiri,Aqrabi,Aulaqi,Fadhli,Haushabi,Subeihi, andYafa.[4]
British expansion into the area was designed to secure the important port that was, at the time, governed fromBritish India. From 1874, these protection arrangements existed with the tacit acceptance of theOttoman Empire that maintainedsuzerainty of Yemen to the north, and thepolities became known collectively as the "Nine Tribes" or the "Nine Cantons."
Beginning with a formal treaty of protection with theMahra Sultanate of Qishn and Socotra in 1886, the British began a slow formalisation of protection arrangements that included more than 30 major treaties of protection with the last signed only in 1954. These treaties, together with a number of other minor agreements, created the Aden Protectorate that extended well east of Aden toHadhramaut and included all of the territory that would becomeSouth Yemen except for the immediate environs and port of the colonial capital, Aden.
Aden with its harbour was the only area in full British sovereignty and, together with some offshore islands, was known asAden Settlement (1839–1932),Aden Province (1932–1937), theColony of Aden (1937–1963) and finallyState of Aden (1963–1967).
In exchange for British protection, the rulers of the constituent territories of the Protectorate agreed not to make treaties with or cede territory to any other foreign power.In 1917, control of Aden Protectorate was transferred from theGovernment of India, which had inherited theBritish East India Company's interests in variousprincely states on the strategically important naval route from Europe to India, to the BritishForeign Office. For administrative purposes, the protectorate was divided into theEastern Aden Protectorate (with its own Political Officer, a British advisor, stationed atMukalla inQu'aiti from 1937 toc. 1967) and theWestern Aden Protectorate (with its own Political Officer, stationed at Lahej from 1 April 1937 to 1967), for some separation of administration.
In 1928, the British established Aden Command, directed by theRoyal Air Force, to preserve the security of the Protectorate. It was renamedBritish Forces Aden in 1936 and was known later as British Forces Arabian Peninsula and then Middle East Command (Aden).[5]
The boundaries between the polities and even their number fluctuated over time. Some such as the Mahra Sultanate barely had any functioning administration.
Not included in the protectorate wereAden Colony and the insular areas ofPerim,Kamaran, andKhuriya Muriya that were administered by it.
The Eastern Protectorate (c. 230,000 km2) came to include the following entities (mostly inHadhramaut):
The Western Protectorate (c. 55,000 km2) included:
In 1938, Britain signed an advisory treaty with theQu'aiti sultan and, throughout the 1940s and 1950s, signed similar treaties with twelve other protectorate states. The following were the states with advisory treaties:
These agreements allowed for the stationing of aResident Advisor in the signatory states which gave the British a greater degree of control of their domestic affairs. Thisrationalised and stabilised the rulers' status andlaws of succession but had the effect of encouraging official corruption. Aerialbombardment andcollective punishment were sometimes used against wayward tribes to enforce the rule of Britain's clients. British protection came to be considered by some to be an impediment to progress, especially by promoters ofArab nationalism as reinforced by news from the outside received by newly availabletransistor radios.
British control was also challenged byKingAhmad bin Yahya of theMutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen to the north who did not recognise British suzerainty in South Arabia and had ambitions of creating a unifiedGreater Yemen. During the late 1940s and the early 1950s, Yemen was involved with a series of border skirmishes along the disputedViolet Line, a1914 Anglo-Ottoman demarcation that served to separate Yemen from the Aden Protectorate.
In 1950,Kennedy Trevaskis, the Advisor for the Western Protectorate developed a plan for the protectorate states to form two federations, corresponding to the two halves of the protectorate. Although little progress was made with the plan, it was considered a provocation by Ahmad bin Yahya. In addition to his role as king, he also served as theimam of the rulingZaidi branch ofShi'a Islam. He feared that a successful federation in theShafi'iSunnite protectorates would serve to encourage discontented Shafi'ites who inhabited the coastal regions of Yemen. To counter the threat, Ahmad increased Yemeni efforts to decrease British control and, during the mid-1950s, Yemen assisted anumber of revolts by disgruntled tribes against protectorate states. The appeal of Yemen was limited initially in the protectorate but a growing intimacy between Yemen and the popular Arab nationalist president of EgyptGamal Abdel Nasser and the formation ofUnited Arab States increased its attraction.
Aden had been of interest to Britain as a link toBritish India and then, after the loss of most of Britain's colonies from 1945 and the disastrousSuez Crisis in 1956, as a valuable port for accessing crucial Middle Eastern oil. It had also been chosen as the new location forMiddle East Command.
Nationalist pressure prodded the threatened rulers of the Aden Protectorate states to revive efforts at forming a federation and, on 11 February 1959, six of them signed an accord forming theFederation of Arab Emirates of the South. During the next three years, they were joined by nine others and, on 18 January 1963, Aden Colony was merged with the federation creating the newFederation of South Arabia. At the same time, the (mostly eastern) states that had not joined the federation became theProtectorate of South Arabia, thus ending the existence of the Protectorate of Aden.
On 10 December 1963, astate of emergency was declared in the former protectorate and the newly createdState of Aden.
The Emergency was caused largely byArab nationalism spreading to the Arabian Peninsula, encouraged especially by the Socialist andpan-Arabist doctrines of the Egyptian presidentGamel Abdel Nasser. The British, French, and Israeli invasion forces thathad invaded Egypt after Nasser'snationalisation of theSuez Canal in 1956 had been forced to withdraw after intervention from both the United States and theUSSR.
Nasser had only limited success in spreading his pan-Arabist doctrines through the Arab world, with his 1958 attempt to unify Egypt andSyria as theUnited Arab Republic ending in failure only 3 years later. An anti-colonial uprising in Aden in 1963 provided another potential opportunity for his doctrines, though it is not clear whether the revolt among the Arabs in Aden had the Yemeni guerrilla groups drawing inspiration from Nasser's pan-Arabist ideas or acting independently themselves.
By 1963 and during the ensuing years, anti-British guerrilla groups with varying political objectives began to coalesce into two larger, rival organisations: first the Egyptian-supportedNational Liberation Front (NLF) and then theFront for the Liberation of Occupied South Yemen (FLOSY), who attacked each other as well as the British.
By 1965, theRAF station (RAF Khormaksar) was operating nine squadrons. These included transport units with helicopters and a number ofHawker Hunter ground attack aircraft. They were called in by the army for strikes against positions using"60 lb" high explosive rockets and30 mm Aden cannon.
TheBattle of Crater brought Lt-ColColin Campbell Mitchell (AKA "Mad Mitch") to prominence. On 20 June 1967 there was a mutiny in the Army of South Arabian Federation, which spread to the police. Order was restored by the British, due mainly to the efforts of the 1st BattalionArgyll and Sutherland Highlanders, commanded by Lt-Col Mitchell.
Nevertheless, deadly guerrilla attacks particularly by the NLF resumed soon against British forces, with the British leaving Aden by the end of November 1967, earlier than had been planned by British Prime MinisterHarold Wilson and without an agreement for the succeeding governance. The NLF then seized power.
