Forty years is a common measure of time in Middle Eastern history and fable, and for almost exactly that period - from th eBritish capture of Baghdad and Jerusalem in 1917 until the Suez crisis of 1956 - Great Britain was the paramount power in most of the Middle East. This book is about the establishment of that power, the uses to which it was put, and the reasons for its decline after 1945.

The term 'Fertile Crescent' is commonly used as shorthand for the group of territories extending around the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates. Here it is assumed to consist of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Palestine. Much has been written on the history of these countries which were taken from the Ottoman empire after 1918 and became Mandates under the League of Nations. For the most part the histories of these countries have been handled either individually or as part of the history of Britain or France. In the first instance the emphasis has normally been on the development of nationalism and local resistance to alien control in a particular territory, leading to the modern successor state. In the second most studies have concentrated separately on how either France or Britain handled the great problems they inherited, seldom comparing their strategies. The aim of this book is to see the region as a whole and from both the European and indigenous points of view. The central argument is that the mandate system failed in its stated purpose of establishing stable democratic states out of what had been provinces or parts of provinces within the Ottoman empire. Rather it generated basically unstable polities and, in the special case of Palestine, one totally unresolved, and possibly unsolvable, conflict. The result was to leave the Middle East as perhaps the most volatile part of the world in the later twentieth century and beyond. The main purpose of the book is to examine why this was so.

Britain in the Middle East provides a comprehensive survey of British involvement in the Middle East, exploring their mutual construction and influence across the entire historical sweep of their relationship. In the 17th century, Britain was establishing trade links in the Middle East, using its position in India to increasingly exclude other European powers. Over the coming centuries this commercial influence developed into political power and finally formal empire, as the British sought to control their regional hegemony through military force. Robert Harrison charts this relationship, exploring how the Middle East served as the launchpad for British offensive action in the World Wars, and how resentment against colonial rule in the region led ultimately to political and Islamic revolutions and Britain's demise as a global, imperial power.

British imperial interests in Iraq during and after the First World War are well known and have often been studied. But what of British policy towards the Mesopotamian provinces before 1914? In this well-documented study, Stuart Cohen provides the first coherent account of growing British interest in these provinces, in which the defense of India, commercial considerations, the protection of Shia Muslim pilgrims, and fear of a German-dominated Berlin-to-Baghdad railway all had a vital role to play. First published in 1976 and now available in paperback for the first time, this book is essential reading not only for an understanding of the making of British policy towards the Arab provinces of the Ottoman empire, but also of the last days of Turkish rule in Iraq itself.

Examines British military, political and imperial strategy in the Middle East during and immediately after the First World War, in relation to General Allenby's command of the Egypt Expeditionary Force from June 1917 to November 1919.

A study of Anglo-Iranian relations during World War I. This book analyzes such diplomacy as an example of great power politics in regional affairs, examining Britain's concern to maintain stability in Iran and exclude foreign interests from the Persian Gulf and the approaches to India.