Download Middle East history research paper

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Daniel Moore
Pete Rottier
Middle East History
November 25, 2012
Filling the vacuum with conflict: the mandate system in the post-WWI Middle East
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Perhaps no region of the world harbors more conflict and lacks as much stability as the
Middle East. One need only to look at a political map — its states with jagged boundaries drawn
up by European powers — to see how tensions can escalate among the many peoples within.
However, a deeper analysis into the root cause of present-day crises and unrest reveals similar
patterns of foreign influence, imperialism, state-building and nationalism. It also shows from
both policy and implementation standpoints how the birth of present-day countries, from Israel in
the Levant to Iraq in Mesopotamia, resulted from unequal, drawn-up mandates and broken
promises after the World War I. Some nationalistic groups were honored; some werenʼt. This
paper examines the effect of the first world war on the region in these respects — and how
policies during the crucial postwar period still has lingering effects on entire populations of
people.
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In order to understand the impacts of World War I, one must first consider a massive
state that hasnʼt existed for more than 100 years: the Ottoman Empire. Those 100 years,
however, seem insignificant considering its 623-year reign, which started in 1299 with a
collection of fierce, aggregated Turkish tribes — ghazi warriors — in Anatolia and expanded into
an empire with Mehmed IIʼs 1453 conquest of Constantinople from the Byzantines (“Ottoman
Empire”). This effectively ended Roman reign and caused both a religious and ethnic shift in one
of the most geographically advantageous sections of the world. At the Ottoman Empireʼs peak
at the end of the 16th century, its far reaches snaked along North Africaʼs Mediterranean shores,
encompassing the Balkans, Mesopotamia and the entire Anatolian Peninsula (“Ottoman
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Empire”). However, by the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Ottoman Empire began to
fade as it struggled to keep up with Europeʼs degree of modernization. This struggle is
particularly evident during Tanzimat reforms, which although helped Westernize the Ottoman
military and central government — and burgeon power of Christians — it also disenfranchised
some factions of its Islamic population, leading to the formation of such groups as the Young
Ottomans to challenge authority with alternative ideas (Akgunduz 318). Wars like the Crimean
(1853-56) and Turko-Russian (1877-78) ate away its boundaries as the state grew weaker
(“Ottoman Empire”). This history is important when considering the World War I theatre because
the Ottoman extent contained several present-day states. It included the people of Tunis and
Damascus and Baghdad under the same umbrella. A sense of unity pervaded the empire. The
sheer identity crisis many groups experienced at the Ottoman collapse in 1922 allowed ethnic
groups to capitalize off nationalistic feelings that had been brewing for years previous. The
problem that would inevitably emerge, however, is deciding who should draw new boundaries
that would satisfy all nationalist groups.
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A growing sense of ethnic nationalism, a significant Western idea imported into the
Ottoman Empire and amplified during its reform era, led to a dramatic increase in the number of
revolutionary political parties. At its core, James Gelvin argues nationalism has five self-evident
assumptions that surround a theme of “common interest,” or the belief that humanity can be
naturally divided into distinct peoples with common characteristics and endeavors (Gelvin 209).
A group linked by history is unchanged by time and circumstance, for example, and special
relationships to a historically significant piece of land never end. Most importantly, selfgovernance is the only way to perpetually ensure a groupʼs well-being. These ideas, to various
degrees, birthed boundaries and influenced the shape of the current Middle East: “In the
modern world, everyone must belong to a nation” (209). The Ottoman Empire, during its
Tanzimat reforms, fostered the culture of nationalism that would come into play during and after
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the war. Tanzimat decrees established the notion of a divided citizenry within a state, each with
its own rights (210-11). This idea is an inevitable extension of the modern state in which trade
and infrastructural development, such as telegraphs and roads, fostered both commercial,
private and political ties among people (212-13). Another element of nationalism, however, is
critical when considering the Middle East since WWI: nationalism as a defense. “All
nationalisms arise in opposition to some internal or external nemesis,” Gelvin writes, “All are
defined by what they oppose” (222). Indeed, even for urban notables benefiting from the
reforms of the modernizing Ottoman state, “there was only so much imperial patronage to go
around. Some were sure to feel slighted.” (213). This perspective will come even more
pronounced with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. With the idea of how nationalism can take root
and fill an political vacuum, one can now examine WWIʼs true impacts through the lens of the
mandated state system.
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WWI was sparked by shots fired on the streets of Sarajevo, once an Ottoman city, killing
Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife. The assassination pitted the AustroHungarian Empire, where Ferdinand was an heir to rule, against Serbia, where the assassins
were harbored (Willmott 10-11). As previously discussed, the Ottoman Empire, though at the
time crumbling and entering its second constitutional era, still represented a critical position in
1914, ruling Anatolia, Levant, Mesopotamia and Egypt. The fact that Europe was divided into
unequal alliances secured by a web of treaties — a result of a disrupted balance of power and
“concert” on the continent — meant that the Ottoman Empire now faced either one side or the
other (Gelvin 180-81). Joining the Central Powers with Germany and Austria, the empire
opposed Britain, France and arch-rival Russia, with the intention of gaining back some territory
lost in the Russo-Turkish War in 1877 (“Ottoman Empire”). While the physical casualties were
remarkable — nearly a quarter of the Ottoman population were decimated — the negotiations
connived among the Allies during the war later impacted the collapsed state wherein millions of
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ex-citizens would roam with only old ethnic ties to self-identity (Gelvin 180). For example, the
British feared losing valuable trade routes and oil exploration in the region (Woodward).
Because of this fear, they ventured to protect important possessions in the Middle East by
partnering with Arabs who were in revolt against the Ottoman Turks.
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Britain developed a strategy during the war to feed internal uprisings against the
Ottoman Empire. The two-year Arab Revolt was one of the seminal and effective events in the
Middle East theatre. A June 1908 military coup by the Young Turks had stripped Sultan Abdul
Hamid II of his power, and a countercoup the following year failed to regain it (Woodward).
However, secret societies of Arab nationalists displeased at this “Turkification” of the empire
called upon Hussein ibn Ali, a highly respected Muslim ruler of the Hejaz, a strip of land in
Arabia that includes the Islamic holy city of Mecca (8). Ali had solicited British support for an
Arab uprising in the years leading up to WWI, but it wasnʼt until Ottoman troops were marching
towards the Suez Canal — threatening important access to Asia did the Allies need a true revolt
to work for their benefit (Browne). In a correspondence of letters between the British and Ali in
1915, High Commissioner Sir Henry McMahon promised the creation of an Arab state in
exchange for a full-scale revolt against the Ottoman Empire (“United States”). Britain lent money
— as much as 220,000 pounds a month by 1918 — and arms — rifles, mortars and explosives
— to the effort, the command of which was divided among Aliʼs four sons: Emirs Faisal and Zeid
in the north, Emir Abdullah in the east and Emir Ali in the south (“United States”). Providing
counsel was T.E. Lawrence, an Oxford-educated archaeologist and historian who the British
government had asked at the outset of the war to assist with military intelligence. Lawrence
ultimately became a liaison officer who worked alongside the Faisalʼs Hashemite forces in 1916
(Parnell). Britain even sent the Royal Navy to assist in defending Yanbu from the Ottomans
December 1916 (7). The fighters were mostly Bedouin tribesmen who, although formally
untrained, knew the battlefields better than anyone else and utilized guerrilla warfare tactics and
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other strategies of modern desert warfare. They racked up win after win, ultimately taking land
from Medina to Damascus (Browne). Ottoman troops, under the command of Fakhri Pasha,
swelled to 12 battalions to defend the supply lines and infrastructure of the empire, which was
growing weaker every day. But, as they would later realize, success on the battlefield did not
bring Arabs any closer to a unified Arab state.
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The Arab Revolt laid the groundwork toward the nation-building that would take place at
the warʼs end. The devil was not just on the battlefield; it was also in the details of the backroom negotiations between imperial powers. For example, during the Arabsʼ successes over the
Turks in the Hejaz, British Col. Gilbert Clayton had written to Lawrence: “It is thus essential that
Aqaba should remain in British hands after the war” (Browne). Even Lawrence, who had grown
so empathetic with the Arabs that Faisal presented him with the silken robes of a Bedouin
leader, kept quiet, though not without guilt (Browne). On the surface, the prospects of an Arab
state didnʼt seem impossible to the fighters. In the Versailles peace settlement that ended World
War I, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson espoused the principle of self-determination, or the right
for nationalities to choose their form of government and, to an extent, their boundaries (Kegley
121). In January 1918, Wilson delivered “14 Points” of postwar world order; the 12th demanded
“other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security
of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development” (Browne). But in
their book “World Politics,” Charles Kegley and Eugene Wittkopf explain how, in practice, the
principle was applied almost exclusively to war-torn Europe, where six new states were created
from the territory formerly the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Middle East, meanwhile, fell under
the rule of the mandate system (121). The Ottoman Empire was transferred under League of
Nations auspices and then to countries that would govern new, drawn-up states as mandates,
pending their eventual self-rule (121). The people, as the leagueʼs justification spelled out in
Article 22 of its covenant, were “not yet able to stand by themselves” and that mandates provide
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the best method of governance: “Advanced nations, who by reason of their resources, their
experience or their geographic position can best undertake this responsibility,” the covenant
reads (“The Covenant”). However, this paternalistic view of the division and management of new
nations had little regard for future ethnic conflicts. Despite the League of Nationsʼ claim that
Western powers had the “experience” to draw nations, the mandate system lacked foresight and
logic.
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The rise of ethnic nationalisms in the Middle East had finally reached fruition, each brand
demanding a piece of what the Ottomans left behind. However, the power was in the hands of
the West. Britain assumed the mandates for modern-day Iraq, Palestine and Transjordan;
France assumed Syria (Kegley 121). Gelvin points out how, simply on paper, the partitions
created conflict. Jordan, for example, was drawn so that half its government revenue by 1979
depended on foreign money because it had virtually no economic resources of its own (Gelvin
193). Iraqʼs boundaries, on the other hand, created a political nightmare, a “platform for
asserting political claims” (193). Political scientist Charles Wheelan described how this lack of
foresight during the partition continues to affect the country today, particularly in the handling of
rebuilding Iraqi civil society after the 2003 U.S. invasion. Problems with drafting a new
constitution after the fall of Saddam Hussein reinforced the glaring ethnic differences within its
boundaries, leading to a challenge “made difficult not only by years of dictatorship but also by
deep religious and ethnic schisms” (Wheelan 479). Although they made up less than 20 percent
of the population, Sunni Muslims dominated Husseinʼs government (480). Iraqʼs Shia majority,
who had been denied power for hundreds of years, were now in the driverʼs seat and clung to it.
Meanwhile, Iraqi Kurds, concentrated in the northern part of the country and also oppressed
during Husseinʼs rule, wanted autonomy (480). All this conflict ties back to the mandate system.
While the Allies walked into political and economic catastrophes that could have been avoided
from the start, other problems were carried over from secret agreements made during the war.
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Alliances formed during the Arab Revolt ultimately came back to haunt the British
policymakers as they were dividing nations. In Syria, French claim of the territory meant the
overthrow of its newly crowned king and British ally Emir Faisal, who occupied Damascus at the
warʼs closing. Britain made no move to stop the overthrow — “The friendship of France is worth
ten Syrias,” declared British Prime Minister David Lloyd George (Pipes 25). Faisal attempted
diplomacy with Paris for the recognition of an independent Syrian nation — knowing he had no
military capacity to fight (27). Emir Abdullah, furious at his brotherʼs troubles in Syria, began to
march north, threatening a fight. To appease him, the British in March 1921 divided its Palestine
mandate into western Cis-Jordan — “this side of Jordan,” which retained the name Palestine —
and eastern Trans-Jordan — “across the Jordan” (28). They named Abdullah king of TransJordan, which received independence in 1946 and is still to this day a Hashemite kingdom ruled
by Abdullahʼs descendants (Gelvin 192). Meanwhile, Faisal was ushered into the monarchy of
Iraq in August 1921 which, as previously discussed, was not well planned politically, its borders
incorporating the three former Ottoman regions of Baghdad, Basra and Mosul. Britain
abandoned the Iraq mandate in 1932 but remained heavily involved as much as it suited its
interests, such as the Anglo-Iraqi war in the 1940s to ensure the Hashemite monarchy
maintained its power, which led to even more nationalistic resentment in the country (Hughes).
The monarchy was eventually overthrown by a military coup in 1958, and weak attempts at
peaceful coexistence among Arab nations, such as CENTO (Central Eastern Treaty
Organization), had little impact, especially when the Cold War further divided the East and the
West and left the region open to exploitation from both sides. The mandate system birthed much
of the present-day conflict in the Middle East, and no conflict is a more glaring extension of
nationalistic tension created by this unfair partition than that of the Israelis and Palestinians.
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Despite the complexities lobbed by experts about the geopolitics of an area as conflicted
as Palestine, it all boils down to a simple real estate issue — and the fact that Zionism was
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favored and more integrated with the international community than Arab or Palestinian
opposition. The idea of a Jewish state was first supported by the British in 1917 — ironically
enough, during the Arab Revolt — then granted by the League of Nationsʼ 1922 British Mandate
for Palestine and officially recognized as independent by the United Nations in 1948 upon
expiration of that mandate (Ben-Gurion). It was the result of a half-century of growing Zionism,
Jewish nationalism in part founded by an Austro-Hungarian journalist in the late 1800s and
fueled by rising anti-Semitic activity in Europe (Gelvin 229). In his own words, Theodor Herzl
explains how Zionism acts as a defense: “We are one people — our enemies have made us
one in our despite, as repeatedly happens in our history. Distress binds us together, and thus
united, we suddenly discover our strength” (229-30). Fast forward to the numerous, bloody wars
over borders, cities and resources in Palestine, and one can see how the mandated state of
Israel, whether morally justified or not, allowed one nationalism to gain ground over another.
Part of the reason for that gain lies in the degree of adaptation to the modern world. Zionism is
no more or less legitimate than any kind of Arab or Palestinian nationalism. Just as “distress
binds” Zionists together, Jewish settlement in Palestine, no doubt seen as encroachment by
those who had lived there for centuries, sparked nationalistic sentiment in these peoples. Jenin,
for example, is one of the most violent cities in all of Palestine. Located in the northern part of
the West Bank — a disputed territory — that has throughout history been claimed by
Palestinians, Israelis and Jordanians, the city is for the time being under the control of the
Palestinian National Authority (Lee). During the Ottoman era, it was ruled by Bedouins, which
rendered it somewhat autonomous from the functions of the empire. Thus, when it was brought
under the British Mandate, itʼs no surprise the cityʼs residents launched aggressive opposition.
In 1938, Britain reported to the United Nations “an intensified campaign of murder, intimidation
and sabotage” from the Jeninʼs residents; later that year, British forces blew up parts of the town
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with explosives (Corera). This kind of back-and-forth retaliatory violence is seen nonstop in this
region of the world largely due to a difference in power of the nationalistic groups.
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The way nationalistic sentiment glued Palestinian efforts together was different from that
of the Zionists. Nationalism for Palestinians often manifested in militant operations (16). For
example, Islamic militarism is associated with terrorist tactics such as targeting civilians, taking
hostages, and using suicide bombers. Terrorism by definition is used when groups feel
desperate, as if thereʼs no other way to communicate (White 10). Magnified by media, terrorist
acts get the message across because of the horror they cause. A myriad of militant
organizations — some harbored and supported by Arab nations, some rogue — have emerged
with the sole purpose of destroying the state of Israel (White 217-44). Meanwhile, there is only
one — and a very powerful one at that — Israel defense force; one Israeli government; one
organized, pro-Western, Zionist people with the legitimacy of a mandate. As Gelvin puts it,
Zionists played by the same book and embraced the mandate system while Palestinian
movements faced competition and internal fissures (Gelvin 221). This could lead to a
misconception that one nationalism is less purposeful than the other, when the difference in
tactics actually result from uncontrollable situations. This is not to say terrorist attacks are
uncontrollable or even remotely justified, but merely to argue the consideration of where this
culture of terrorism began.
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Conflicts in Palestine offer some final insight into how the mandate system both
appealed and enflamed the natural characteristics of nationalism in the Middle East. Itʼs
important to expand on the idea of the Middle East as the cradle of all civilization (“Iraq Timeline
Part I:”). Whether writing in evolutionary terms, in which humans first evolved in the Horn of
Africa, or settlement terms, in which the most ancient of all civilizations span Mesopotamia (now
Iraq), the Levant (now Israel and Palestine) and the Persian Plateau (now Iran). This point is
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emphasized by the fact the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, Damascus, is also
currently the center of civil war. The ancient history of the Middle East is vast and has become
an area of increasing study in the modern era, especially during the crucial period of time after
WWI. Using history is a popular way to subscribe oneself to a brand of nationalism. Ottoman
and Persian intellectuals who had been trained in Europe in new tools of archaeology could,
during the early twentieth century, finally trace a “historical evolution” of their nation (Gelvin
213). This allowed resurgent, post-WWI nationalism to be supported with evidence for a claim of
homeland. This is seen through Israelʼs desire for what is known internationally as the West
Bank; what is known to Jews as ancient Judea and Samaria. Herzl suggested Israel to be the
Jewish homeland because the ancient Kingdom of Judah existed there before Christ (229). The
lengthy Middle Eastern inhabitance is such an obvious fact that its significance is often
overlooked, especially in regard to modern times. But it cannot be emphasized enough in
reference to current conflict.
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World War One, true to its name, left a dent in the previous structure of the world. It
further advanced the most advanced nations, destroyed others, created others still. Closely
following the worldwide trend of modernization — state creation and an integration into a market
economy — the war also placed more pressure on those who hadnʼt already converted to do so.
During the postwar period, the West stepped up this pressure on fractured people who were
once were all under the ethnic umbrella and longtime governance of the Ottoman Empire. To fill
the vacuum, Britain and France draw new boundaries and empowered new leaders in a way
that they hoped would be favorable to protecting their revitalized interests in the region. The
spoils of war, divided by mandates, turned out to be conflict-ridden with tensions extending into
present times. Nationalism, an inevitable effect of the imposed state system, also harbors the
claimed legitimacy of the right to self-rule. All these political and social processes met in the
Middle East during and after WWI. The “war to end all war” did not succeed in its goal. But
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perhaps, understanding the nature of the present-day conflicts through the lens of history, all
parties can work toward more stable and peaceful futures living side by side.
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