How did this paradox come to pass? In a peaceful and just society, ethics and morality create and preserve the very existence of peace. War is the ultimate breakdown of morality, and personal survival comes to the fore. At the social level, we turn to leaders who will guarantee our national survival. We are willing to accept the philandering leader as long as he gives us the best chance to exist. In war, this social compromise has already been made: men follow the most competent leader because he is the best guarantor of their lives; the competent sinner will always supplant the incompetent saint in tactical leadership. Yet in a further evolution or twist of the paradox, within the society of soldiers war often brings out the best character qualities among the combatants: self-sacrifice, self-discipline, generosity, initiative, hopefulness, spirit, camaraderie, responsibility, patience, determination. All these qualities were manifest throughout Lawrence’s life, before and after the desert. The crucible of combat simply refined the metal and mettle of his humanity.
The autonomous leader, like Lawrence, seeks respect rather than reputation, for only the autonomous leader, who finds ultimate solace within himself, can find self-respect as meaningful, while “self-reputation” makes no sense. Reputation is always exterior to the self, dependent on the estimate and esteem of others. The autonomous leader also views charisma much differently. Where the heroic leader derives immense satisfaction from the adulation of his followers, who sense the gravity of his presence, the autonomous leader is more concerned with making others feel good about themselves. This sense of enabling helps to foster a spirit of empowerment. The subordinates feel self-actualized in their engagement with the world. Their identity shifts from the leader to the self and creates a sense of self-confidence, a willingness to assume responsibility, and a spirit of initiative. As an expert learner, the autonomous leader naturally becomes an expert teacher, further reinforcing conditions of empowerment. Within the context of conflict learning, mutual learning becomes crucial since the military milieu is so ambiguous, volatile, and dynamic.
Perhaps the best précis on Lawrence as an autonomous leader was penned by the commander who knew him best: Edmund “the Bull” Allenby. After Lawrence was killed, Allenby wrote: “He depended little on others; he had his private reasons for all he did, and those reasons satisfied him. Loyal pursuance of his own ideals, and the habit of independent thought, brought about a sound self-education; practice in analysis of character resulted in a full understanding of other men. His exceptional intellectual gifts were developed by mental discipline; and the trained mind was quick to decide and to inspire instant action in any emergency. Hence his brilliance as a leader in war.”
In perhaps the final testament to Lawrence’s leadership, almost sixty of his bodyguard died in his service—over half the original complement. They had formed a fellowship out of the sinews of leadership. As pariahs outcast by thirty or more desert tribes, they had developed into a firm union bound fast by a courage of despair, whose only hope was mutual trust. Only the intensity of mind-numbing activity seemed to transcend the loss of a personal identity, which they seemed always to rediscover in the freedom of the group. Over time, Lawrence’s iron will and determination in creating his own tempered striking force challenged him to higher standards of leadership: “to live up to my bodyguard,” he said, “to become as hard, as sudden, as heedless.” Lawrence’s ascetic self-abnegation had created a refined and efficient desert fighting machine and added yet another jewel to a never-ending chain of irony: the image of the ascetic Templar knight leading a band of renegade Muslim raiders in a holy war.
Thus, leader and led, in a dance of mutual self-respect, changed each other, slowly, irony by irony, the transformation bending to the will of Lawrence: “Into the sources of my energy of will I dared not probe.… The practice of our revolt fortified the nihilistic attitude in me. During it, we often saw men push themselves or be driven to a cruel extreme of endurance: yet never was there an intimation of physical break. Collapse rose always from a moral weakness eating into the body, which of itself, without traitors from within, had no power over the will. While we rode we were disbodied, unconscious of flesh or feeling; and when at an interval this excitement faded and we did see our bodies, it was with some hostility, and with a contemptuous sense that they reached their highest purpose, not as vehicles of the spirit, but when, dissolved, their elements served to manure the field.”7
The autonomous leader, though, often pays a heavy psychological and emotional price. His predilection for self-reflection creates a self-awareness that, over time, can create the personal grief experienced by leaders like Lawrence, who refuse blithely to rationalize the moral ambiguities of their actions and the actions of their men and the doublespeak and even betrayal of their superiors.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Thief of Souls
Even to the creator himself, the earliest effect may seem to be a commerce with disorder. For the creative, which is an extension of life, is not an elaboration of the established, but a movement beyond the established, or at least a reorganization of it and often of elements not included in it.… This is the reason why, in order to invent, one must yield to the indeterminate within him, or, more precisely, to certain ill-defined impulses which seem to be of the very texture of ungoverned fullness which John Livingston Lowes calls, “the surging chaos of the unexpressed.”
—BREWSTER GHISELIN, The Creative Process
Allenby’s planning conferences had already begun by the time Lawrence arrived from Tafileh. Allenby had tried to get word to him in the Tafileh highlands, but the aircraft sent to bring word had dropped messages in the wrong place. He entered into the meetings just as deliberations had turned to strategic issues. In general, London was greatly satisfied with the outcome of the recent Palestine campaign and the capture of Jerusalem. The operations in Palestine were quickly becoming the only winning game in town, and Lloyd George was ready to ante up again at the gaming table of war. The slaughter at the third battle of Ypres that ended in November continued to drive strategic assessments to look for a military solution outside the western front and toward Germany’s main allies. Practically, it meant that Allenby would be expected to pull more rabbits out of his military hat. True to the spirit of the Christmas season, visions of strategic sugarplums danced in the heads of the War Cabinet after the fall of Jerusalem. They saw Damascus and even far-off Aleppo as reasonable plums ripe for Allenby’s taking. A quick seizure of Aleppo would finally knock Turkey out of the war and open a strategic route to allies like Russia and Romania.
By early 1918, the grand strategic situation of the war had changed dramatically. The Germans had signed a new armistice with the Russians, freeing up vast numbers of troops in the east that could be sent to the western front and even to the Middle East if need be. The Germans were planning a massive offensive in the spring before the American intervention could change the strategic calculus. The growing resurgence of Germany in the western theater gave “Westerners” like Robertson more ammunition to argue for a minimalist approach in the secondary theaters like Palestine. Lloyd George and the other “Easterners” argued that the protracted war in France had demonstrated decisively Clausewitz’s principal dictum that defense is always the stronger form of war. As long as the Allies stood on the defense, they could withstand any onslaught the Hun might throw against them, at least until the American saviors arrived. Furthermore, the imminent collapse of Bulgaria would open up a new front against Austria in the region and directly threaten Germany’s key ally.
As the debate continued into the new year, Lloyd George decided to turn the matter over to the Allied Supreme War Council at Versailles for resolution and advice regarding the military situation in the Middle East. The planning body was responsible for the coordination and integration of all Allied grand strategy and issued the findings of its study on January 21, 1918. Its conclusions were highly supportive to the position of the “Easterners.” It recognized that Turkey was “the weakest point
in the hostile coalition and should be the object of the attack.” This meant, therefore, that the Allies should stand on the defensive in France, Italy, and the Balkans and exploit the weakness Turkey presented in Palestine. Robertson responded immediately, decrying his irrelevance as chief adviser to War Cabinet, which seemed bent on ignoring his military advice.
Lloyd George had come to feel that an impartial assessment was required now that the two sides of the argument had held their positions virtually unchanged since the beginning of the long debate. He sent General Jan Smuts, onetime nemesis of Allenby during the Boer War days, to Egypt in the first part of February. Smuts responded quickly on February 15 with a telegram to London stating that simultaneous offensives in Palestine and Mesopotamia would be infeasible without major reinforcement. In a more comprehensive report delivered on March 1, Smuts argued that the decisive front was in Palestine because of its strategic proximity and natural line of approach to Aleppo. He further recommended that because of its distance from Aleppo and primitive logistics infrastructure, the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force should stand mainly on the defensive. Under these circumstances, the MEF could therefore relinquish two of its six infantry divisions as well as a cavalry brigade and send these units to reinforce Allenby along with an Indian cavalry division from France. These reinforcements would increase Allenby’s offensive capability by at least 25 percent, while the Turkish balance would continue to deteriorate or remain the same.
Smuts was already privy to Allenby’s plans, which began to consider the operational position more comprehensively for the first time by including the forces and operations east of the Dead Sea. This meant a fundamental reassessment of the Arab capabilities and Turkish intentions along the Hejaz from Deraa to Medina. The first phase of this plan meant tying in the British flank in Palestine with the Arab forces across the Dead Sea. In considering this move, Allenby naturally sought out the advice of Lawrence.
LAWRENCE WAS STILL recovering from the crisis of Zeid’s profligacy in Tafileh when he met with Allenby. He could not refuse the general’s request to continue what was, in effect, a charade, as much as he may have wanted to: “There was no escape for me. I must take up again my mantle of fraud in the East. With my certain contempt for half-measures I took it up quickly and wrapped myself in it completely. It might be fraud or it might be farce: no one should say that I could not play it. So I did not even mention the [moral and psychological] reasons which had brought me across [from Tafileh]; but pointed out that this was the Jordan scheme seen from the British angle. Allenby assented, and asked if we could still do it. I said: not at present, unless new factors were first discounted.”1
The first factor was the Turkish garrison in Maan. In order for the Arab forces to range westward and link up with the British eastern flank, this position would first have to be isolated and then taken. Here the problem facing the Arabs was logistical. They needed more mobility if they were to advance to the northern side of Maan and cut the rail there. This meant reinforcements on the order of seven hundred baggage camels as well as more infantry guns and machine guns. Furthermore, the Arab rear and right flank would have to be covered from attacks coming south out of Amman. Allenby immediately approved the requests, ordering to Aqaba two elements of the Egyptian Camel Corps, a formation of Egyptians under Frederick G. Peake that had proved so effective throughout the war. With the new transport capability, the four thousand Arab regulars could now range eighty miles in advance of their base, well within the operational requirements for a successful assault on Maan. As for the Arab flank, Allenby expected to send an Indian brigade to Es Salt, which would pin Turkish forces in Amman.
On the next day, February 28, a corps commanders’ conference was held to discuss the phasing of the campaign. The first phase would establish a secure British right flank with the aid of the Arab regulars. Lawrence would support the movements of this operation in a secondary role after the British and Arab regulars had made contact with each other and captured Maan. Afterward, with the help of the Egyptian Camel Corps, the Arab regulars would move their base of operations north, closer to Jericho. These general movements east of the Dead Sea would further encourage and expand the general scope of the Arab Revolt. Once the British eastern flank was secured, a general advance could begin along the Mediterranean coast. A first thrust would include the seizure of the plain of Esdraelon and the Jezreel Valley and then securing a line from Haifa to Tiberias. The next phase would carry the advance along the coast to Tyre and Sidon, with the final objective being the occupation of Beirut. The British right flank would keep pace with the left by moving through the Judean Hills and by advancing into the Yarmuk Valley. The advance in this sector would begin with a strike east out of Jerusalem on the road through Jericho and down to the Jordan River.
Allenby was making the best out of a difficult operational situation. The official history castigates him for a plan that was “stiff and mechanical, and it made transport master instead of servant.” Liddell Hart continues the same facile criticism. The logistical reality was much less facile. The extension of the standard gauge of the Sinai railway could not be hastened at the flick of a marshal’s baton. Serious engineering work had to be done at a deliberate pace. While Allenby was making his final preparations for the offensive, Lloyd George presented his plans to the Allied Supreme War Council back in Versailles. Once again, Robertson refused to support the plan, this time in front of the French, raising the ire of the prime minister to a new level. It was becoming apparent that Robertson as chief of the Imperial General Staff would soon find himself in a sack.
FOLLOWING THE MEETING with Allenby, Lawrence went down to Cairo for a few days of R&R. He then flew to Aqaba to reestablish his authority with Zeid’s big brother Prince Feisal and explain how Zeid had diverted the money meant solely for the Dead Sea fight. Most likely Zeid was operating under a misunderstanding: to him gold was gold, to be spent on the immediate tasks at hand. The idea that gold would have a strategic value was something utterly alien to his understanding of military economics. Feisal, on the other hand, must have had some notion of its special allocation. More troublesome to Feisal was the Turkish threat to Tafileh. His gain in tribal and political status through its capture was more valuable to him than any amount of gold. Lawrence tried to convince him that under Allenby’s new campaign strategy, Tafileh was irrelevant, “not worth losing a man over.” In fact, if they took the place, the Turks would weaken their hold on both Maan and Amman, making everyone’s job a whole lot easier. On March 4, the Turks did just that. Lawrence put a good face on the loss by relaying Allenby’s generosity to Feisal in tangible terms: the camel train of seven hundred animals and three hundred thousand pounds of gold deposited directly into Lawrence’s personal war chest for the upcoming campaign season more than made up for Zeid’s losses. The regular Arab army was particularly pleased with the new transport, which finally made it a mobile field force. Now Joyce, Jaafar, and the others would have something real and lethal to work with.
After dispensing Allenby’s largesse, Lawrence went on a four-day trip to Cairo to begin the staff coordination with Alan Dawnay’s Hedgehog planning staff. Hedgehog was essentially a clone of Allenby’s general staff: a shadowy presence of Allenby himself, along with his leadership and authority. Alan, an intelligence officer, was Guy’s brother; Guy had planned the fall offensive that led to the fall of Jerusalem. Guy Dawnay was recalled to France, and Alan, as Allenby’s archangel, became “Allenby’s greatest gift to us—greater than thousands of baggage camels.… His was an understanding mind, feeling instinctively the special qualities of rebellion: at the same time, his war-training enriched his treatment of this antithetic subject. He married war and rebellion in himself; as, of old in Yenbo, it had been my dream every regular officer would. Yet, in three years’ practice, only Dawnay succeeded.” Greatly to Lawrence’s disappointment, Dawnay’s lack of spoken Arabic and the unfortunate state of his health (which had been shattered in Flanders Fields) meant
that he could not command in the field. But for all that, Alan “had the gift, rare among Englishmen, of making the best of a good thing. He was exceptionally educated, for an Army officer, and imaginative. His perfect manner made him friends with all races and classes. From his teaching we began to learn the technique of fighting in matters we had been content to settle by rude and wasteful rules of thumb. His sense of fitness remodeled our standing.”
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