During the First World War, Britain made three separate sets of promises about the future of the Middle East, to three different audiences, to win the war against the Ottoman Empire. These promises did not fully agree with each other, and the contradictions between them caused conflict for decades afterward.
Why Britain needed Arab help: The Ottoman Empire ruled most of the Middle East and had joined Germany in 1914. Britain wanted an Arab Revolt Arab Revolt against the Ottomans to weaken them from within, so it promised Arab leaders independence in return for their support.
1. The McMahon-Hussein Correspondence (1915-16)
Hussein bin Ali, the Sharif of Mecca (the Ottoman-appointed guardian of the Muslim holy cities), exchanged letters with Sir Henry McMahon, the British High Commissioner in Egypt. Hussein wanted British backing for a large independent Arab kingdom stretching across the Middle East, in exchange for launching a revolt against the Ottomans.
- What McMahon promised — British support for Arab independence in most of the Arab-speaking Ottoman lands, in exchange for an Arab revolt against the Ottomans
- The vague wording — McMahon excluded some coastal areas of Syria from the promise, but the exact borders were never clearly fixed, leaving room for later disagreement
- Hussein's expectation — that his son Faisal would eventually rule a single independent Arab state covering Syria, Iraq, and Arabia
2. The Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916)
At the very same time, Britain was secretly negotiating with France. British diplomat Sir Mark Sykes and French diplomat Francois Georges-Picot drew up a secret plan to divide the Middle East between Britain and France once the war was won — with no mention of Arab independence.
| Power | Areas allocated |
|---|---|
| Britain | Southern Iraq (including Baghdad and Basra), and a zone including Transjordan and Palestine ports |
| France | Coastal Syria, Lebanon, and southeastern Turkey |
| Shared/international control | Palestine (proposed as an international zone) |
The core contradiction: Sykes-Picot directly contradicted the promises made to Hussein. Britain had promised the Arabs independence over land it was simultaneously agreeing to hand to France. When the Bolsheviks published the secret treaty in 1917 after the Russian Revolution, Arab leaders felt betrayed — a betrayal that shaped Arab politics for the rest of the century.
3. The Arab Revolt (1916-18)
Trusting McMahon's promise, Hussein launched the Arab Revolt in June 1916. Arab tribal forces, led in the field by his son Faisal and advised by the British officer T.E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia"), fought a guerrilla campaign against Ottoman forces — famously sabotaging the Hejaz railway and helping British General Allenby capture Damascus in 1918.
Link cause to consequence: For Paper 3, don't just describe the Arab Revolt — explain its significance. It gave Arab leaders (especially Faisal) a claim to have earned independence through active military contribution, which they used at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 — making Sykes-Picot's betrayal even more bitter.
4. The Balfour Declaration (1917)
In November 1917, British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour wrote to Lord Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, stating that Britain viewed "with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people", while adding that nothing should prejudice the civil and religious rights of "existing non-Jewish communities" in Palestine — the Arab majority.
- Why Britain issued it — to gain support from Jewish communities worldwide (especially in the USA and Russia) for the war effort, and to strengthen Britain's own claim to Palestine after the war
- The built-in contradiction — promising a Jewish national home in a land where Arabs were roughly 90% of the population, without defining what "national home" meant in practice
- The result — a third, competing promise, layered on top of McMahon-Hussein and Sykes-Picot, over the very same territory
Three promises, one land: McMahon-Hussein promised Arab independence. Sykes-Picot promised Anglo-French control. Balfour promised a Jewish national home. All three overlapped in Palestine and Syria. This triple promise is the root cause of Middle Eastern conflict examined throughout this whole prescribed section.
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At the Paris Peace Conference (1919), the Allied powers decided the fate of the former Ottoman Arab provinces. Arab hopes for independence, raised by the Arab Revolt, were disappointed: instead of full independence, the territories were placed under a new system of foreign control called the mandate system.
What was a mandate?
A mandate mandate was, in theory, temporary supervision by a "more advanced" nation, under the authority of the new League of Nations, to prepare a territory for eventual self-government. In practice, mandates functioned almost exactly like colonies.
Class A mandates: Iraq, Transjordan, Syria and Lebanon were classed as Class A mandates — considered the most developed and closest to independence, needing only "advice and assistance" from the mandatory power. This classification was used to justify continued European control while claiming it was for the Arabs' own benefit.
The San Remo Conference (1920) — dividing the mandates
| Mandate | Power | Key features |
|---|---|---|
| Iraq | Britain | Formed by joining three former Ottoman provinces (Mosul, Baghdad, Basra) with little shared identity; oil interests were a major British motive |
| Transjordan | Britain | Created in 1921 as a separate mandate east of the Jordan river; Abdullah (Hussein's son) installed as Emir to compensate the family after France expelled Faisal from Syria |
| Syria | France | Faisal had been declared King of Syria by a Syrian National Congress in 1920, but France rejected this and invaded, defeating Faisal's forces at the Battle of Maysalun (1920) |
| Lebanon | France | Carved out of Syria by France as "Greater Lebanon", combining a Christian Maronite heartland with new Muslim-majority areas — creating long-term sectarian tension |
Faisal expelled from Syria
French forces crushed Faisal's short-lived Arab kingdom in Syria in July 1920, ending Arab hopes of a single independent Arab state.
Britain compensates the Hashemites
To manage Arab anger and keep the family loyal, Britain made Faisal King of Iraq (1921) and his brother Abdullah Emir of Transjordan (1921) — the so-called "Sharifian solution".
Indirect rule, real control
Britain and France kept real power through treaties, military bases, and advisers, while local rulers provided a face of nominal independence.
Promised a kingdom → given two thrones instead: Iraq for Faisal, Transjordan for Abdullah.
British mandates: Iraq & Transjordan
- Ruled through Hashemite monarchs (Faisal, Abdullah) as a cheaper form of indirect rule
- Britain kept air bases, oil rights, and control of foreign policy via treaties (1922 Anglo-Iraqi Treaty)
- Revolts occurred (Iraqi Revolt 1920) but were suppressed, partly using the new tactic of aerial bombing
French mandates: Syria & Lebanon
- Ruled through direct rule — French officials held real executive power, unlike the British approach
- France deliberately divided Syria into separate statelets (e.g. an Alawite state, a Druze state) to weaken unified nationalism
- Faced major revolts, most seriously the Great Syrian Revolt (1925-27), suppressed with heavy force
Compare mandate styles: A strong Paper 3 answer contrasts British indirect rule through client monarchs with French direct rule and deliberate division. Both were forms of imperial control, but the methods — and the resistance they provoked — differed.
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Egypt was not an Ottoman territory by 1914 — it had already been under British occupation since 1882 and was made a formal British protectorate in 1914. But the war years transformed Egyptian nationalism into a mass movement demanding full independence.
Causes of the 1919 Revolution
- Wartime hardship — Egyptians suffered forced labour, requisitioned animals and crops, and heavy taxation to support the British war effort, without any political reward
- Rising expectations — US President Wilson's Fourteen Points (1918) promised self-determination self-determination for peoples, encouraging Egyptian nationalists to expect independence after the war
- Refusal of a delegation — in November 1918, a group of Egyptian leaders led by Saad Zaghlul formed a wafd ("delegation") asking the British to allow Egyptian representatives to argue Egypt's case for independence at the Paris Peace Conference
The spark: exile of Zaghlul: When Britain refused the Wafd's request and, in March 1919, arrested and exiled Saad Zaghlul and his colleagues to Malta, it triggered nationwide protests, strikes, and riots across Egypt — the 1919 Revolution. Students, workers, women and rural peasants all took part, uniting Muslims and Coptic Christians in a shared national cause.
The Wafd Party emerges
Out of the 1919 protests, Zaghlul's delegation formalised itself into the Wafd Party, which became Egypt's dominant nationalist movement for the next three decades. Its central demand was full and complete independence, with no residual British control.
Milner Mission (1919-20)
Britain sent Lord Milner to investigate; his report recommended ending the protectorate and negotiating a treaty — an early sign Britain accepted change was needed.
1922 Declaration of Independence
Britain unilaterally declared Egypt independent, ending the protectorate and allowing a constitutional monarchy under King Fuad — but it was independence with major strings attached.
The Four Reserved Points
Britain kept control over: (1) the security of imperial communications (the Suez Canal), (2) Egypt's defence against outside attack, (3) protection of foreign interests and minorities, and (4) the status of Sudan.
Independence in name only: The 1922 Declaration is a classic case study in limited sovereignty. Egypt gained a king, a parliament, and a 1923 constitution — but British troops still occupied the Suez Canal Zone, Britain still controlled Sudan and foreign policy, and British officials still held influence in government. Nationalists, including the Wafd, saw this as incomplete and kept campaigning through the 1920s and 1930s.
| Feature | Before 1922 | After 1922 |
|---|---|---|
| Formal status | British protectorate (since 1914) | Nominally independent kingdom |
| Head of state | British High Commissioner held real power | King Fuad I, with elected parliament |
| British troops | Occupied throughout Egypt | Restricted mainly to Suez Canal Zone |
| Sudan | Under joint Anglo-Egyptian control | Remained under British-dominated control |
Exam link: Egypt shows the same imperial pattern as the mandates: Britain grants a symbolic form of self-rule (a king, a parliament, an "independence") while keeping the substance of power (troops, canal, foreign policy) — just as it did through Faisal in Iraq.