This book was published in 1958 - a lifetime ago. There have been many wars, conflicts and revolutions since it was written. Mowat's perspectives and his knowledge and affection for the region and its peoples may be relevant to a new century.
From the original book's 'blurb': The Middle East, a centre of tensions and revolutions, is in a state of transition. The old order was dominated by the empires of Turkey and Persia. The new order is coming to birth through nationalism and the influence of Western civilisation, which compete with those :other influences exerted by communism and Russia.
Oil has added a new impetus to power politics, but although pattern of power today as it plays on the Middle East is not markedly different from what it was a century ago. In such a setting the ideological factor is new. Yet it might be decisive.
The author traces the development of these forces and their growing impact on the Middle East from the days when an uneasy balance was imposed on the area by the Pax Britannica. He takes the reader through the series of decisions which have already brought Britain to the situation that obtains today in Palestine, Persia and Egypt; and clarifies the issues in the light of the decisions which may still confront her.
The situation as it is today can best be appreciated, he believes, by a sympathetic understanding of the inner evolution of the countries concerned and of the people who have had a major part in their making.
Robin Mowat is the author of Climax of History and other books. He was a Scholar of History at Hertford College, Oxford, and a University Prizeman. During the war he was at the Middle East Intelligence Centre at G.H.Q., Cairo and served with the British Military Mission as Lecturer in the History of the Middle East at the Egyptian Staff College. He had opportunity then and subsequently to visit widely the countries of the Middle East, and he writes with firsthand knowledge of many of the events and personalities concerned.
Since the war he has been a Senior Lecturer in History at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, and is newly appointed to University College, Ibadan, Nigeria.
Engelsk