The signing of the Convention between Great Britain and Russia on August 31, 1907.1 should be attributed without exaggeration to the most significant event in the international life of the turn of the XIX-XX centuries, which was made possible by a combination of internal and external factors. Apparently, it is no accident that this diplomatic act received rather contradictory assessments first by contemporaries, and later by historians who paid attention to various aspects of the Anglo-Russian agreement against the background of the main trends in European and world politics.

Over the past decades, experts have done a tremendous amount of work to study the causes, essential characteristics and consequences of the "diplomatic revolution" of 1907 in the relations of the two most powerful empires - the British and Russian 2. Nevertheless, a number of fundamentally important points related to this epochal event require a more in-depth study, or a fresh reading from the standpoint of the current level of development of historical science. Therefore, the author's intention was to highlight insufficiently studied and controversial issues of Russian-British political contacts regarding the situation in Central and East Asia, which caused the appearance of distorted ideas about the preparation and content of the 1907 Convention.

The first problem that any researcher dealing with this topic faces is to determine the starting point of a series of attempts to overcome mutual alienation that arose as a result of Russia's defeat in the Crimean War of 1853-1856 and was only intensified by the geopolitical rivalry of the great powers in Asia. Thus, experts are well aware of the statement by V. M. Khvostov that "British diplomacy began to probe the ground regarding the possibility of an Anglo-Russian agreement" in 1905 and continued its efforts at the Algecirassa conference (January-April 1906) [Istoriya diplomatiki, 1963, p.606]. However, is this really the case?

The inclusion of recently available Russian and British archival materials in scientific circulation shows that the venerable Soviet historian made an obvious mistake in this case. Back in 1877, Chancellor A. M. Gorchakov took the initiative to resolve mutual contradictions in Persia, of course guided mainly by tactical considerations to ensure the rear of the Russian troops in the upcoming war against the Ottoman Empire. A decade later, in

1 Hereafter, the entire chronology is given in a new style.

2 The most significant works are those listed in the list of references, which, of course, is not exhaustive.

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In late 1887-early 1888, an influential political figure of the late Victorian era, Lord R. Churchill, made a visit to the banks of the Neva River in order to search for options for establishing a modus vivendi between two empires in Central Asia [Pashukanis, 1935, p. 13]. At the beginning of February 1895, participants in a Special conference convened in St. Petersburg in connection with the Sino-Japanese war called for joint diplomatic steps with England to resolve this conflict. Somewhat later, the career diplomat Sir Henry Wolf, who served as an envoy to Tehran in the mid-1890s, and Lord J. Hamilton, Minister for India from 1895 to 1903, became active supporters of the agreement. The latter, in one of his letters to Curzon, pointed out the sharp strengthening of Russia's military and economic potential due to the accelerated construction of railways on its territory, and especially in the Asian part, which made a military clash with a traditional enemy a rather risky enterprise for the British [Neilson, 1995, p.17]. At the same time, Pavel Lessar, an experienced Russian diplomat who was filling in for the ambassador in London, shared with a well-known publisher and journalist U. Stead's own vision of the desirability of close coordination between the foreign ministries of both countries in order to counter the growing German threat, first, as Lessard suggested, at the regional level, and then on a broader scale, taking into account the mutual addition of Russian land power to British naval power [Stead, 1909, vol. 2, p. 230-231].

The completion of the territorial division of the world between the great powers by the 1900s, which meant from a geostrategic point of view its "closure" and the struggle for redivision, led to new diplomatic initiatives of the St. James's Cabinet, which he made in mid-1898. However, Lord R. Salisbury's broader proposal for establishing spheres of influence of Britain and Russia In the Ottoman Empire, Persia, and the Far East, it was rejected by the tsar, who considered it necessary to conclude only a limited Anglo-Russian agreement regulating railway concessions in China (signed on April 28, 1899) [Popov, 1927, pp. 111-134]. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that even such a narrow-minded practical arrangement has elicited a welcome response on the banks of the Thames. In particular, one of the leaders of the informal "Far Eastern group" in the British establishment, Lord Ch. Beresford described the agreement as a new step after the conclusion of the alliance with Japan in 1902 on the way to London's rejection of "brilliant isolation" [Popov, 1927, pp. 131-132].

The tsarist government's unwillingness to eliminate the potential for conflict in relations with Britain, which persisted until the beginning of the Russo-Japanese War, usually intensified at times of foreign policy difficulties for London. A striking example of this is the spread of Anglophobia during the armed confrontation between the British and Boers in southern Africa (1899-1902). Along with the statement of pro-Boer sympathies in Russian society, the then Ambassador to Russia Ch. Harding noted with bitterness that neither the tsar, nor the courtiers, nor the official authorities even inquired in June 1902 about the state of health of Edward VII, although his sudden illness forced the government of A. Balfour to postpone the coronation ceremony of the monarch [Hardinge, 1947, p. 80-81].

The line of avoiding an agreement with the Foreign Office was traced in the well-known note of the Minister of Foreign Affairs M. N. Muravyov on Russia's tasks in the international arena, drawn up in January 1900. [Popov, 1926, pp. 4-18], and was continued by his successor V. N. Lamsdorff. Explaining the position of St. Petersburg in the instructions to A. K. Benckendorff when he left for his new duty station in London, V. N. Lamsdorff noted on February 6, 1902: "Thus, if the mutual spheres of influence of both powers in Persia were delineated according to the aspirations of the British, Russia would not gain any advantages, but would nevertheless legitimize Great Britain much bigger ones

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more rights than she currently enjoys. Therefore, the imperial government invariably avoided all such deals with England on the basis of Persian affairs." It is characteristic, however, that the summary of the same instruction did not exclude the possibility of reconciliation of the interests of the two countries with "mutual good will", despite the shock that official St. Petersburg experienced when it received the news of the signing of the Anglo-Japanese union treaty of 1902 [AVPRI, f. 133, op. 470, d. 68 (1902), l. 44-60ob.].

The sharp aggravation of the situation around Manchuria, Korea and Tibet in the autumn of 1903 stimulated the unionist government of A. Balfour to make another attempt to discuss regional problems of British-Russian relations with tsarist diplomats. It is noteworthy that the initiative of the Foreign Secretary, Lord G. Lansdowne, this time met with a much more favorable attitude of Count Lamsdorf. The explanation for the softening of the position of official St. Petersburg should be sought both in the difficulties in negotiations with the Japanese, and in the opportunity that has opened up to use the movement of a large detachment of Anglo-Indian forces under the command of Colonel F. A. Kropotkin. Yangkhazbenda to Lhasa for a counterplay based on London's accusations of open aggression against Tibet [BD, 1929, p. 183, 187]. Despite the next false start of official negotiations caused by the outbreak of war against Japan, it was during the mutual soundings of the end of 1903 that the agenda of future negotiations authorized by the heads of both states was formed, as documents show. Not by chance. Harding, who from 1904 to 1906 was head of the diplomatic mission in Russia, and then as deputy E. Gray directly coordinated the negotiation process between the new British Ambassador on the banks of the Neva, A. Nicholson, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, A. Izvolsky, noted in his memoirs that the conclusion of the 1907 Convention required almost four years of preliminary discussions and negotiations. only a little more than a year of coordination of its articles [Hardinge, 1947, p. 146].

The Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 made significant adjustments in the development of contacts. Paradoxically, the research literature continues to suggest that the military actions in the Far East delayed the start of official negotiations and that the immediate reason for them was the threat of the implementation of large-scale projects of William II to build the Baghdad Railway with access to the Persian Gulf (Ananyich, 1960). However, the comparison of these sources shows a more complex dynamics of the development of bilateral relations during this critical period.

In fact, the tsarist government feared not so much German penetration in the Middle East, especially in Northern Persia, where Russia's political and economic influence remained predominant, as the prospect of Great Britain entering the war on the side of Japan, given the existence of secret articles of the Treaty of alliance between the two countries in 1902. In the future, "Lamsdorff wrote to the Minister of War A. N. Kuropatkin after the outbreak of hostilities in the Far East," then, of course, we should not lose sight of the fact that this power, which has officially declared its allied obligations towards Japan, under certain conditions would be able to go over to the side of our enemy. Consequently, it would not be useless to take preparatory measures in case of a break with England. On the other hand, however, it seems to me that too obvious military preparations against England, which have not hitherto been justified by its external relations with Russia, could only encourage the British government to resort to actions directly hostile to us, and thus create difficulties in other countries where Russian and British interests collide " [RGVIA, f. 2000, op. 1, d. 361, l. 1-1ob.].

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The journal of a Special Meeting convened on April 4, 1904 to discuss a new ten-year program for the construction of the Navy confirms the conclusion that the Far Eastern vector of Russian-British relations was of paramount importance for St. Petersburg during this period. In a note to the Foreign Ministry, the assistant Chief of the General Naval Staff, A. F. Gayden, noted: "England fears the influence of Russia in Persia and Afghanistan, but the time will come when it will realize that its rival in Persia is not Russia, which needs only Persian cotton and the sale of mineral wealth and sugar, i.e. those products that it needs to sell. England cannot give Persia - and Germany, which is supplanting it with its brilliant success in the trade of products of manufacturing industry-steel and chemical. The sooner the immediate borders of England and Russia converge in Afghanistan, the easier and more solidly an agreement will be reached with England on Asian policy issues to the mutual benefit of both states." It is noteworthy that, completing the analysis of the international situation, the author of the note justified the real possibility of "achieving full political and economic rapprochement [emphasis added].) with England for the pacification of the Middle East, which is always ready to break out, and for the lasting maintenance of peace through the most powerful Anglo-Franco-Russian allied naval force in the Mediterranean " [GARF, l. 131-142].

The change in sentiment among the top Russian bureaucracy, and most importantly, among some of the military, while maintaining Anglophobia (Britain was suspected of secretly helping Japan), did not go unnoticed by representatives of the Foreign Office. Its head, the Marquess of Lansdowne, drew attention to the desire of St. Petersburg to refrain from any steps that could displease London. "The war against Japan," he reflected in a letter dated May 4, 1904, to S. Spring-Rice, the charge d'affaires in St. Petersburg, " has made the present moment unfavorable for entering into negotiations, but the Russian government has never been so disposed to a sincere understanding [with Britain-E. S.], provided that the Government of the Russian Federation is ready to enter into negotiations. His Majesty will formulate the just conditions that they [i.e. Russians - E. S.] would like to see in its foundations" [BD, p. 189].

For their part, Russian diplomats increasingly pointed out to their British counterparts, in the words of V. N. Lamsdorff, the "colored native danger" for the "white" powers in Asia, which required combining their efforts to protect the borders of colonial possessions. It is worth paying attention to a remarkable passage in one of the messages of the head of the Foreign Ministry to the representative of Russia in London, dated August 30, 1904: "Knowing at least some Asian peoples," Lamsdorff emphasized, trying to remove Britain's concern about the strengthening of the Russian military presence in Central Asia, " one cannot deny the possibility and even the probability of the most unexpected consequences from such movements [i.e., national liberation movements].], which start in one place, but affect in a completely different place, even after a significant period of time. Meanwhile, at different borders we have the same vital and essential interests, the violation of which we cannot allow; because of this circumstance, we take, of course, necessary, in our opinion, precautions that are not at all urgent or extraordinary in nature and strictly correspond to the internal essence of the situation " [RGVIA, f. 2000, op. 1, d. 361, l. 105].

It is no accident that the attempts of one of the grand dukes to organize in the summer of 1904 the interception of military contraband, which was transported by foreign, including British, ships for Japan, were very soon stopped as a result of the energetic protests of the British. It is also significant that the well-known incident in the North Sea near the port of Hull, when the squadron of Admiral Z. P. Rozhestvensky at the end of October 1904 mistakenly fired at the schooners of British fishermen, mistaking them for Japanese destroyers, did not lead to the following events:

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However, it also led to the entry of Great Britain into the war against Russia (of course, it is difficult to overestimate the role of France in deterring both powers), although it again delayed the normalization of bilateral relations [BD, pp. 5-41].3
A new series of soundings was undertaken by the parties in the summer and autumn of 1905. Again, events in the Asia-Pacific region had a decisive impact on the parties ' plans. Russia's military defeats on land and at sea, as well as the renegotiation of the Anglo-Japanese treaty on August 12, 1905, led St. Petersburg and Tokyo to sign a peace treaty on September 5 of the same year. But even earlier, at the end of July 1905, Tsar Nicholas and Emperor Wilhelm agreed on an alliance that reanimated the worst "nightmare" for Britain in Europe - the creation of a coalition of continental powers consisting of Russia, France, Germany and Austria-Hungary. Confidential information about this prospect very soon became known to the Foreign Office, since the already mentioned Ambassador Ch. Harding had a network of secret informants among the court and high officials of St. Petersburg (Hardinge, 1947, p. 108).

Perhaps unnecessarily emphasizing London's desire to start negotiations, but generally correctly reflecting the mood of the British, the tsar reported to "cousin Willie" in the autumn of 1905: "England is actively trying to get us to agree on the question of Asian borders and moreover began this immediately after the resumption of the Anglo-Japanese alliance. I have not the slightest desire to start negotiations with her" [Ostaltseva, 1977, p. 125]. However, the autocrat was obviously lying, since a number of objective factors forced Russia to enter the negotiation process. This is evidenced, for example, by a series of editorials in the semi-official Novoye Vremya, which promoted the idea of the urgent need to maintain the status quo between Britain and Russia in the Middle East. "These articles were the subject of favorable comments in the English press," Harding shared his observations with Lansdowne in a message dated October 8, 1905 , "and became a means of achieving detente in relations between the printed publications of the two countries" [BD, p. 208 - 209]. Thus, the process of discussing Russo-British differences gained steady momentum between October 1903 and November 1905, although it cannot yet be called negotiations.

The second group of issues that are controversial among specialists concerns determining the decisive factor in the transition of the parties from general discussions to practical preparation of the Convention. At the same time, most historians refer to the German threat, referring to the statements of E. Gray, who in correspondence with like-minded people, for example, with the ardent Germanophobe, editor of the National Review L. J. Max, supported the latter's point of view about the desire to "establish direct trusting relations with Russia, eliminating German mediation in this part", which constantly divides both sides. powers [Morris, 1984, p. 42]. Of course, the impact of Kaiser Wilhelm's strategically short-sighted policy on the decision of London and St. Petersburg to start official negotiations cannot be underestimated. However, in our opinion, it was the conjunctural combination of a set of external and internal prerequisites with the coincidence of the aspirations of the leading politicians of the two countries that allowed them to overcome the barriers of mutual alienation in 1906-1907.

External factors that determined the scope of the Convention included the pro - British position of Russia's ally, France, and the inability to "put together" an alliance.-

3 The latest and final "military alarm" in relations between Russia and Great Britain reached its peak on October 26, 1904, when Lansdowne sent a telegram to Harding asking him to tell Lamsdorf that if the Second Pacific Squadron continued sailing without calling at the Spanish port of Vigo, "we may find ourselves in a state of war [with Russia. - E. S.] until the end of the week " [BD, p. 12]. This demand of London was explained by the desire of Great Britain to extend the period of the squadron's voyage to the coast of Japan in order to give Tokyo the opportunity to better prepare for its "meeting".

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tinental powers, and even with the participation of the United States (Xiu's favorite idea. Witte), the resumption of the Anglo-Japanese alliance and the threat of eventual involvement of the Ottoman Empire in it, and finally, the common interest of Russia and England in suppressing the slightest aspirations of the peoples of the Middle East and Hindustan to sovereignty. 4 A certain role was played by calculations that were carried out by strategists at the Main Headquarters of both empires, which showed that neither Russia nor Britain is able to ensure the inviolability of the borders of their vast possessions in the event of large-scale hostilities. As can be seen from the memos prepared by military analysts of the two countries, St. Petersburg faced the tasks of defending the western provinces, the coasts of the north and south seas, possessions in Transcaucasia and Central Asia, and borders in the Far East [RGVIA, f. 2000, op. 1, d. 361, l. 23], and London, in addition to preventing landings on the British Isles and fighting Irish nationalists, - protecting interests in the Middle East, in the Persian Gulf basin and on the north-western frontier of India [Williams, 1966, p. 360-373].

The stalemate that had developed by 1906 in relations between Russia and Great Britain in terms of the enormous costs of armed confrontation with each other with an uncertain outcome, even taking into account the weakening of the former and the build-up of the naval power of the latter, was forced to be recognized in the spring and summer of 1906 by both members of the British Committee on Imperial Defense and senior officers of the Russian General Staff. So, in the event of an attack by Russian troops on India, in addition to 100 thousand troops, an additional 500 thousand were required to be sent from the mother country in the first weeks of hostilities. a contingent that the St. James Cabinet did not have [Searle, 2004, p.483; Williams, 1966, p. 367-368]. It is obvious that even the financially well-off British Empire could not afford to spend significantly on the land defense of India in the conditions of an arms race on the seas. At the same time, the Russian budget, which was experiencing huge problems due to the costs of the war against Japan and the fight against revolutionary actions, was also unable to allocate more and more funds for confrontation with a traditional geopolitical rival. At the same time, it was the official St. Petersburg represented by Prime Minister S. Y. Witte who in the winter of 1905-spring of 1906 asked representatives of the City of London for a large loan to cover the budget deficit after the refusal of the Berlin bankers [BD, p. 214]. As you know, it was granted jointly by the British and French to the tsarist government in April 1906, not least because of the confidential support of responsible Foreign Office officials, who did not forget, however, to demand payment of large monetary compensations in compensation for the value of property lost by British subjects in Port Arthur and Dalny during the Russian-Soviet war.the Japanese War [NA, 181/861].

Among the domestic political circumstances of the rapprochement between London and St. Petersburg, it is necessary to note the change in the situation in both countries caused by the democratic revolution in Russia and the coming to power of the liberal party in Great Britain. It was precisely these transformations within the power elites, which were accompanied by the appearance of new figures in the diplomatic arena, first of all E. Gray and A. P. Izvolsky, that made it possible to translate semi-official soundings into a real negotiation process. It is also worth paying attention to one more important point: the generation of Lamsdorf and Lansdowne, whose views were formed during the most acute phase of the Russian-British rivalry in Europe and Asia, was replaced by people with

4 The mass riots and growing chaos in the Middle Eastern states are evidenced, for example, by the notes of the Times columnist V. Chirol, who made a trip together with the Viceroy of India, J. R. R. Tolkien. Curzon made a trip to the Persian Gulf region in late 1903-early 1904 [Chirol, 1927, p. 168-170].

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a worldview that was not limited to issues of European politics, but included the problems of protecting imperial interests in other regions of the world, and above all in Asia.5
Speaking about the views of E. Gray, it is appropriate to refer to his repeated statements in support of the concept of getting out of the "brilliant isolation" and resolving the contradictions with Russia on the Asian borders as soon as possible, long before he took up the post of head of the Foreign Office [Gray, 1925, vol. 1, p. 4; Trevelyan, 1937, p. 94]. It is no coincidence that he was enthusiastic about the news of the signing of the Anglo-French agreement of 1904, seeing in it the beginning of the formation of a broader alliance with the participation of the Russian Empire [Rob-bins, 1971, p.131]. In one of his first instructive letters to the Charge d'affaires in St. Petersburg, S. Spring-Rice, dated December 22, 1905, Gray emphasized: "I want to see Russia re-represented in the structures of Europe and, I hope, more friendly to us than before" [The Letters..., 1929, p. 53-54].

As for the position of A. P. Izvolsky, in contrast to V. N. Lamsdorff, who was never part of the inner circle of Nicholas II, who considered the minister as a person who was under the influence of the autocrat so unloved XIU. Witte, the new head of the Russian Foreign Ministry, managed to gain the full confidence of the tsar thanks to the ability to establish personal contacts with the crowned heads of Europe. An example is Izvolsky's conversations with Edward VII in the spring of 1904, when he was Minister to Denmark. It was then, according to the memoirs of the future minister, that the idea of forming an Anglo-Russian Entente was approved by the British monarch [Izvolsky, 1989, p.13]. It is characteristic that the influence of the young, energetic foreign Minister on Nicholas II in the initial period was so great that even the Empress Alexandra, who was not disposed to England, preferred to refrain from interfering in the negotiations [Izvolsky, 1989, p.177].

Unfortunately, the historiography of the dynamics of the British-Russian dialogue on the road to the signing of the 1907 Convention is not free from another myth, namely, the view that the negotiation process was carried out in the quiet of offices exclusively by diplomatic representatives of both countries. In fact, military leaders, representatives of financial and industrial circles, journalists (mainly from the British side), as well as senior officials "on the ground"-in British India and in Russian Central Asia - had a significant influence on the formulation of the agenda and the search for solutions to the main problems.

According to the estimates of the direct participant in the negotiations, Ambassador A. Nikolson, the majority of ministers, some influential aristocratic families (Benckendorfs, Heydens, Dolgoruks, Naryshkins) and industrialists, especially those who had economic interests in Asian countries, were among the supporters of negotiations in Russia, despite the general indifference of the general public [Bourne and Watt, 1983, p. 96-97]. At the same time, the British feared the pro - German sentiments of some of the courtiers associated with Kaiser Wilhelm, and the traditional skepticism of the military elite, especially the chairman of the State Defense Council, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich (Jr.), and the Chief of the General Staff, F. F. Palitsyn [BD, p.255-265]. It is no coincidence that at all stages of the negotiations, A. P. Izvolsky was forced to periodically convene special meetings to develop a consolidated position on the disputed articles of the future Convention.

The participants of the first of them, which took place on September 20, 1906, spoke in favor of the negotiation process, and from the side of the Minister of Finance V. N. Kokov.-

5 For a comparison of the qualities of "Victorians" and "Edwardians" in the power elite of the United Kingdom, see [Neilson, 1995, p. 47-50]; for the problem of the perception of Great Britain by representatives of the Russian military elite, see [Sergeev, 2006, p.228-247].

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However, the agreement was motivated by the need to protect Russia's financial interests in Persia, and by the threat of a new Japanese aggression in the Far East [RGVIA, d.6643, l. 80-85]6. The second Special Meeting, convened on February 14, 1907, focused on the situation around the Baghdad Railway and the prospects for cooperation with Britain in pursuing a course to limit Germany's strategic appetites in the Persian Gulf basin [Pashukanis, 1935, pp. 19-25]. The highest dignitaries present at the third and fourth meetings, on April 27 and August 24, 1907, respectively, discussed the situation around Afghanistan, which for both powers was complicated by the attempts of the emir of this country to act as the patron saint of all Muslims in Central Asia and India with the support of German agents [RGVIA, d. 6926, l. 85-99, 140 - 151; Reisner, 1925, pp. 54-66].

It is interesting that at the final meeting of the Special Meeting, the main opponent of the Convention just before its signing was the Minister of Trade M. A. Ostrogorsky, who proposed to demand compensation from London for Russian companies trading with Afghan partners. In turn, the top officials of the General Staff, reassured by the signing of the Russo-Japanese agreement on July 30, 1907, which significantly mitigated the Japanese threat, took a benevolent position as a result, finally burying plans for organizing a campaign against India [Marshall, 2005].

It should also be noted that the draft articles of the Convention on the Afghan question were agreed by Izvolsky not only with the General Staff, but also with the regional military leaders represented by the Governor-General of Turkestan N. I. Grodekov and his staff officers, who held a special meeting on this issue in Tashkent on May 27, 1907. According to the participants of the discussion, of all possible scenarios, the most acceptable for Russia would be St. Petersburg's consent to recognize the dominant influence of Great Britain in Afghanistan, which thus turned into a buffer between the two powers [Kotlyar, 1962, pp. 221-223]. A letter from General Grodekov to A. P. Izvolsky dated March 17, 1908, expressing the opinion of the Russian administration in Turkestan, stated that the rejection of the agreement would entail serious consequences for Russia, since there was still the possibility of a clash with England with the constant threat of an impending crisis in Central Asia ," which would greatly restrict our freedom of action in the political sphere." and military relations on all fronts." Assessing the bold diplomatic move of St. Petersburg, the Governor-General pointed out in the political part of the" Most Comprehensive Report for 1907 "that the agreement put an end to the period of friction and opened a new era of cooperation and" mutual support of Europeans in Asia " [Ter-Egiazarova, 1969, pp. 93-99].

The decisive impetus for British diplomacy to enter the negotiation process was given after considering the current foreign policy situation at an informal dinner of the leading Liberal Cabinet ministers: E. Gray, R. Holden, G. Asquith and J. Morley on April 24, 1906, and their conversation lasted about four hours [Nicolson, 1930, p. 206]. "We discussed the entente far and wide," the Minister of Indian Affairs, J. R. R. Tolkien, said. Morley in a letter to the Viceroy, Lord Minto, the day after this historic meeting (Morley, 1921, p.137). The immediate reason for it was a heated discussion in the Committee of Imperial Defense on the memorandum of Sir J. R. R. Tolkien. Clark's account of Britain's probable objectives in the war against Russia, as well as General G. Kitchener's note on the allocation of additional funds for strengthening the Anglo-Indian armed forces [Williams, 1966, p. 367-368]. As a result, participants

6 Recall that on December 22, 1905, Japan and China signed an agreement on mutual border defense, which contained secret articles of anti-Russian orientation [Shalina, 2000, p. 89].

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We agreed to respond positively to the soundings of St. Petersburg by sending A. Nikolson, the hero of the just - concluded Alhessirak Conference, to the Russian capital as an ambassador. He was given a specific task-to ensure the interests of the British Empire in Europe, India, and the Middle and Far East by concluding a mutually beneficial deal with Russia, and this deal should be formalized in such a way that the European, and above all the Russian, public would have an opinion about the serious concessions made by London to St. Petersburg on Tibetan and Persian issues in exchange for Russia's recognition of the status quo in Afghanistan.

Overcoming the resistance of most of the British administration in India, the military, and representatives of the Middle Eastern group of colonial businessmen mentioned above, Gray sought to convince the United Kingdom establishment that an agreement with Russia was "the only real alternative to the policy of drift, with its constant complaints, bickering, and dangerous friction" (Gray, 1925, p.153). In a private letter to S. Spring-Rice, the head of the Foreign Office also pointed out that the Convention would provide a unique opportunity for Britain to avoid a significant increase in military obligations to both India and the empire as a whole, allowing it to defuse general tensions with Russia [NA, 371/371]. Finally, in the message to the President of the United States, T. To Roosevelt (December 1906), the architect of the 1907 Convention explained the objectives of the British-Russian negotiations as follows: "We want to preserve and strengthen the Entente with France, otherwise it will sign its own treaty with Germany for fear that we might betray it... To complete this basis, we want to conclude an agreement with Russia... If we are not friends, then in any case we will not be enemies " [Ostaltseva, 1977, p. 165].

In addition to diplomats and military personnel, well-known British journalists E. Dillon and D. Wallis, as well as Slavic historian B. Par, made a significant contribution to the negotiation process. All three of them were considered experts in Russia in the British Isles, but the first violin was undoubtedly played by Wallis, who, according to A. P. Izvolsky, " spoke fluent Russian, since he lived in one of the central provinces of Russia in the family of a rural priest and had acquaintances in all classes of Russian society." Notably, it was Wallis who provided a confidential channel of communication between Edward VII and Nicholas II, acting alongside Dillon and Par as an unofficial Foreign Office expert on assessing the situation in Russia and a secret informant for Ambassador Nicholson. The assistance of these individuals to British diplomacy in developing and implementing specific foreign policy steps in the Russian direction is difficult to overestimate [Izvolsky, 1989, p. 126; The Letters..., 1929, vol. 2, p. 54; Pares, 1931, p. 125; Hughes (2), 2000, p. 514-515].

The author's tasks do not include a detailed analysis of all the vicissitudes of the negotiations themselves, which lasted from June 7, 1906 to August 31, 1907, sometimes interrupted for weeks by agreeing on certain points of the future Convention, especially since the main stages of the negotiation process received detailed coverage in historiography [History of Russian Foreign Policy..., 1997, p. 203-206, 213-215; Neilson, 1995, p. 267-288; Hughes (1), 2000]. However, some key episodes in the preparation of documents need to be re-interpreted or clarified based on sources that have become known to specialists in recent years.

First of all, it is necessary to clarify the question of the initiator of the preparation of the articles of agreement directly. Domestic and foreign historians do not have a single point of view on this issue, because each of the parties, camouflaging the real state of affairs, sought to give the "palm" to the partner. However, a comparison of confidential correspondence and memoirs of the participants shows that the negotiations were initiated by Russian diplomacy in the person of Foreign Minister V. N. Lamsdorf, who decided to take such a step at the suggestion of Prime Minister XIU. Vit-

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te 7. The latter sought to achieve several goals at once: first, to prevent the emergence of the London-Constantinople-Tokyo military-political axis; secondly, as mentioned above, to obtain a loan in the British financial market in the context of ongoing anti-government protests; and thirdly, to restore the autocracy's shaken international prestige by organizing a visit by Edward VII to Russia [NA, 181/879, 181/873; BD, p. 219-221; The Letters..., 1929, vol. 2, p. 54-57]. Fulfilling Witte's instructions, Lamsdorff sent a directive to Ambassador A. K. Benckendorf, in which he pointed out the need to appeal to the British with a request to outline the contours of a possible agreement [AVPRI, f. 137, Report of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for 1905, l.82; Ostaltseva, 1977, pp. 158-159].

In response, E. Gray tried to dispel rumors about any secret guarantees of inviolability of Turkish possessions given to Constantinople by Great Britain and Japan [NA, 181/873]. But, more significantly, rejecting the possibility of the king's arrival in Russia as untimely, British diplomacy submitted to St. Petersburg first concrete proposals for cooperation between the two powers along the Baghdad Road (April 1906), and then a draft settlement of the situation around Tibet (June 1906) in connection with the conclusion of the Anglo-Chinese convention on April 27 the same year [RGVIA, f. 2000, op. 1, d. 6643, l. 27-30]. At the same time, it was the Tibetan issue that was, in the words of A. P. Izvolsky, the "touchstone" of the negotiations, since the tsar's dreams of acting as the protector of a distant, lost country in the mountains clearly did not correspond to the real capabilities of Russia, given the presence in Lhasa of a large detachment of British forces under the command of Colonel F. Janghazbend [Schimmelpenninck van der Oye, 1994, p. 13-20]. As D. D. Pokotilov, the envoy to Beijing, informed the Foreign Ministry on June 18, 1906, "all the interest we have shown recently in Tibetan affairs, and in the fate of the Dalai Lama in particular, can only be justified by the consideration that the position we have taken in this matter gives us an opportunity at a favorable moment and abroad." It is only a question of how far we can be satisfied with the compensations that England will be willing to give us for our concession in the affairs of Tibet." It is noteworthy that Nicholas II made a note on this report: "In my opinion, Pokotilov's considerations are correct "[Popov, 1928, p. 49].

The study of diplomatic correspondence shows that the negotiation process included two main stages: the first - from June to November 1906 and the second-from March to August 1907. The least amount of time was spent by the parties on agreeing on the Tibetan problem [Shaumian, 2000, p. 127-136], and the longest-on the second priority region - Afghan with a temporary break to discuss the economically important issue of dividing spheres of influence in Persia for Russia and Britain [BD, p.232 - 305; Nicolson, 1930, p. 238 - 243; Churchill, 1939, p. 107-176]. It is also worth emphasizing that the general favorable background for the negotiation process arose during the interaction of future Entente participants at the Alhessirak Conference on Morocco in the spring of 1906 and in connection with the beginning of secret, although, of course, not for the British, contacts between St. Petersburg and Tokyo during the same period. It is also worth bearing in mind another important circumstance that researchers usually do not take into account, namely, the desire of both St. Petersburg and London to demonstrate peace-loving intentions in the process of preparing and holding the Second Hague Conference.-

7 In the margins of one of Nicholson's reports, Deputy Foreign Minister Harding made a note that it was Russia that initiated the resumption of bilateral contacts after the Russo-Japanese War [BD, p. 272].

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conference of 1907 on disarmament problems. The achieved reduction in tension between the Russian and British Empires perfectly corresponded to this goal.

Historiography is not free from the simplistic notion that the progress of negotiations was slowed down mainly by the fault of the Russian side, since, as, for example, the well-known Russian historian A.V. Ignatiev writes, " the Izvolsky-Kokovtsov line met with serious opposition in military circles and court spheres "[Istoriya vneshnoi politiki Rossii, 1997, p. 206].

In reality, the situation was much more complicated. Far from detracting from the serious resistance of the conservative part of the Russian power elite to the emerging rapprochement with liberal Great Britain, we note the extremely cautious, and sometimes wait-and-see approach of E. Gray to the development of official dialogue. The reason for this reticence lay in the ambivalent perception of Russia by the British ruling circles: on the one hand, their representatives had fears of the impending collapse of the authoritarian regime, which naturally reduced the strategic importance of the new partner of England in the fight against German hegemony, and on the other, many observers on the shores of Albion had a feeling of the possibility of establishing a pro-German military dictatorship in Russia which would reduce the chances of reaching mutual understanding to zero [Iswolsky, 1937, p. 35].

Another crucial aspect of the negotiation process, which is almost not reflected in the research, is the surprisingly restrained reaction of Berlin to reports of ongoing negotiations between London and St. Petersburg. It was not only that A. P. Izvolsky, after making a "ritual" trip to Germany in October 1906, promised the Germans to take their interests into account when concluding the Convention. As suggested by A. Nicholson in a dispatch to E. Gray dated November 15 of the same year, the Russian minister gave the Berlin Cabinet firm guarantees to continue to act as an element of deterrence, capable of preventing any attempt to isolate Germany from London or Paris [BD, p.253]. It was under this condition, which, in fact, meant the use of St. Petersburg by the Kaiser's diplomacy as a "Trojan horse" in the composition of the emerging Entente, that Berlin agreed not to oppose the Anglo-Russian rapprochement.

The issue of a turning point in the course of negotiations cannot be ignored. It should be attributed to November 28, 1906, when the adviser to the Embassy in London, S. A. Poklevsky-Cosell, received the consent of the British side in the person of Charles Harding "to consider in the future any proposals of Russia regarding the Dardanelles". According to Nicholson's memoirs, this news, which made the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry "shine with pleasure", led Izvolsky to assess the British initiative as a "great change" in bilateral relations and a truly "historical event". From that day on, despite the almost four-month pause caused by the consideration of British proposals for Persia by St. Petersburg, the atmosphere in the negotiations became more friendly, and the opposition from the court and the General Staff significantly decreased [BD, p.254; Nicolson, 1930, p. 243].

In this regard, we would like to point out the attempts of both sides to expand the agenda of the talks by discussing not only the problem of the Black Sea Straits, but also the situation around Mongolia on the Russian side, as well as the situation in the Persian Gulf on the British side. On the first issue of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles, which was of fundamental importance to St. Petersburg, British diplomacy managed to get rid of Izvolsky by promising to return to the discussion later, namely, after the conclusion of the Convention and the simultaneous settlement of the Japanese-Russian contradictions in the Far East. Again, Russia's fears of affecting Germany's interests in this matter played a role [BD, p.296]. Regarding the second problem, which was the desire of the Tsarist Foreign Ministry to get Britain and Japan to recognize the Russian sphere of influence in the Ministry of Education and Science-

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London also refrained from making any guarantees, leaving St. Petersburg and Tokyo to independently develop the so - called Mongolian formula [BD, p.284-285]. As for the question of recognizing the special interests of the British in the Persian Gulf, the stubborn resistance of the head of the Tsarist Foreign Ministry to the intentions of the British to include this item in the agreement forced British diplomats to abandon the original plan, having, however, obtained the consent of the Russian partners to take into account the wishes of London de facto, especially G. [BD, p. 475-480, 482 - 483, 491 - 493; Kazem-Zade, 2004, pp. 402-407].

Let's sum up the results. The result of hard work on the text of the document was two agreements on Tibet and Persia, as well as the convention on Afghanistan, signed in St. Petersburg by Minister A. P. Izvolsky and Ambassador to Russia A. Nicolson. It is interesting that the initiative to give the arrangements the form of an agreement or convention was made by the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry. "He is also of the opinion," the British representative reported to London a week before the document was signed , "that the official name" convention "will concern the Governments of Persia and China, whereas the term" agreement"," declaration "or" arrangement", indicating only the name of the treaty. the line of conduct that Russia and Great Britain have mutually pledged to follow in relation to the Persian and Tibetan issues would not have the character of encroaching on the sovereign rights of Persia and China " [BD, p. 299 - 300]. Although the British themselves were in favor of making the agreement on all three issues more binding from the point of view of international law in the form of a "convention", they eventually recognized Izvolsky's arguments as fair. However, despite the legal subtleties, with the light hand of journalists, all three Anglo-Russian regional agreements became known as the 1907 Convention.

Further, unlike the Anglo-French alliance of 1904, which was based on mutual security guarantees, the agreement between Russia and Great Britain did not provide for the parties to accept any obligations and thus did not restrict their freedom of action. This important fact was pointed out by E. Gray and other apologists of the Convention (T. Sanderson, G. Lansdowne) in speeches from the parliamentary rostrum [Hansard..., 1908, vol. 183, p. 1309-1310, 1327-1328; vol. 184, p. 557]. Therefore, its signing, obviously, should be considered not as the birth of another military-political union of the two empires in the traditional sense of the concept of "balance of power", but as the achievement of an agreement (entente), which meant recognizing the possibility of combining on the world map the spheres of predominant influence of a particular power with regions where each of them retained its freedom of action. As a result, an imperfect but effective mechanism for curbing territorial expansion on the periphery of imperial possessions was created.

It is also important to emphasize that the Convention in practice opened a period of detente between the two leading players in the Eurasian geopolitical space. According to N. A. Bazili, a well-known diplomat of the first quarter of the 20th century, assistant to the Head of the Chancellery of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who would have been joined by most educated contemporaries, it "completely changed the atmosphere of Anglo-Russian relations" (Basily, 1973, p. 78). This circumstance allows us to state the end of the so - called Great Game, a period of confrontation between the Russian and British empires that threatened to escalate into a large-scale war for several decades. In any case, as some researchers rightly point out, the "Big Game" has lost its main role in determining the general vector of bilateral relations by the political elite of the two countries [Gillard, 1977, p.177]. This conclusion is not contradicted by the individual violations of the Convention that both partners subsequently committed, especially in Persia, and by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation.-

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Some historians try to downplay the historical significance of this diplomatic act [Klein, 1971, p.126-147; Siegel, 2002, p. 175-196].

As if anticipating criticism of this kind, E. Gray, in one of his public speeches before taking up the post of State Secretary for Foreign Affairs, stressed that often "the spirit of agreements is more important than their letter" [Otte, 2005, p.41]. In the difficult conditions of growing crisis trends, liberal Great Britain, forced to simultaneously solve the problems of maintaining the balance of power in Europe and protecting the remote borders of the empire, managed to reach a compromise with autocratic Russia, pursuing strategic goals. Thus, the role of a regional balancer, which England performed throughout the XIX century, was sacrificed to imperial goals, which allowed London not only to preserve, but also to expand the borders of overseas possessions after the end of the First World War.

In tactical terms, the Anglo-Russian Entente, which the Foreign Office sought to present to the European public as a result of London's concessions to St. Petersburg and which E. Gray himself later called "a strategic victory of British diplomacy "[Gray, 1925, p. 155], laid a solid foundation for cooperation between the two powers in 1914-1917. After the war against Japan and the revolutionary upheavals, together with a respite on the international stage, I got a real chance to join the experience of building a civil society in one of the oldest European democracies. And although the Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907 failed to prevent the first global armed conflict in the history of mankind, the invaluable experience of finding solutions to acute problems and reaching compromises later turned out to be in demand by the world community.

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