Lessons of 1920 revolt lost on Bremer

[NNN0LHI]

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1066565924981

By Charles Clover
Published: November 17 2003 4:00 | Last Updated: November 17 2003 4:00

The argument between Arnold Wilson, the British civil commissioner in Baghdad from 1918-1920, and his more famous deputy, the author Gertrude Bell, shook the British colonial establishment for a time. But if the lessons were soon forgotten, they were destined to be repeated 83 years later.

Right up to the end of the bloody 1920 revolt against British rule that claimed the lives of 500 British soldiers, Mr Wilson had insisted that the answer to the "Mesopotamian question" was direct rule in Baghdad by a British high commissioner.

Ms Bell, more presciently, had thought since a year earlier that the answer was to choose an Arab head of state. "I pray the people at home may be rightly guided and realise that the only chance here is to recognise political ambitions from the first, not to try and squeeze the Arabs into our mould and have our hands forced in a year - who knows - perhaps less," she wrote to a friend in January 1920. She would prove all too correct. Mr Wilson stepped down and, in 1921, the British were forced to grant Iraq nominal independence under a provisional government headed by King Faisal I.

The lessons of British rule have eerily repeated themselves since the US-led invasion of Iraq last March. After a seven-month military occupation costing more than 200 soldiers' lives (including non-combat deaths), the US-led coalition has been forced to give up ambitious plans for indefinite direct rule and promise a formal end to the state of military occupation by next June.

more

[Lithos]

1. Yes

We are back in a very similar boat.

Ms. Bell was quite knowledgable about the Arab mind during the early quarter of the 20th Century. Possibly more at home both socially and culturally in the ME than Lawrence of Arabia. She knew almost all of the major political players in the Middle East, including Arab, Egyptian, Persian, Jewish and British. It was her influence which guided the Arab Revolt which destroyed the Ottoman Empire's influence in the Middle East as well as her vision which crafted and created the modern state of Iraq.

L-

[VolcanoJen]

2. Moving from LBN to Editorials & Other Articles Forum

This is a great piece, but since it's found on the Financial Times Comment & Analysis Page, it's better suited for the Editorials Forum.

Please continue the discussion here, in its new location.

Thanks!
VolcanoJen
DU Moderator