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The Official History of the Joint Intelligence Committee, Vol. I: From the Approach of the Second World War to the Suez Crisis

that might as easily be applied to more recent, and equally troubled, ventures in the same region. The book shows how British failures in realistically planning the Mesopotamia operation are counterpointed by the steady, wellplanned and, most importantly, correctly resourced march across the Sinai desert in 1916. This in turn led to the oftenforgotten three hard-fought Battles of Gaza of the following year, which paved the way for General Allenby’s entry into Jerusalem. Interestingly, one gunner in Gaza is quoted complaining that ‘we never had enough gas for a good barrage’. That gas was used at all in the Middle East theatre was certainly news to this reviewer, as was the intense concentration of artillery at Gaza, which matched that, says Ulrichsen, on the Somme. Ulrichsen’s observations concerning presumed British expertise in governance, based on the Indian experience, are incisive. Experience of successful governance in one country, Imperial India, is by no means transferable to another – in this case Iraq. Readers today with any experience at all in ‘stabilisation’ with its plethora of ‘experts’ in generic topics ranging from ‘security and justice’ to ‘gender’ or ‘civil society’ will readily see Ulrichsen’s point. For many in Britain, the First World War is now a distant memory, a useful distractive anniversary with little in the way of contemporary public resonance in an essentially peaceful and secure Europe. In the Middle East, by contrast, the embers from the First World War have, to put it mildly, yet to cool. Indeed, they burn brightly; accordingly, Ulrichsen’s war in the Middle East does not end in 1918. There is a fine treatment of the post-war settlements that set the region up for many of the conflicts that have ravaged it since, acknowledging the role of the West’s craving for oil in fomenting these. The long-term consequences of decisions made by generals and politicians a century ago continue to have direct effect today, from the 1917 Balfour Declaration paving the way, eventually, for the creation of the state of Israel, to the partition of the Arab world by the victorious powers after the war’s end. Ranging over grand strategy, regional and national politics, economics and demography, The First World War in the Middle East provides a superb panoramic analysis of the conflict. Ulrichsen’s triumph lies in his treatment of the impact of the war on the theatre as a whole, rather than on individual national actors. Anyone wanting an excellent primer to this absolutely vital, yet underwritten, topic could do no better than to start here.