The First World War in the Middle East

In this concise yet deeply researched book, Ulrichsen (Insecure Gulf) seeks to correct widely held Western misperceptions about WWI and its role in staging the collapse of the Islamic Caliphate and the resultant shaping of arbitrary Middle Eastern borders. Writing primarily for an academic audience, Ulrichsen details the lasting effects of the war, from North Africa through Mesopotamia, and explores how Muslim communities around the world reacted to the war. He notes that the British, for example, feared that Indian Muslim soldiers sent to Egypt would defect to the Ottomans, but that their fear “proved unfounded, owing to the substantive ethnic and linguistic differences that prevented... serious communication or collaboration.” Foreshadowing more recent misadventures, Ulrichsen writes that, late in the war, “the War Cabinet in London belatedly grasped the value of gaining control of [northern Iraq] as a potential source of oil supplies for the British Empire.” Long sections of drily catalogued historical minutiae will deter nonspecialists, but Ulrichsen’s central thesis, which states that ad hoc and ill-considered decisions made by distracted foreign powers crystallized into immutable realities that continue to constrain life in the region a century later, is relevant for anyone with an interest in the Middle East. (May)