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Developing Iraq: Britain, India and the Redemption of Empire and Technology in the First World War*

Developing Iraq: Britain, India and the Redemption of Empire and Technology in the First World War* DEVELOPING IRAQ: BRITAIN, INDIA AND THE REDEMPTION OF EMPIRE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR The Great War campaign in Mesopotamia began as a small, Government of India operation for the defence of Indian frontiers and British interests in the Persian Gulf. However, once at the Gulf, Indian Army Force D began to advance rapidly north along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in a characteristic effort to shore up what it already held. Baghdad quickly became its object, not least because its fabled past ensured that everyone at home had heard of it: ‘It was the Arabian nights’. To Britons the campaign might have remained a picturesque subplot of the war’s grand narrative, but for a monumental failure in the midst of its surge upriver: a reverse at Ctesiphon forced the troops under General Charles Townshend to retreat to Kut, where they were besieged through the winter of 1915–16. After more than 20,000 troops were lost in botched rescue attempts, 9,000 soldiers and thou- sands of non-combatants surrendered to the Turks in April 1916 — ‘the British Army’s greatest humiliation in the First World War’, and that too in ‘the one theatre of the war where we * http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Past & Present Oxford University Press

Developing Iraq: Britain, India and the Redemption of Empire and Technology in the First World War*

Satia, Priya
Past & Present , Volume 197 (1) – Nov 1, 2007
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References (103)

Publisher
Oxford University Press
Copyright
© Published by Oxford University Press.
ISSN
0031-2746
eISSN
1477-464X
DOI
10.1093/pastj/gtm008
Publisher site
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Abstract

DEVELOPING IRAQ: BRITAIN, INDIA AND THE REDEMPTION OF EMPIRE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR The Great War campaign in Mesopotamia began as a small, Government of India operation for the defence of Indian frontiers and British interests in the Persian Gulf. However, once at the Gulf, Indian Army Force D began to advance rapidly north along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in a characteristic effort to shore up what it already held. Baghdad quickly became its object, not least because its fabled past ensured that everyone at home had heard of it: ‘It was the Arabian nights’. To Britons the campaign might have remained a picturesque subplot of the war’s grand narrative, but for a monumental failure in the midst of its surge upriver: a reverse at Ctesiphon forced the troops under General Charles Townshend to retreat to Kut, where they were besieged through the winter of 1915–16. After more than 20,000 troops were lost in botched rescue attempts, 9,000 soldiers and thou- sands of non-combatants surrendered to the Turks in April 1916 — ‘the British Army’s greatest humiliation in the First World War’, and that too in ‘the one theatre of the war where we *

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Past & Present – Oxford University Press

Published: Nov 1, 2007

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