Iraq and Iraqi Revolt (1920) Following the Iraqi Revolt of 1920, British colonial administrators felt a more effective and cheaper method to rule the area would be to create an Iraqi government in which British influence was less visible. It was in this environment that Sir Percy Cox took up residence in Baghdad as the first High Commissioner under the Iraqi Mandate, travelling via Kut el-Amara. Later, reflecting on Britain's new policy and the difficulties involved, Cox wrote to Lady Bell: The task before me was by no means an easy or attractive one. The new line of policy which I had come to inaugurate involved a complete and necessarily rapid transformation of the facade of the existing administration from British to Arab and, in the process, a wholesale reduction in the numbers of British and British-Indian personnel employed. Acting as High Commissioner, Cox collaborated with former Ottoman officials and tribal, sectarian, and religious leaders and oversaw the creation of a largely Arab provisional government, or "Council of State," with the purpose of seeing the young country through the turbulent period following the revolt. Cox selected as president the (Sunni) religious leader Abd Al-Rahman Al-Gillani, the Naqib of Baghdad. Council members were culled from local elites whom Cox felt could be relied upon to support the British agenda. The satisfactory functioning of this interim government allowed Cox to attend the Cairo Conference, convened by the new Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill in 1921. The 1921 Cairo Conference and the crowning of King Faisal Among the points Cox considered salient coming into the 1921 Cairo Conference was the reduction of British spending in Iraq and the selection of a ruler for the country. To satisfy the first item, Cox proposed a plan to cut immediately expenditure and withdraw troops from Mesopotamia. On the question of who should rule Iraq, Cox considered the best option to be one of the sons of the Sharif of Mecca, with whom the British had a special relationship during the war due to promises made during the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence. At the conference, the Sharif's son Faisal emerged as the preferred choice, with Cox noting that Faisal's military experience in World War I as well as his vast political skills made him the most qualified to raise an army and rule Iraq effectively. Cox would later write that the decision in favour of Faisal was "easiest to arrive