Churchill’s Folly: How Winston Churchill Created Modern Iraq (2004)
Christopher Catherwood
Carroll & Graf
Historical Background
Looking at the Middle East in the 21st century, it seems to be a land of near eternal conflict. Currently, there are difficult problems facing many of the countries in the region and these problems have existed to varying degrees throughout our entire lifetimes. Many of the problems stem from religious differences, both between Islam and the other Judeo-Christian religions and within Islam itself. There are also problems between the different peoples, especially Turks, Arabs, and Kurds. Now include vast oil resources and incessant meddling from Western powers, it certainly seems that there has never been peace in the Middle East and there may never be in the future.
However, as recently as a little over a century ago, the Middle East was not the same fractious place that it is today. For centuries the area was controlled by the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Even as the empire foundered in the 19th century, the Middle East was peaceful compared to today. Then World War I began and everything changed. The Ottomans joined the Central Powers and when they lost to the allies their empire finally collapsed. And then the Europeans stepped in. The League of Nations was formed and a mandate was granted to Britain to administer much of the Middle East until the people could govern themselves. This is where the problems truly began.
Important people in the book
Book Overview
Christopher Catherwood examines Britain’s role, especially that of Winston Churchill, in creating the mess that is Iraq. Iraq was an artificially created nation that was imposed on the residents of Mesopotamia following World War I. Catherwood focuses only on the area that is now Iraq and how Churchill created the new country.
Chapter One - From Abraham to Allenby
Catherwood gives a brief introduction to the history of the region from ancient times to 1917. Two of the most pertinent events to this discussion are the rise of Islam (and its division into Sunni and Shia branches) and conquest of the area by the Ottoman Empire. Catherwood also gives a quick overview of British goals in the area. The British wanted to ensure control of the Suez Canal so they could maintain their link to India. This was of paramount importance. Furthermore, they wanted to prevent Russian (then Bolshevik) and later, Turkish, control of the region. Finally, the British sought to control access to suspected large oilfields in Mesopotamia. From today’s perspective, it is odd, but this last consideration carried far less weight than the first two. Winston Churchill, as Secretary of State for War and Air was responsible for British military and therefore played an important role in the Middle East.
Chapter Two - The Arab Revolt and the Great Betrayal
In 1916, British diplomat Mark Sykes and French diplomat François Georges-Picot signed an agreement partitioning the territories of the soon-to-be defeated Ottoman Empire between Britain and France. The Sykes-Picot Agreement has gone down in history as an example of British perfidy due to the fact that the British had also been in discussions with the Arabs to recognize Arab independence in exchange for the Arabs launching a revolt against the Ottomans. The Arabs and British did force the Ottomans from much of the Middle East and the Kingdom of Syria was established with Faisal as king. However, Britain and France then followed the conditions of the Sykes-Picot Agreement, France took over Syria, and ejected from the territory.
Catherwood suggests that while the British did conclude two separate agreements, the appearance of betrayal was magnified by T. E. Lawrence who fabricated much of his story of the Arab Revolt.
Chapter Three - How Two Men in London Changed the World
The British and French wanted to divide up the Middle East before the American president Woodrow Wilson had a chance to intervene. In 1920, the European Allied powers convened the San Remo Conference and divided the Middle East amongst themselves according to League of Nations guidelines. Aside from the British gaining control of Mesopotamia, they also gained the Mandate for Palestine, which was important because the British were in favor of establishing a Jewish homeland.
Shortly after the San Remo Conference the Allies drew up the Treaty of Sevres to formally dismantle the Ottoman Empire. This led to the Turkish nationalist, Kemal Ataturk, breaking away from the Ottoman Empire and establishing a rival Turkish government and declaring war.
Meanwhile, the Arabs in Mesopotamia began to rebel against British rule putting a strain on the British who were trying to reduce their troop commitment there. However, by the end of 1920, the British were able to quell the rebellion and Churchill was put in charge of the newly created Colonial Office to oversee the region.
Chapter Four - Churchill and His Forty Thieves
Churchill’s main goal in Mesopotamia was to create “an Arab regime that would preserve British interests but would cost as little as possible.” To this end, the British plotted to find someone who could legitimately lead a Middle Eastern state in Mesopotamia and who would preserve British interests. The leading candidate was Faisal, the erstwhile king of Syria. In his favor, he was directly descended from Muhammad and was friendly to the British. He was, however, little known in Mesopotamia and he was Sunni Muslim while the majority in Mesopotamia were Shiite. Another problem was that there was a large Kurdish population in the north were Sunni but not Arabs.
Chapter Five - Changing the Map: The Cairo Conference of 1921
In 1921, Churchill convened the Cairo Conference and invited all the leading Middle East experts to determine British policy in the region. Churchill, as ever, was keen on saving money and was still trying to reduce the size of the army in Mesopotamia. To this end, it was determined that Faisal was the best candidate to rule the new British protectorate of Iraq. There were two problems: the French detested Faisal, warning the British that he could not be trusted, and would therefore cause problems; and the fact that Faisal was unknown in Mesopotamia and the British wanted his leadership to appear popularly mandated. Churchill would have liked to have created a Kurdish state at this time, but there were no good candidates for a Kurdish ruler so the idea was dropped. Churchill was happy to have so easily solved Britain’s Middle East problems.
Chapter Six - Winston’s Bridge
Almost as soon as he was “elected” king, Faisal began to assert his independence and not behave like a good little British puppet. At the same time, the Turks defeated the Greeks and therefore became a threat to Iraq. The situation became so problematic that Churchill considered completely withdrawing from Iraq, but British Prime Minister David Lloyd George was determined to stay. Fortunately for the British, by October war with Turkey was averted and Faisal had signed an acceptable treaty with the British. Unfortunately for Churchill, in that same month while he was suffering from appendicitis, the Liberal government fell and Churchill lost his office and his seat in Parliament.
Chapter Seven - From Faisal to Saddam
In this final chapter, Catherwood merely gives a brief history of Iraq until 2003, pointing out that it has had a violent history for the entire period and that many of the problems are a direct result of Churchill’s actions following World War I.
Assessment
Catherwood makes a good argument that the world is still suffering from the decisions that Churchill and the British government made 100 years ago in the Middle East. He describes Britain’s goals there as the pursuit of an “empire lite,” basically an empire on the cheap. While they did recognize that placing a Sunni king on the throne of a country composed of mostly Shiites might lead to problems in the future, they were only looking to further their current goals and were merely kicking other problems down the road. The same thing can be said about their failure to create a Kurdish state.
Catherwood also does a good job of showing that Winston Churchill, the genius Liberal (at that time) statesman was the chief architect of the Iraq we know today. His desire to save money at all costs was his primary motivation and what happened in Mesopotamia 100 years ago reflects that. The one thing that would have strengthened Catherwood’s argument would have been to show exactly how bad a state the British financial situation truly was. Was the British Empire truly as destitute as it seemed, or were Churchill’s cost-cutting measures more of a reflection of his own personal ideals? It is easy to believe that following World War I, Britain would need be in need of money, but unfortunately Catherwood does not make it clear to what extent this was actually true.
Overall, the book is easy to read and provides a clear picture of a complex situation. Even people with little to no knowledge of Mesopotamia following World War I will find this book useful and interesting.