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nat we Learnea...fro m th e Arab RevoltBy T.E. LawrenceI n August 917, M ajor TE. Law-rencethe celebrated "Lawrence ofArabia" penned a brief guide forBritish officers who would be assistingArab forces in their ongoing revoltagainst the Ottoman Turks. Pu/isht'iin The Arab Bulletin, a highly secretmagazine on Middle East politics in-tended for Biish leaders, Lawrence's"27 Articles" succinctly summ arizedwhat he had learned the preceding yearas a highly successful adviser to ir-re gulai Arab troops. Military Histor>'presents ke y elements of the article herein edited form.

Lawrence, right, was a fluent A rabicspeaker and a keen ob server of hisho sts' strength s and weaknesses. Go easy for th e first few week s. Abad Stan is difficult to atone for, andthe Arabs form their judgments onexternals that we ignore. Get to know th eir families, clans andtribes, friends and enem ies, wells, hills

and roads. Do all this by listening andby indirect inquir)'. Your place is advisory, and you radvice is due to the comm ander alone. Win and keep the confidence ofyour leader. Strengthen his prestigeat your expense before others whenyou can. Remain in touch with your leaderas constantly and unobtrusively asyou can. Do not be too intimate, too promi-nent or too earnest. The foreigner and Christian is not apopular person in Arabia. Howeverfriendly and informal thetreatment of yourself maybe, remember always thatyour foundations are very

Jsandy ones. Cling tight to your senseuf humor. You will need itevery day. li is dilTicuk to keep q uietwhen everything is beingdone wrong, but the lessyou lose your temper, theg r e a t e r y o u r a d v a n t a g e .Also, then you will not go[nad yourself. Do not \ry to do too muchwith your own hands. Bet-i ter the Arahs do it toler-

ably than that you do it per-s lectly. It is the ir war, andyou are to help them, notto win it for them. Wear an Arab headcloth when witha tribe....A thick headcloth forms agood protection against the sun, and ifyou wear a hat, your best Arab friendswill be ashamed of you in puhlic. Disguise is not advisable. Except inspecial areas, let it be clearly knownthat you are a British officer and aChristian. At the sam e time, if you can

wear Arab kit when with the tribes,you will acquire their trust and inti-macy to a degree impossible in uni-form.... Also then the Turks will nothang you when you are caught. Religious discu ssion s will be fre-quent....Their conviction of the truthof their faith, and its share in everyact and thought and principle of theirdaily life, is so intimate and intenseas to be unconscious, unless rousedby opposition. Their religion is asmuch a part of nature to them as issleep or food. ln familiar con ditio ns, they fightwell, but strange events cause panic.Keep your unit small.... The more un-orthodox and Arab your proceedings,the more likely you are to have theTurks cold, for they lack initiative andexpect you to. Don't play for safety. Their minds work just as ours do,but on different premises. There isnothing unreasonable, incomprehen-sible or inscn itable in the Arab. Avoid too-free talk about women,lt is as difficult a subject as religion,and their standards are so unlike ourown that a remark, harmless in English,may appear as unrestrained to themas some of their statements would lookto us, if translated literally The beginning and ending of thesecret ofhandlingArabs is unremittingstudy of them. Keep always on yourguard; never say an unnecessary thing;watch yourself and your companionsall the tim e; hear all that passes, searchout what is going on beneath the sur-face, read their characters, discover theirtastes and their weaknesses, and keepeverything you find out to yourself. Have no in teres ts and no ideasexcept the work in hand, so that yourbrain is sa tura ted with one th ingonly, and you realize your part deeplyenough to avoid the little slips thatwould counteract the painful workof weeks. Your success will be pro-portioned to the amount of mentaleffort yo u dev ote to it. ( ^