Description
By (author) Satia Priya
Short /annotation:
In this groundbreaking book, Priya Satia tracks the intelligence community”s tactical grappling with this problem and the myriad cultural, institutional, and political consequences of their methodological choices during and after the Great War.
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At the dawn of the twentieth century, British intelligence agents began to venture in increasing numbers to the Arab lands of the Ottoman Empire, a region of crucial geopolitical importance spanning present-day Iraq, Jordan, Syria, and Saudi Arabia. They were drawn by the twin objectives of securing the land route to India and finding adventure and spiritualism in a mysterious and ancient land. But these competing desires created a dilemma: how were they to discreetly and patriotically gather facts in a region they were drawn to for its legendary inscrutability and by the promise of fame and escape from Britain? In this groundbreaking book, Priya Satia tracks the intelligence community”s tactical grappling with this problem and the myriad cultural, institutional, and political consequences of their methodological choices during and after the Great War. She tells the story of how an imperial state in thrall to the cultural notions of equivocal agents and beset by an equally captivated and increasingly assertive mass democracy invented a wholly new style of “covert empire” centered on the world”s first brutal aerial surveillance regime in Iraq. Drawing on a wealth of archival sources–from the fictional to the recently declassified–this book explains how Britons reconciled genuine ethical scruples with the actual violence of their Middle Eastern empire. As it vividly demonstrates how imperialism was made fit for an increasingly democratic and anti-imperial world, what emerges is a new interpretation of the military, cultural, and political legacies of the Great War and of the British Empire in the twentieth century. Unpacking the romantic fascination with “Arabia” as the land of espionage, Spies in Arabia presents a stark tale of poetic ambition, war, terror, and failed redemption–and the prehistory of our present discontents.
Review quote:
[…] a significant edition to the historiography of the First World War beyond Europe… [An] impressive study…
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[An] impressive work which ambitiously seeks to explore the cultural space within which political, military and intelligence personnel operated.
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This book is nuanced, challenging, nicely written, interesting and thought-provoking… rich and rewarding… It is a book that is sure to be well received and it will further our understanding of Britain and the Middle East.
Biographical note:
Priya Satia is Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University.
Review quote: previous edition:
“A significant addition to the historiography of the First World War beyond Europe…[and] a timely reminder that these ”sideshows” of the First World War were in fact very important in determining the political structures of the modern Middle East.”–Nadia Atia, History Workshop Journal””Arabia” was both a frightening and an alluring concept for Englishmen, and Satia vividly captures the mindset and psychological attraction that drew so many to work in that region…Satia”s extensive knowledge of the personalities involved both in England and Middle East provides the reader with a vivid and fascinating picture of the interactions and connections between the players. One can only hope that she will provide us with future books focusing on thespies whose activities helped shape British imperial policy.”–Ranee K. L. Pnjabi, History: Reviews of New Books”Almost thirty years after the publication of Edward Said”s Orientalism, Satia”s careful deconstruction of the British colonial archive illustrates how cultural procedures could lea
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