T. E. Lawrence ftontispiece The bungalow at No. 2 Polstead Road, Oxford, facing page 48
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representative that he assumed responsibility for sending Shukri to Beirut 80 but he could only have acted through Lawrence, since he was not in Damascus at the time, but either still at Azrak or on his way. The result of this move, as was no doubt calculated, was at once to create "an incident" when Allenby ordered the flag to be hauled down -- there was "violent effervescence" in Damascus, and "an incipient mutiny" in Feisal's forces. 81 In a letter written in 1929 to Professor William Yale, Lawrence says that " Feisal had ordered his people to have nothing to do with littoral Syria south of the Tripoli gap," and asserts that " Shukri was sent to Beirut by Ali Riza Pasha." 82 Yet the French official note of the 7th October, 1918, shows Feisal admitting full responsibility for Shukri's action! Lawrence in this letter does not really deny his responsibility, but writes one of his artful word twisters: "If Shukri told you I had urged him to Beirut, it was probably that he was getting frightened at the magnitude of his error, and wanted to make-believe that he had authority." 83 One can hardly imagine a more feeble suggestion. Lawrence then expresses amazement at Yale's remark that "British political officers were working to create a situation in Syria which would make impossible . . . the Sykes-Picot treaty." In this letter, Lawrence says "the Sykes-Picot treaty was the Arab sheet-anchor," though, in his memorandum to the Cabinet written 4th November, 1918, he had said that "the geographical absurdities of the Sykes-Picot agreement will laugh it out of court," and thought it "would perhaps be as well if we spared ourselves a second effort on the same lines." 84 As to the behaviour of the British political officers in Syria, I limit myself to three examples. At the time of the Shukri-Beirut trouble, M. Coulondre, the French representative, received from General Clayton (who was about to leave) the assurance that Major Cornwallis (of the Arab Bureau, but then British liaison officer to Feisal) would warn Feisal that only Allenby had the right to appoint these Arab governors. When Clayton had gone, Cornwallis, according to Brémond, refused to carry out his orders. 85 On the 10th December, 1918, Georges Picot telegraphed from Damascus 86 that "the officers of the British Intelligence are carrying on an anti-French agitation" by falsifying the text of the Anglo-French declaration of the 26th September, 1918 -243- asserting "that the agreements of 1916 no longer subsist." On the 2nd January, 1919, Pontalis, the new French representative in Syria, telegraphed 87 that the English authorities had refused permission for a Francophile Lebanese delegation to go to London, and that the English postal censorship had received orders to hold up the correspondence of French officials dealing with the question! These are French secret official documents, not quasi-fictional heroics, and certainly support Professor Yale's contention. Of course, at the time those telegrams were sent, Lawrence was no longer in Damascus, but working in the same sense in London and at the Peace Conference. Thus, while some of the sympathy expressed for "Arab freedom" and "Arab self-determination" was doubtless sincere, these "causes" were in the main British camouflage for the more realistic purpose of excluding the French as far as possible from the Middle East and establishing British influence throughout that area. -244- PART THREE -245- [This page intentionally left blank.] -246-
CHAPTER ONE "WHEN DAMASCUS fell," says Lawrence dramatically, "the Eastern war -- probably the whole war -- drew to an end." 1 This is typical of Lawrence's blatant propaganda, which succeeded so well because its blatancy harmonised with those to whom it was addressed. In spite of a few acknowledgments -- which can always be triumphantly quoted -- that other fronts existed, that his "war" was "a side-show of a side-show," 2 even "a tussle in a turnip-field," 3 -- the whole trend and assertiveness of Seven Pillars (and extracts in Revolt) are designed to insinuate that the Eastern war was the really important one and that the important contribution to that war came from Lawrence and "the Arabs." There was a political as well as personal motive for this, as there was an obvious political motive for the systematic over-estimate of "the Arabs" in Antonius's book, which is essentially propaganda for "the Arabs" against the British, the French and the Jews. Similarly, in spite of its too sweepingly generous and patronising compliments to others -- British and Arab -- which ring as hollow as a hearty vote of thanks to the staff -the whole trend of Seven Pillars is to build up Lawrence as the hero of this over-estimated "Arab revolt." Hence his extreme annoyance with Herbert Read for pointing out that the book hasn't got a real hero. 4 It is perfectly true that six weeks after the fall of Damascus, both the Eastern war and the World War ended; but they did not end because of the fall of Damascus, and they would have ended at the same time if Damascus had not fallen. The surrender of Bulgaria, on the 30th September, opened the way for an immediate invasion of European Turkey, under the threat of which the Turkish govern- -247-
Why did Lawrence leave Damascus on the 4th October, so soon after its capture? There seems no reason to doubt his declaration that he was bored and exasperated by the Arabs; 6 and after nearly four years without home leave, he might most legitimately ask for it, though he had few or none of the usual motives which made ordinary men over-value such brief concessions of liberty. The suggestion that he left in order to hasten to the aid of the Western front need not be taken seriously, though Lawrence encouraged the tale. 7 If he had gone to the French front, in what capacity would he have served? As Anglo-Arabian liaison officer to his military hero, Marshal Foch? And he hurried so determinedly that, while leaving Damascus on the 4th October, he did not reach England until (so he says) the 11th of November. None of these arguments would have weighed with General Allenby, who, if anyone, would have been able to tell Lawrence that the war in the West was ending. Lawrence says he invoked a "year-old promise" from Allenby, and thus secured release, 8 but does not go into details. The fact is that, since Feisal's "Arab army" had a political rather -248- than a military significance, the moment had now arrived for its British officers to disappear discreetly. At Deraa they had all, except Lawrence, gone over to Barrow in a body; and before they reached Damascus, Sir Hubert Young -- the all-important Q of "the Arabs" -- had, with the aid of Lawrence and telegrams, already re-transferred to the British army, with a soldier's sigh of relief at finding once more the soothing influences of "military precision and punctuality." 9 I have already quoted Lawrence's "What mattered to me was the government of Damascus," and it was to secure that object that he had been employed. "When I left Damascus on October the fourth, the Syrians" (surely the Sharifians? -- the Syrians had rebelled) "had their de facto Government, which endured two years, without foreign advice, in an occupied country wasted by war, and against the will of important elements among the Allies." 10 Another example of Lawrence's propagandist skill, is that sentence. Feisal's government endured because it was supported by British subsidies and ultimately British arms -- as witness that moment of panic during the Abd el Kadir rebellion, when Lawrence had been forced to ask General Chauvel for military help, though it had not been used. 11 This fact is passed over very lightly by the Bureau, as is the further fact that Abd el Kadir was murdered by Sharifian police on the 6th November. 12 When Allenby let Lawrence go on the 4th October, the reason was that, with the ending of the war, the scene of Lawrence's -- and at times Feisal's -- political activities would have to be transferred from the Middle East to Paris and London. The two of them would be pawns in Lloyd George's game of keeping the "agnostic, atheistic French" out of Palestine and as much of Syria as possible. The last entry in Lawrence's calendar of war movements shows that he reached Cairo on the 8th October, 1918. From there he wrote a letter on the 14th, not to any of his long-neglected friends in England, but to Major Scott, who was still base commandant at Akaba. Lawrence reports that he was leaving Egypt but with no indication that he was hurrying back to Europe to fight on the Western front. On the contrary. The "old war," he says, is ending and he thinks his use is gone; he asks for his engraved British rifle to be sent to Cairo, with the modest reflection that "we have, I expect, changed history in the Near East." 13 His last reflection is a purely political one, of wondering how the Powers will deal with -249- "the Arabs." That was what he was being sent back by the Arab Bureau to try to influence. Of course, Lawrence could not even be conveyed from Cairo to England without a fresh crop of stories. At that particular epoch, about three weeks were needed for officers on leave to make the journey, ten days of which had to be spent on a troop train between Taranto and Le Havre. 14 There was also a faster wagon-lits staff train on which (so Lawrence says) none could travel under the rank of full colonel. Lawrence put out the story that, because he "liked comfort," he wanted to travel on ths train, and therefore Allenby at once created him full colonel "special, temporary and acting," 15 with which should be connected the saluting stories with which Lawrence entertained his friends and, at a later period, the ranks of the R.A.F. Now, the only special appointment to which Lawrence was ever gazetted was that of "Deputy Military Governor, Class X Special Appointment" in 1918, 16 though for what purpose is not stated. There is no evidence that he was ever even temporarily appointed full colonel, though he certainly claimed it, and it appears in the early Lowell Thomas version of the saluting story, which soon branched out into more stories. Lawrence was still claiming in 1933 that the full colonel, staff-train story was true, as recorded by Hart. 17 Whether there is anything in the full colonel story or not, Lawrence certainly turns up as one in the story he told Lowell Thomas of the Railway Transport Officer who was a Lt.-Col. * when Lawrence returned to England after the war via Marseille. According to the common plan of these stories, Lawrence wears a raincoat over his badges of rank, is rudely spoken to on the assumption that he is a junior officer, displays his badges, and exacts an abject apology. 18 One can see how well such stories would always go with "other ranks." The full-colonelcy for the staff train also turns up in Graves's book in 1927, and immediately precedes an improved version of the saluting story, still more sympathetic to other ranks. Here "at a rest-camp" -place unspecified -- a major is seen bullying two privates ("battlewearied men") for not saluting him, and makes them twice salute him without returning the salute. " 'One moment, Major,' said a voice behind him" . . . and we can almost guess who it is before ____________________ * In my experience R.T.O.'s dealing with movements of officers on leave were invariably captains.
____________________ * How likely that an officer walking with a woman "obviously a new acquaintance," would court publicity by exacting salutes, on leave, in London! -251- report on Arabian affairs (dated 4th November) which he sent in to the Government, and the telegram of enquiry despatched on the 18th November by the Secretary of State for India to Delhi and Baghdad. Here we come upon an extremely complicated subject and a controversy which lasted for years -- indeed the complicated subject remains complicated after 35 years, and the controversy has become plural with no very hopeful signs of solution. Lawrence was out of it by 1922; but, for good or evil, the influence of his views long prevailed, though they would not have done so if they had not been originated by a considerable and powerful official clique. Earlier in this book, attempts were made to prepare for an understanding of this situation and also to indicate its complexity by listing the different petty states of Arabia proper with their rulers, the different and mutually hostile British authorities (especially those of "Cairo" versus "Delhi and Simla") who strove to deal with them, the complication arising out of French historical claims to Syria, the ambitions of King Hussein, the Jewish ambitions in Palestine, the British conquest of Irak and the oil-fields therein, the excited native nationalist political caucuses. On top of that you have to consider the extraordinary pell-mell of peoples in those ancient lands, not so much a mosaic or a melting-pot as a retort of unmixable liquids with mutually repellent chemical qualities -- religious, as Moslem, Christian, Jew, Druse and weird sectarian survivals; racial, as Arabs, Turks, Assyrians, Kurds, Circassians, Armenians; linguistic, for there were large areas of "Arabia" where Arabic was not spoken or even understood. Consider, too, that all these varying strains of population had endured centuries of arbitrary Turkish rule -- which was usually misrule -- now suddenly abolished by the violence of war in miserable conditions of famine (especially in Syria), and yet however much they had hated Turkish rule, it was for most of them the only way of government they knew, for we must except the real nomad Arabs of the desert who were more or less independent since they and their lands were too poor to be worth more than anyone's casual exploitation. The view of the political committees of Syria and Palestine and Irak was unanimous that the enormous expenditure of European lives and money was well worth while if it led to the immediate transfer of complete sovereign power to those local committees, the immediate withdrawal of all the conquering troops, but the continuation of -252- ample subsidies and supplies for an indefinite period. The British and French query: where do we come in? was howled down as base treachery to the self-determination of small nations. Mr. Antonius, the special-pleading advocate of "the Arabs," describes the Sykes-Picot agreement as a "shocking document," and so it is from the point of view of an irresponsible doctrinaire bombinans in vacuo, but it was an attempt -- however imperfect and self-seeking -at a practical solution. Antonius also makes a great point of the fact that the backward desert tribes were left to themselves, and only the politically more advanced and settled populations handed over to foreign tutelage. But it is impossible to impose settled government on primitive nomads (did the United States ever succeed with the redskins?), and it was precisely the settled population of "Arabia" which was far enough advanced for some government though not for complete self-government. In spite of off-stage and up-stage critics, there really was no panacea for immediately arranging all this satisfactorily, and nothing but trial and error remained. One factor which would have contributed greatly towards reasonable solutions would have been a close and cordial co-operation between the two great European powers involved. And this Lawrence and his friends had done their best to destroy. The solution put forward by the Arab Bureau through Lawrence, and continuously urged by him with fanatical pertinacity and a fine disregard for all contrary opinion and evidence, had certain good points about it -- especially good debating points -- but also suffered from certain defects. According to the telegram from the India Office he had proposed: ". . . formation of three Councils of Arab States outside Hejaz and its dependencies, viz.: (1) Lower Mesopotamia, (2) Upper Mesopotamia and (3) Syria, to be placed respectively under Abdulla, Said and Feisal, sons of King Hussein. Hussein himself would remain King of Hejaz and would ultimately be succeeded by his eldest son Ali." 23 This simply meant handing over the whole of this immense area of the defeated Turkish Empire to members of one aristocratic family related to the Prophet, though not the only one entitled to the dignity of Grand Sharif of Mecca. Obviously, motives of self-interest and -253- financial dependence would make them virtually guardians of British interests, commercial and otherwise, as set forth by Lawrence in his Arab Bulletin report, 24 until they felt strong enough to repudiate their benefactors. It ignored the claims of France, it brushed aside Ibn Saud, and, while half-accepting, half-sneering at the views of those trying to set up a colonial government in Mesopotamia, it overlooked their practical problems of organisation, revenue and so forth for the romantic political object of setting up "Arab government." In urging "sovereignty" for Feisal in Syria, Lawrence certainly mentions that he had "inherited" the old Turkish bureaucrats, "all of whose lower ranks, and many of whose upper ranks, are Arab." 25 If so, they don't seem to have been of much use, for Young notes that at Damascus, half his time was spent "in trying to help to organise the departments with which I must come in contact." 26 A gross miscalculation lies in the words Lawrence applied to Ibn Saud: " Ibn Saud is now striving to limit the puritan revival becoming too strong for him. If he is carried away by it, and attacks the Holy Places, orthodox Islam will deal with him, as with his ancestor. If he can control it he will remain Emir of Nedj after military failure has warned him to recognise the Sharif as his overlord." 27 Every forecast there made was completely disproved by facts and time. Ibn Saud did not find Wahabism too strong for him; he not only smashed Abdulla and his "Arab regulars," but eventually occupied the Holy Places -- orthodox Islam being unable to do anything about it -- and instead of "recognising the Sharif as his overlord," ruled over the Sharif's former dominions as king! But, in spite of such errors of prophecy, the document achieved the object of all such propaganda -- while pushing the views of its author, it told its readers exactly what they wanted to hear, namely that what "the Arabs wanted" was: Hussein as "overlord of all desert Arabia," which they (the British) didn't want to rule; Abdulla as "nominal" Arab king of Lower Mesopotamia, which they intended to have; Said as "nominal" ruler of the Mosul area supposed to go to France, but which they also wanted; and Feisal as "sovereign" ruler of Syria to keep out the French from the area so regrettably promised -254- to France. The last item could not have been put more clearly or more tactfully: "In Syria the Arab movement becomes really important, since its origin was to prevent the man-power and strategic advantages of the country falling into the hands of any continental power." 28 (i.e., France). For cool cynicism that is hard to beat. But where in this dexterous neo-Machiavelli are we to find that anxious and tortured "man with a conscience," who could not endure the thought that he had been commanded to give "the Arabs" promises which had not been fulfilled, a situation which so much revolted his plain-dealing integrity that he felt compelled to throw his medals back at his King? The influence of Lawrence in the highest political circles in England soon made itself felt in a move as clever as it was mischievous. On the 17th November, 1918, Feisal suddenly arrived in Beirut (when Picot was absent in Cairo) and was entertained publicly by General Bulfin at dinner as "His Royal Highness, the Emir Feisal, Commanderin-Chief of the Arab forces." 29 He had been invited to come to England with a small suite which included Nuri Said with the rank of brigadier, but was in fact taken on board a British cruiser and landed at Marseille; and there or at Lyons he was met by Lawrence. According to Lowell Thomas, Feisal was accompanied by "Lawrence's tentmate, Major Marshall" (he was one of the doctors at the Akaba base), who was curious to see what the French would do with their uninvited guest. In a few hours Lawrence turned up and: ". . . with his usual tact, he avoided friction with the French by borrowing Marshall's Arabian head-dress, and attaching himself to Feisal's delegation as a member of the Emir's personal staff and not as a British officer." 30 Directory: fileadmin -> uni -> fakultaeten -> split lehrstuehle -> englische literatur -> Materialien -> Houswitschka -> Lawrence of Arabia fileadmin -> Comparative Politics Central Europe Mgr. Juraj Marušiak, PhD. course coordinator fileadmin -> Annex 1 to the Interim Report fileadmin -> Review of projects and contributions on statistical methods for spatial disaggregation and for integration of various kinds of geographical information and geo-referenced survey data fileadmin -> An overview of land evaluation and land use planning at fao fileadmin -> Contact information fileadmin -> Review of the literature fileadmin -> Sigchi extended Abstracts Sample Adapted to mamn25 fileadmin -> Communication and Information Sector Knowledge Societies Division Lawrence of Arabia -> Lawrence of arabia and american culture Download 1.73 Mb. Share with your friends:
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