Download A Genius for Deception

the twice-promised land
In Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Lawrence tells how the Arabs waded
through blood to reach Damascus, which they were the first to enter,
and where they successfully restored order from 1 October 1918.
Wavell says this was ‘not the whole truth’, but it was a central tenet of
the Arab propaganda myth that Lawrence needed to create.
Allenby, the commander-in-chief, ‘gigantic and red and merry’, turned
up in his grey Rolls-Royce at the Victoria Hotel, Damascus. According
to Lawrence, he approved ‘in ten words’ all Lawrence had done,
confirmed his appointments, and took over the hospital and the railway.
Then Feisal, ‘large-eyed, colourless and worn’, arrived by special train
from Deraa, smiling through the tears which the welcome of his people
squeezed from him. Allenby and Feisal met for the first time:
They were a striking contrast – the burly confident Englishman, accustomed
to command and to dominate by sheer force of personality, and the slight
ascetic Arab with his princely bearing, to whom the arts of the politician were
more natural than the vigour of a soldier. Both were men of fine quality, and
appreciated and trusted each other.
Wavell, Allenby: A Study in Greatness
But then Allenby started imposing the terms of the Sykes–Picot
agreement about French and British spheres of influence. Feisal must
deal with a French liaison officer, and not attempt any control of
Lebanon, even though Feisal’s country Syria needed a Mediterranean
port. The French dislike of the Hashimites began to emerge. Feisal,
arguing for self-rule, denied knowledge of any Anglo-French deal and
Lawrence – who had, in fact, betrayed the existence of the Sykes–Picot
agreement to him – claimed ignorance of it too. What the Arabs
should have earned by their own courage and endurance in the
campaign was now trumped by imperial realpolitik. Lawrence backed
away in disgust from the great deception he had been part of, inducing
people to fight for what would never be given. Wavell described
Lawrence as ‘overstrained in mind and body’. He asked Allenby’s
permission to go, and left Damascus on 4 October 1918. The last
word in Seven Pillars of Wisdom is ‘sorry’.
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T. E. Lawrence has had many detractors, but also powerful friends.
Chief among his admirers was Winston Churchill, who refers to
Colonel Lawrence’s ‘astonishing personality’ in The World Crisis, and
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