The Twentieth Century

By Sir John Glubb

During the six years which divided the Young Turk revolution of 1908 from the First World
War, the Ottomans suffered an endless succession of disasters. In the Balkans they met with
many reverses until their territory in Europe was reduced to Thrace alone. In 1912, Tripoli
became an Italian colony. In the same year, Ibn Saud occupied the Hasa province on the
Persian Gulf, driving out the Ottoman garrison. In Syria, the pan-Turkish policy of the
Committee of Union and Progress had alienated Arab intellectuals and two secret societies had
come into existence, pledged to work for Arab independence.

When war began in Europe in August 1914, the Committee of Union and Progress were divided,
the civilian members favouring neutrality, the military members wishing to enter the war on the
German side. In September, however, war was declared.

The governors of Mecca and Medina had been chosen from the descendants of the Prophet,
ever since the seventh century. The Ottomans had inherited the suzerainty over the Holy Cities
from the Mamlooks in 1517. For centuries Ottoman overlordship had been little more than
nominal, but during the nineteenth century, control was strengthened. The Porte tried to
achieve greater authority by its normal practice of divide and rule—in this instance by sowing
discord between the members of the Prophet's family. When a clash occurred between rival
sharifs, the government supported one of the weaker candidates, who was obliged to rely on
Ottoman assistance in order to resist his opponents.

In 1892, a certain Sharif Husain ibn Ali was “invited” by Sultan Abdul Hameed II to come to
Istanbul, where he was received with veneration, made a member of the Council of State and
kept under strict observation. In 1903, however, the Committee of Union and Progress
dismissed the then Sharif of Mecca and sent Sharif Husain in his place, contrary to the advice of
Abdul Hameed II, who was in some ways a more acute politician than the young reformers.

When the National Assembly was constituted in Istanbul, Sharif Abdulla, the second son of
Husain, sat as the member for the Hejaz. In February 1914, Abdulla, on his way from Mecca to
Istanbul, called on Lord Kitchener in Cairo to enquire what would be the attitude of Britain to an
Arab revolt in the Hejaz. Lord Kitchener's reply was non-committal.

In November 1914, the Sultan of Turkey, in his capacity of khalif, declared a jihad or holy war,
calling upon all the Muslims in the world to fight against France, Britain and Russia. To Britain in
India and Egypt, and to France in North Africa, a universal rising of Muslims would have been
extremely embarrassing. British contacts with the Sharif of Mecca were renewed and, on 5th
June, 1916, Sharif Husain rebelled against the Turks.

In January 1917, it was agreed that an Arab force commanded by Husain's third son, the Ameer
Feisal, should advance northwards and operate on the eastern flank of a British army which was
invading Palestine from Egypt. On 6th July, 1917, an Arab tribal force, accompanied by T. E.
Lawrence, captured Aqaba. On 9th December, 1917, the British army under General Allenby
took Jerusalem.

A Turkish garrison of some ten thousand men remained blockaded by the Arabs in Medina
throughout the war. The Arabs cut the railway north of Medina, while the Turks used several
thousand men trying to repair it. When the front moved northwards to Jerusalem, the Arabs
likewise destroyed the railway north of Maan, where they cut off another seven thousand Turks.

On the whole, it has been estimated that the Arab revolt diverted between twenty and thirty
thousand Turkish troops from the Palestine front. In the final British offensive, on 19th
September, 1918, the Arabs seized the railway junction at Deraa behind the Turkish lines,
thereby ensuring the almost complete destruction of the 4th, 7th and 8th Turkish armies.

The most active part of the Arab forces consisted of bedouin tribesmen who, being able to
move freely in the desert, were in a position continually to turn the Turkish eastern flank. The
result was a striking example of guerilla tactics. The Arabs, who could scarcely have defeated a
Turkish brigade in battle, were able by guerilla methods to divert thirty thousand men from the
main battle front. The Arab effort was, of course, only maintained by the aid of British money
and weapons, but their performance was nevertheless remarkable.

In addition to this actual contribution to the fighting, the revolt of the Sharif of Mecca against
Turkey helped to counteract the effect of the holy war declared by the sultan, for the sharif was
a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad himself.

Moreover, the news of the Hejaz rising resulted in the spread of anti-Turkish feeling in Syria
and Lebanon. The military governor, Jamal Pasha the Less, added fuel to the fire by the
severity of his repression of pro-Arab sentiment.

When the Turkish Empire entered the First World War, Ibn Rasheed declared his support for
the sultan, while Ibn Saud asked for help from the British government in India. Captain W. H. I.
Shakespear, then British agent in Kuwait, was sent to Ibn Saud. This gallant officer persuaded
Ibn Saud to attack Ibn Rasheed, who threatened to interfere with the British invasion of Iraq.
In January 1915, an indecisive battle was fought between the two Arab princes at Jarab, in the
course of which Shakespear was killed.

Ibn Saud did not move again until 1921, when he finally defeated Ibn Rasheed and became
sole ruler of Nejed and the Hasa, and the neighbour of King Husain of the Hejaz.

The Arab revolt in the Hejaz had been preceded by an exchange of letters between Sir Henry
McMahon, the British High Commissioner in Egypt, and Sharif Husain, in which the former had
agreed in general to the grant of independence to the Arabs after the war. (Egypt and North
Africa were not then included in the Arab independence movement.) Sir Henry McMahon
excluded from this pledge an undefined area “west of Damascus”. The correspondence was
terminated by the outbreak of the Arab revolt and never reached the stage of a formal
agreement.
From the beginning of the war, however, Russia, Britain and France had signed a secret
agreement on the subject of the dismemberment of the Turkish Empire. Russia, which coveted
Istanbul, seems to have been the original prime mover. In May 1916, Britain and France signed
the so-called Sykes-Picot Agreement, in which they agreed to establish spheres of influence in
the Arab State to be set up after the war.

The establishment of spheres of influence was a common practice before 1914. Russia and
Britain had signed an agreement in 1907, defining their spheres of influence in Persia.
Immediately before the First World War, France, Germany and Britain had initialled an
agreement regarding their economic concessions in the Turkish Empire. Looked at from an
economic angle, the Powers agreed not to interfere with one another. If, for example, Ruritania
required a railway in its northern province, Russia (let us say) would offer to build it, France and
Britain remaining aloof. If, however, a railway was needed in the south, Britain (for example)
would offer.

Agreements of this nature have since been stigmatized as economic imperialism but, in 1914,
this sharing of economic benefits was not considered incompatible with the political
independence of the country concerned. Sir Mark Sykes, who signed the agreement on behalf
of Britain, was an enthusiastic orientalist and a strong advocate of Arab independence.

For Britain to assist the Arab countries to form a large independent state was not merely a
piece of sentimental idealism but was also a wise and statesmanlike policy. It will be
remembered that the Mediterranean, Egypt and the Red Sea constituted Britain's main trade
and strategic route to India and Australia. It was her constant fear that some potentially hostile
Great Power, like Russia or Germany, might place itself astride this commercial highway and
strangle British commerce. In 1915, the Turks and the Germans had actually reached the banks
of the Suez Canal.

For more than a hundred years, Britain had protected her lifeline by supporting the Ottomans to
keep the Russians out. The Ottomans had now become enemies, so why not support an Arab
state in the role formerly played by the Ottomans? The Arabs would be too weak to defend
their independence alone, but, with British assistance, might form a stable government which
would resist any advance by Germany or Russia. Thus an Anglo-Arab alliance seemed to
present the ideal solution for both peoples.

No sooner did the British take Damascus in September 1918 than they set up an Arab
government under the Ameer Faisal. In July 1919, the self-appointed General Syrian Congress
assembled in Damascus, claiming to represent Syria, Palestine, Lebanon and Trans-Jordan,
which had not as yet been divided into separate countries. It passed a number of resolutions of
which the gist was that Syria, including Palestine, should be an Arab state with the Ameer Feisal
as king, and that foreign tutelage should be rejected but foreign assistance accepted. If
possible, the assistance should be provided by the United States. If that were impossible,
Britain would be accepted but French aid would be refused.

In September 1919, President Woodrow Wilson sent Dr. King and Mr. Crane to report on the
situation. Their recommendations were to the effect that a mandatory power was necessary,
preferably the United States or, failing her, Britain, and that Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and
Trans-Jordan should be one country with one mandatory. There can be no doubt that the
resolutions of the Syrian Congress and the recommendations of the King-Crane Commission
provided a just and wise solution.

A French army had meanwhile landed in Lebanon. On 20th July, 1920, General Gouraud’s
army marched on Damascus, which it occupied on the 25th, and the Arab state ceased to exist.
In the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the only privileges awarded to France in Syria were “a right of
priority in enterprises and local loans” and that she “shall alone supply foreign advisers or
officials on the request of the Arab state”. The uninitiated have sometimes denounced the
“iniquitous” Sykes-Picot Agreement as the cause of the French occupation of Syria. Not only is
this incorrect but Sir Mark Sykes, when he signed it, was under the impression that he was
promoting Arab independence.

The situation had been further confused meanwhile by the issue of the Balfour Declaration on
2nd November, 1917. This document stated that the British government viewed with favour
“the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine”. The second part of
the declaration stated, “it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may
prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”.

The phrase “a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine” has often been pointed to as a
typical piece of political chicanery. “How,” it has been asked, “could a national home exist in
Palestine, except under a Jewish government?” In fact, however, such was all that the Jews
had ever enjoyed in history. Palestine had all through history been inhabited by a mixture of
races.

The second provision in the Balfour Declaration, protecting the rights of non-Jewish
communities in Palestine, seems to suggest that the British government believed that the
majority of the inhabitants of Palestine were already Jews, this sentence being the usual
reservation to protect the rights of minorities. In fact, when the Balfour Declaration was issued,
Jews formed only seven per cent of the population of Palestine, “non-Jewish communities”
constituting ninety-three per cent.

When considering the slovenly wording and careless diplomacy of toe Sykes—Picot Agreement
and the Balfour Declaration, it is necessary to remember the war situation in 1917. Russia had
ceased to fight and, the whole strength of Germany, Austria and Turkey was turned against the
Allies. When the Balfour Declaration was issued, the continued independence of Britain and
France themselves hung in the balance. The best, perhaps the only hope of being able to
repulse the expected German offensive in the spring of 1918, was to secure the entry of the
United States into the war. The British government was advised that this could most easily be
achieved by conciliating Jewish opinion, in view of the powerful influence exerted by leading
Jews in America.

The Balfour Declaration would appear therefore to have been an emergency measure to meet
the war crisis which had arisen as a result of the defection of Russia. It need not be assumed,
however, that the British government was aware that the promise made to the Jews would ruin
their plans for long term co-operation with the Arabs. The fact that Israeli-Arab hostility has
since then achieved world-wide publicity should not cause us to imagine that, when the Balfour
Declaration was issued, the matter appeared in Britain to be of much importance.

Zionist policy throughout showed a remarkable contrast to that followed by the Arabs in one
respect. The Zionists always accepted whatever concessions they could get and, having
consolidated the ground won, immediately began to work for more. The Arabs repeatedly
rejected compromise solutions and insisted on all or nothing. The Balfour Declaration was so
vaguely worded that it could mean everything or nothing. The Zionists nevertheless accepted it
and immediately began to use it as a lever to get more.

The Mandate for Palestine, allotted by the League of Nations, consisted principally of provisions
in favour of the Jews. Although Jews only constituted seven per cent of the population, the
word Jews or Zionist appears twelve times in the Mandate. The Arabs, who formed ninety-three
per cent of the population, were not once mentioned.

The French seizure of Syria provoked at first more indignation than the Jewish National Home,
because it took place immediately and by force. The implications of the Palestine Mandate were
not fully appreciated for some time. On 20th July, 1925, the Druzes of Syria, living in the area
south-east of Damascus known as the Druze Mountain or Jebel al Druze, rose in rebellion
against the French. The remainder of Syria gave them little military support, but fighting
continued against the Druzes until the summer of 1926.

The years 1926 to 1939 passed somewhat uneasily in Syria. Opposition to France, however,
was almost entirely political and there were no further military operations. Lebanon also
remained under direct French administration during the same period. The Lebanese, however,
had throughout history looked westward across the Mediterranean rather than eastward
towards Arabia. Many of their leaders had been educated in France or in French schools in
Lebanon, and opposition to the mandate was never acute, as it was in Syria.

Iraq had been occupied by the British army during the course of the First World War, but here
no Arabs had fought on the side of the allies. After the end of the war, the future of Iraq, unlike
that of Syria and Palestine, was not of interest to other Great Powers or to strong political
groups capable of bringing pressure on the League of Nations or lobbying the members.
Harassed by the more urgent problems of Germany, Russia, Austria and Turkey, the British
government shelved the question of Iraq, leaving that country under an improvised military
administration.

In June 1920, the Iraq tribes rose in revolt. The principal military officers in the army of the
Ameer Faisal had been Iraqis, who had previously been serving in the Turkish army. They had
witnessed the French seizure of Damascus and had returned to Iraq, stating that Britain had
betrayed her pledges. The arrival of these officers caused an outburst of resentment in
Baghdad. The actual fighting, however, was done entirely by the tribes, who were not inspired
by nationalist ambitions, but by opposition to government control in any form. The British
administration had attempted to govern the whole country, but the tribes were determined to
retain their independence, as they had done for four centuries under the Ottomans. The military
operations involved were not extensive, but they were an unhappy prelude to Anglo-Iraqi
relations.
The imposition of a mandate by the League of Nations was, however, resented. A system of
dyarchy, under which Iraqi executive officials were “doubled” by British advisers, inevitably
produced some personal friction. The mandate, however, was terminated in October 1932 and
Iraq became a member of the League of Nations.

In the 1920s, Iraq had been surrounded by enemies. The French and the Turks wished to
annex Mosul, the Kurds were often hostile, and a new revival of Wahhabi fanaticism in Central
Arabia led to bloodthirsty raids from the desert against the tribes on the Euphrates. Moreover,
the Iraqi tribes themselves were by no means reconciled to control by any government. Britain
freely used her armed forces and her international prestige to defend Iraq and to subject the
tribes to control. Without such help, it is doubtful whether Iraq would have survived.

Amid all the impassioned political propaganda of the past fifty years, the actual administration
of the Arab countries after the First World War is often forgotten. The fact remains, however,
that until the end of the war, almost all senior government posts had been held by Turks. For
four hundred years, the Arabs had enjoyed no opportunity to produce statesmen,
administrators, technicians or soldiers. Thus the task which faced them, when the Turks
suddenly disappeared in 1918, was one of immense difficulty.

For twenty years, between the two World Wars, many British officials worked with untiring zeal
and devotion to build up every department of modern government. The methods of taxation,
the preparation of annual budgets, the legal system, irrigation, public works, roads and
railways, education, police and the build-up of armies from nothing—all these varied and
essential services were the work of mandatory officials, many of whom were inspired by a
deeply loyal devotion to the Arab countries in which they worked. It is not right that such
patient and devoted service be entirely forgotten.

At the end of the First World War, Sharif Husain of Mecca had assumed the title of king. Central
Arabia, then known as Nejed, was ruled by the Saud family, which for a hundred and fifty years
had provided the leaders of the Wahhabi religious movement. In 1924, the Wahhabis invaded
the Hejaz and drove King Husain from his throne. Abdul Azeez ibn Saud assumed the title of
King of the Hejaz and Nejed, later changed to that of King of Saudi Arabia, King Husain died, an
exile from his country, in Cyprus.

Egypt, which had been in chaos and misery in 1882 when the British army occupied Cairo, had
become rich, strong, and well-governed in the ensuing thirty years. But, as always occurs in
such cases, benefits soon came to be accepted as a matter of course, while grievances rankled.
The situation was mishandled by the British government, partly owing to the deterioration in
the quality of British officials in Egypt, and to their frequent transfer and replacement. Lord
Cromer had spent twenty-four years in Egypt, but during the war years, most of his staff had
left.

The peoples of Asia and Africa differ profoundly from those of north-west Europe. Their
personal relationships are warmer and they do not expect their governments to be impersonal
machines. The modern Western practice of moving officials to other appointments every three
years renders extremely difficult the maintenance of those close and amicable personal relations
on which in Asia almost everything depends.
Disturbances occurred in Egypt in March 1919, but, on 28th February, 1921, the country was
declared independent and, on 19th April, 1923, a constitution was promulgated. On 19th
November, 1924, however, the assassination of Sir Lee Stack jeopardized all the progress
achieved. On several occasions when a complete understanding was nearly reached, terrorist
actions made progress impossible. King Fuad, moreover, was himself alarmed by the demagogy
of Zaghlul Pasha, the Egyptian nationalist leader.

At the commencement of the Second World War, a large French army was in occupation of
Syria and Lebanon. With the fall of France, however, an Italo-German armistice commission
arrived. In April 1941, a military coup d’état took place in Baghdad, and the regent was obliged
to escape to Jordan. The military government declared war on Britain and appealed to Germany
for help. On 30th April, the Iraqi army attacked the British Air Force Station at Habbaniya. In
May, a column of British troops from Palestine, accompanied by the Jordan Arab Legion,
crossed the desert and retook Baghdad, replacing the regent and his ministers in office.

On 8th June, 1941, British and Free French troops and the Arab Legion invaded Syria and
Lebanon, the occupation of which was completed on 11th July. The civil administration was
then handed over to the Free French. On the occasion of this invasion of Syria, the Free French
had issued a promise of independence to that country. In May 1945, however, when the war
came to an end, the French showed no readiness to withdraw and fighting broke out in the
streets of Damascus.

The British government, which for twenty-five years had smarted under taunts of having
betrayed Syrian independence in 1920, ordered British troops to assume control and, in 1946,
both the French and British armies were withdrawn. Thirty years after the exchange of letters
between Sharif Husain and Sir Henry McMahon, Syria and Lebanon became independent. For a
short time, Britain was the heroine of the Syrians but, alas, political memories are all too short.

In Palestine, Jews and Arabs ceased fighting one another when the Second World War broke
out, and a number of both enlisted in the British Army. But when the tide of victory turned
against Germany, Jewish underground organizations commenced terrorist attacks on British
soldiers and base installations. As soon as hostilities were over, the United States and Russia, in
almost identical words, attacked the presence of British forces in Palestine as did also Jews and
Arabs alike. Britain, as a result, notified the United Nations of her intention to surrender the
mandate. If British troops had remained in Palestine and supervised the execution of the
partition plan, the operation might have been carried out without fighting. Pressure brought to
bear on Britain by the United States and Russia, demanding the immediate withdrawal of British
troops, was partly responsible for the subsequent disasters.

In November 1947, a resolution dividing Palestine into Jewish and Arab areas was passed with
some difficulty by the United Nations General Assembly. Unfortunately the assembly made no
provision for the enforcement of its resolution. When the British mandate ended on 15th May,
1948, the state of Israel was declared and the Arabs and Jews began to fight one another.
Eventually, on 24th February, 1949, Egypt signed an armistice with Israel. Lebanon concluded a
similar armistice on 23rd March, and Jordan on 3rd April, 1949.
When the fighting came to an end, the only portion of Palestine retained by the Arabs was that
which had been defended by the Arab Legion, the army of Jordan. The Iraqi army, which had
defended the Nablus area, withdrew without concluding an armistice with Israel. This remnant
of Palestine was united to Trans-Jordan to constitute the Kingdom of Jordan.

At the end of the Second World War, Britain had conceived the idea that a federation or alliance
of all the Arab countries would ensure stability in the Middle East. From the point of view of
British interests such Arab strength and stability was desirable, in order to ensure the security
of the trade route to the Indian Ocean.

It is interesting to notice that subsequent Arab propaganda has always insisted that Britain and
the United States created the state of Israel in order to weaken and divide the Arabs, and the
vast majority of people in the Middle East believe this to have been the case. In fact, however,
Britain’s principal interest in the area was to protect the passage to the Indian Ocean from
Russian or German control, an objective which might have been achieved by a strong Arab
empire replacing the Ottoman Empire.

As a result, Britain encouraged the formation of the Arab League, the Charter of which was
signed on 22nd March, 1945. Egypt, who had never before identified herself with the Arabs,
claimed leadership of the League. The signatories of the Charter were Egypt, Syria, Lebanon,
Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Yemen.

The possibility of fruitful co-operation between Britain and the Arab League was destroyed by
the tragedy of Palestine. The Arab League, which Britain had hoped would form a power bloc
sufficient to thrust back attempts at Russian infiltration, threw all its energies into the struggle
against Israel.

A notable feature of Middle East politics since 1950 has been the rapid development of radio
broadcasting for political propaganda. The almost unrestrained use of violent polemics and
bitter vituperation has done much to cause unrest and even to provoke outbreaks of violence.
Broadcasting is a peculiarly powerful weapon in the Middle East because it can reach many
communities who did not previously read the press, and also because it can be heard in their
homes by women who would not attend political meetings.

Perhaps, like other weapons, it will become blunted with use, the very violence of the language
used contributing eventually to deaden the effect.