Enemy on the Euphrates (66 page)

6.
   Ibid., p. 261.

7.
   Ibid., p. 332.

8.
   Quoted in Townshend, p. 48.

9.
   Ibid., p. 49.

10.
  Haldane,
The Insurrection in Mesopotamia
, p. 342.

11.
  IO/MSS/EUR/F462, Major General Leslie to his wife, Hilla, 20 August and 10 and 19 October 1920.

12.
  Maunsell,
Prince of Wales’s Own
, p. 287.

13.
  Philby Papers, ‘The Legend of Lijman’, p. 186.

14.
  See Kadhim,
Al-haraka al-Islamiyya fi al-‘Iraq
, p. 341.

15.
  Pirie, p. 80.

16.
  Quoted in Andrew Boyle,
Trenchard, Man of Vision
, Collins, London, 1962, p. 89. It is not clear exactly when this attack took place; it could have been any time between February and May 1921. If towards the latter, this gives further indication of the continuity of the suppression campaign well into 1921.

17.
  Ibid.

18.
  Ibid.

Chapter 34: A ‘friendly native state’

1.
   Disgusted with British policy in Iraq, Philby would soon resign his position.

2.
   Luizard, p. 417.

3.
   Quoted in Satia,
Spies in Arabia
, p. 253.

4.
   For a detailed analysis of the 1922 Treaty, see Ireland, pp. 341–52. A slightly modified version of the initially proposed treaty was not ratified until 1924, after the election of a Constituent Assembly by indirect voting with reserved seats for pro-British Christian and Jewish delegates and further packed by the automatic inclusion of forty largely pro-British sheikhs.

Afterword

1.
   See the works by Antonius and Zeine.

2.
   For critiques of the ‘orthodox narrative’ that both before and during the First World War the Arabs were ‘anti-Ottoman’ and saw the Turks as their enemy, see for example, the articles in Khalidi et al.,
The Origins of Arab Nationalism
, by Dawn, op. cit.; Haddad, op. cit.; Lisa Anderson, ‘The Development of Nationalist Sentiment in Libya, 1908–1922’, pp. 225–42; and James Jankowski, ‘Egypt and Early Arab Nationalism 1908–1922’, pp. 243–70. See also Jonathan Gorvett, ‘The Forgotten Arabs of Gallipoli’,
Al Jazira Net
, 14, January 2004, available at
www.aljazeera.com/archive/2004/01/200849135129326810.html

3.
   Private Ihsan, the Palestinian Arab whose diary is the principal material used in Tamari’s biographical article, spent most of his time in uniform trying to avoid active service and was clearly opposed to the war. However, he was clearly a literate, if not intellectual, individual with very ‘advanced’ ideas, and it is difficult to know how typical he was since, to date, only one other such diary has been found and that belonged to a junior officer whose mother was actually Turkish and who wrote in Turkish – a junior officer named Muhammad al-Salih. In contrast to Private Ihsan, Second Lieutenant Al-Salih was strongly
pro-Ottoman and a loyal and brave soldier. See Hasan Basri Danisman (ed.),
Gallipoli 1915. Bloody Ridge (Lone Pine). Diary of Lt. Mehmed Fasih
, Denizer Kitabevi, Istanbul 2001.

4.
   See E. J. Erickson,
Ottoman Army Effectiveness in WW1: A Comparative Study
, Routledge, Abingdon, 2007, pp. 120–21. The British Intelligence study of 7,233 Ottoman prisoners and deserters on the Palestine front, carried out over the period October–November 1917, showed that 64 per cent were ethnic Turks, 27 per cent Arabs and 9 per cent Greeks, Kurds, Jews and Armenians. These percentages were almost exactly the same as the British estimates for the actual composition of the Ottoman troops confronting them: 66 per cent Turks, 26 per cent Arabs and 8 per cent ‘others’.

5.
   The notable exception being Ireland (1937).

6.
   Elie Kedourie,
England and the Middle East
, Bowes and Bowes, London, 1956, p. 205.

7.
   Marlowe, p. 212.

8.
   Bell, ‘Review of the Civil Administration of Mesopotamia’, p. 144.

9.
   Ibid., p. 147; Longrigg,
Iraq
, p. 122.

10.
  See e.g. Batatu, pp. 174, 220–21.

11.
  Amal Vinogradov, ‘The 1920 Revolt in Iraq Reconsidered: The Role of the Tribes in National Politics’,
International Journal of Middle East Studies
, vol. 3, no. 2, 1972, p. 125.

12.
  Jafna Cox, ‘“A splendid training ground”: The Importance to the RAF of Its Role in Iraq, 1919–32’,
Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History
, vol. 13, no. 2, 1985, p. 175.

13.
  On the bombing of tribal villages in southern Yemen during the 1930s, see H. St J. Philby,
Sheba’s Daughters
, Methuen & Co., London, 1939, p. xiv.

14.
  ‘Informal Empire’ is the term used by Daniel Silverfarb,
Britain’s Informal Empire in the Middle East: A Case Study of Iraq, 1929–41
, Oxford University Press, 1986; ‘Covert Empire’ is used by Satia,
Spies in Arabia.

15.
  Ian Rutledge,
Addicted to Oil: America’s Relentless Drive for Energy Security
, I. B. Tauris, London, 2005, p. 34.

16.
  Eugene Rogan,
The Arabs, A History
, Allen Lane, London, 2010, p. 173.

17.
  Ja‘far al-Khaiyat,
Al-thawra al-‘Iraqiyya
(The Iraqi Revolution), Dar al-Rafidayn, Beirut 2004, p. 5 (1st edn, 1971). The book is a selection of material from Sir Arnold Wilson’s
Mesopotamia, 1917–1920: A Clash of Loyalties
, translated into Arabic with a prologue by the translator.

18.
  This was al-Hasani,
Al-‘Iraq fi dawra al-ihtilal wa al-intidab
.

19.
  Vinogradov, p. 139.

20.
  See Kadhim,
Reclaiming Iraq
, pp. 31–2.

21.
  Kadhim states that while the uprising ‘achieved its political goals … the founding of the Iraqi state[,] [w]hat was not intended was the composition of the state that came into being.’ Kadhim,
Reclaiming Iraq
, p. 164.

22.
  Tripp, p. 31, says it was ‘less than 20 percent’.

23.
  See Jafna Cox, p. 174.

24.
  Dodge, p. 158. Essentially the same point is made by Davis.

25.
  For the sorry political history of Iraq since 1921 see, in particular, Batatu, Phebe Marr,
The Modern History of Iraq
, Westview, Colorado, 1985, Tripp, Dodge, Gema Martín Muñoz,
Iraq, un fracaso de Occidente, 1920–2003
, Tusqets Editores, Barcelona, 2003), Davis and Sluglett.

26.
  On the increasing involvement of Turkey in Kurdistan see ‘Kurdistan Oil & Gas Report’,
Financial Times
, 10 December 2012, pp. 3–4.

Appendix: Some Biographical Notes

1.
   On this and similar atrocities see Sluglett, pp. 188–91; Dodge, pp. 132–56; Satia,
Spies In Arabia
, pp. 239–62.

2.
   James, p. 327.

OFFICIAL UK SOURCES

Published

Admiralty,
Iraq and the Persian Gulf
, B.R. 524 (restricted), Geographical Handbook Series, Naval Intelligence Division, London, 1944.

Bell, Gertrude, ‘Review of the Civil Administration of Mesopotamia’, Cmd. 1061, 1920, HMSO, London, 1920.

Cox, Sir Percy,
Iraq: Report on Iraq Administration, October 1920–March 1922
, HMSO, London, 1922.

House of Commons Debates [Hansard], at
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com
.

Pirie, G.C., ‘Some Experiences of No. 6 Squadron in the Iraq Insurrection 1920’,
Air Publication
, no. 1152, June 1925, RAF Museum Archive, Hendon.

War Office,
Supplement to the London Gazette
, HMSO, London, 5 July, 1921,
London Gazette
,
www.london-gazette.co.uk
.

Cabinet Papers (The National Archive, London)

CAB/21/119, Admiral Edmond Slade, ‘Petroleum Situation in the British Empire’, 29 July 1918.

CAB/24/106, CP 1320: Mesopotamian Expenditure. Memorandum by the Secretary of State for War, 20 May 1920; CP 1356: Bolshevik Aggression in Persia. Copy of correspondence between Persian Foreign Minister and Secretary General League of Nations, 19 May 1920.

CAB/24/107, CP 1467: Appendix D. From Civil Commissioner, Baghdad, 15 May 1920; CP 1475: Secretary of State (India) to Civil Commissioner Baghdad, 7 June 1920.

CAB/24/108, CP 1524: Memorandum by the Minister in Charge of Petroleum
Affairs, 21 June 1920.

CAB/24/109, CP 1623: Strength of British Forces in the Middle East. Copy of telegram from the War Office to the General Officer Commanding, Mesopotamia, 14 July 1920; CP 1646: Civil Commissioner, Baghdad to Foreign Office, 8 July 1920; GOC, Mesopotamia to War Office, 9, 14, 15 July 1920; Situation in Mesopotamia: memorandum by the Secretary of State for War, 17 July 1920.

CAB/24/110, CP 1710: Reinforcements for Mesopotamia, War Office, 30 July 1920; CP 1796: Telegrams relating to the Mesopotamian Situation from Civil Commissioner, Baghdad; CP 1790: Note on the Causes on the Outbreak in Mesopotamia, n.d.

CAB/24/111, CP 1715: Note on the Mesopotamia–Persia Situation by Sir Percy Cox, 30 July 1920; CP 1801: Report on the Attack at Tel Afar, 25 June 1920; CP 1814, 1815: Copies of Telegram from Secretary of State for War to GOC-in-chief, Mesopotamia, 26 August 1920 and reply, 30 August 1920; CP 1871: Secretary of State for India to Cabinet. Copies of Indian newspaper articles, 16 September 1920.

CAB/27/1,
British Desiderata in Turkey in Asia
(The De Bunsen Committee Report), 25 June 1915.

Foreign Office Papers (The National Archive, London)

FO/371,
Personalities, Mosul, Arbil and Frontier
, Government Press, Baghdad, 1921.

FO/800/221, Memorandum, Sir Mark Sykes to Sir Arthur Hirtzel, 16 January 1918.

FO/882/13, Memorandum on Military, Political Situation in Mesopotamia (Section II), 28 October 1915; Copy of Telegram from Sir John Maxwell (Cairo) to Lord Kitchener, War Office, 16 October 1915; Copy of Telegram from Sir Mark Sykes to Sir Percy Cox (Mesopotamia), Cairo 22 November 1915.

India Office Papers (The British Library, London)

IO/L/PS/10/815,
Geological Reports, Mesopotamia and Kurdistan
, Preliminary Report on the Prospects of Petroleum in the Baghdad Wilaya, Government Press, Baghdad, March 1918; Geological Report (Mesopotamia no. 1) District of Qaiyara, Government Press, Baghdad 1919; Telegram, Civil Commissioner, Baghdad, to Foreign Office, 13 March 1918.

IO/L/PS/11/175, Telegram 6948, from Civil Commissioner Baghdad to India Office, 9 June 1920; Telegram 8312, from Civil Commissioner Baghdad to India Office, (Repeated to Viceroy) 10 July 1920; Telegram 8542, Civil
Commissioner Baghdad to H.B.M. Minister Tehran, repeated to Bushire, Simla, Qasvin, India Office, Banda Abbas, 16 July 1920.

IO/L/PS/20/C151,
Tribes of the Tigris
, Government of India for Arab Bureau, Calcutta, 1917.

IO/L/PS/20/C199,
Personalities, Baghdad and Kadhimayn
, Baghdad 1920.

IO/L/PS/20/C152,
Tribes around the Junction of the Euphrates and Tigris
, Government of India for Arab Bureau, Calcutta, 1917.

IO/L/PS/20/63,
The Muntafiq. Al Sa‘dun, Bani Malik, Ajwad, Bani Sa’id, Bani Huchaym
, Arab Bureau, Calcutta, 1917.

IO/L/PS/20/235,
Arab Tribes of the Baghdad
Vilayet, Government of India for Arab Bureau, July 1918, Calcutta 1919.

IO/MSS/EUR/F462, Correspondence of Major General G. A. J. Leslie. Letters copied and sent to Arnold T. Wilson, 24 August 1930, to assist Wilson in writing his own memoirs of these events.

OTHER ARCHIVAL SOURCES

Darwent Collection (Manchester Regiment Archive), Ashton-under-Lyne Central Library: MR4/25/48/1–10:
2nd Battalion Manchester Regiment in Mesopotamia 1920
.

Gertrude Bell Project, University of Newcastle,
www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk
.

Philby Papers, Middle East Centre, St Antony’s College, Oxford: PH VI/3 (various correspondence); ‘The Legend of Lijman’ (unpublished manuscript, 1928); ‘Mesopotage’ (unpublished manuscript, 1946?).

RAF Museum Archives, Hendon.

Books in the Arabic Language

‘Abd al-Darraji, ‘Abd al-Razzaq,
Ja‘far Abu al-Timman wa dawrahu fi al-haraka al-wataniyya fi al-‘Iraq
(Ja‘far Abu al-Timman and His Role in the Iraqi National Movement), 2nd edn, Ministry of Culture and Information, Baghdad, 1980.

Abu Tabikh, Jamil Muhsin (ed.),
Muthakarat al-Sayyid Muhsin Abu Tabikh, 1910–1960: khamsun ‘aman min tarikh al-‘Iraq al siyyasi al-hadith
(Memoirs of Sayyid Muhsin Abu Tabikh 1910–1960: Fifty Years of Iraq’s Modern Political History), Mu’sasa al-‘Arabiyya li al-dirasat wa al-nashar, Beirut, 2001.

al-Asadi, Hasan,
Thawra al-Najaf ‘ala al-Ingliz aw al shararat al-ula li thawra al-‘ishrin
(The Uprising against the British at Najaf or the First Sparks of the Revolution of 1920), Ministry of Information, Baghdad, 1975.

al-Bazirgan, Hasan ‘Ali,
Min ahdath Baghdad wa al-Diyala ithna al-thawra
al-‘ishrin fi al-‘Iraq
(Concerning the Events in Baghdad and the Diyala during the Revolution of 1920 in Iraq) new edn, Bayt al-Hikma, Baghdad, 2000.

al-Fira‘un, Fariq al-Mizhar,
Al-haqa’iq al-nasi‘a fi al-thawra al-‘Iraqiyya, sana 1920
(The Clear Facts About the Iraqi Revolution of 1920), n.p., Baghdad, 1952.

al-Hasani, ‘Abd al-Razzaq,
Al-‘Iraq fi dawra al-ihtilal wa al-intidab
(Iraq between the Occupation and the Mandate), vol. 1, Matba‘ al-‘Irfan, Sidon, 1935.

al-Hasani, ‘Abd al-Razzaq,
Tarikh al-‘Iraq al-haditha
(History of Modern Iraq), Matba‘ al-‘Irfan, Sidon, 1957.

al-Hasani, ‘Abd al-Razzaq,
Al-thawra al-‘Iraqiyya al-kubra, sana 1920
(The Great Iraqi Revolution of 1920), 3rd edn, Matba‘ al-‘Irfan, Sidon, 1972.