“A Sword with Two Edges”: Lawrence of Arabia 1962 and the End of Empire

Year 2013, Issue: 37, 11 - 30, 01.04.2013

Jonathan Stubbs

Abstract

In their 2006 “Quadrennial Defense Review Report” the United States Department of Defense outlined strategies for the “long war” they planned in the Middle East. The key to success, the report suggested, was the “ability to work with and through partners, to operate clandestinely and to sustain a persistent but low-visibility presence” “Quadrennial Defense” 11 . The authors had to reach a long way back to find examples of the tactics they sought to promote, and the illustration most readily to hand came from British rather than American history.

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