Research Catalog

Title

Kurds, Arabs and Britons : the memoir of Wallace Lyon in Iraq, 1918-44 / edited and with an introduction by D.K. Fieldhouse.

Author

Lyon, Wallace A., 1892-1977

Publication

London : I. B. Tauris, 2002.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Fieldhouse, D. K. (David Kenneth), 1925-2018

Description

xiv, 238 p., [8] p. of plates : ill., maps, ports.; 25 cm.

Summary

• "The British Empire was the largest and most powerful empire in the modern age and it reached its geographical climax after World War I with the collapse of Ottoman rule in the Middle East and the acquisition by Britain and France of Ottoman territories as Mandates under the League of Nations. Mesopotamia, renamed Iraq, became a British Mandate. It is a supreme irony that this final stage in British expansion was followed by a steep decline in international power. This was clearly seen in Iraq. Britain's role there became increasingly uncertain and ambiguous, declining from conqueror to Mandatory authority, and then to ally of the sovereign Iraq established in 1932. Although by the treaty of 1930 Britain retained significant rights in Iraq until the revolution of 1958, Britain's influence declined steadily, except during the period of military control between 1941 and 1945." "This was the background to Wallace Lyon's career in Iraq.^
• From 1918 to 1932 he had real power as first a Political Officer, then Administrative Inspector. On Independence in 1932 he became a Land Settlement Officer under contract with the Iraqi government, though from 1941 to 1944 he acted as Political Adviser to the British forces in Iraq. For most of the period he worked in parts of the relatively wild and remote province of Mosul and among the Kurds. His dual and often conflicting functions were to safeguard British interests and to moderate the often tense relationship between the Arab government in Baghdad and the Kurds in the north-east.^
• The task would have been impossible but for his deep understanding of the family, tribal and religious features of this region and the complex structure of relationships among what he came to see as 'his' Kurds." "Kurds, Arabs and Britons provides a unique insight into the history of the Iraq mandate and highlights the importance of Britain's imperial players on the ground in the drive to preserve British interests in the waning years of Empire. Professor David K. Fieldhouse, a leading imperial historian with an internationally acclaimed reputation, has edited the text of this memoir and provided a long introduction which establishes its context in the history of the British Empire and the Middle East."--BOOK JACKET.

Subject

• Lyon, Wallace A., 1892-1977
• Geschichte 1918
• Colonial administrators > Iraq > Biography
• Iraq > History > Hashemite Kingdom, 1921-1958
• Iraq > Politics and government > 1921-1958

Genre/Form

• Biographies
• Erlebnisbericht.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 229-230) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

ISBN

1860646131

OCLC

• 48194086
• SCSB-11736589

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library