Product Description

A Council on Foreign Relations Book

A History Bookclub Selection

Kenneth M. Pollack, formerly a Persian Gulf military analyst at the CIA and Director for Persian Gulf Affairs at the National Security Council, describes and analyzes the military history of the six key Arab states—Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Syria—during the post–World War II era. This is the first time that the complete postwar histories of virtually all of these countries have been recorded in unclassified form. In particular Pollack focuses on the Arab armies themselves, helping to illuminate the persistent problems they encountered on the battlefield. He shows in detail how each Arab military grew and learned from its own experiences in response to the specific objectives set for it and within often constrained political, economic, and social circumstances. This first ever overview of the modern Arab approach to warfare provides a better understanding of the capabilities and limitations of the Arab militaries, some of which are the United States' most likely adversaries and some of which are our most important allies.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #866485 in Books
• Published on: 2002-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 699 pages

From Publishers Weekly
As the U.S. rather publicly contemplates a strike against Iraq, Kenneth M. Pollack, the Council on Foreign Relations' deputy director for National Security Studies, offers a frank and statistically based historical assessment of Iraq's performance in war, along with the performances of Egypt, Jordan, Libya, Audi Arabia and Syria. Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness, 1948-1991 begins with the first of Egypt's engagements with Israel, and ends with the Gulf War, devoting a chapter each to the aforementioned nations (Iraq gets more than 100 pages), and focusing on everything from preparedness to unit cohesion. While it is often more technical than most readers will want, expect journalists to be combing the book (which includes 36 maps) in search of backstory.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
In the March/April 2002 issue of Foreign Affairs, Pollack, who is deputy director of National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, bluntly addressed what should be done once the al Qaeda has been dealt with: "The United States should invade Iraq, eliminate the present regime, and pave the way for a successor prepared to abide by its international commitments and live in peace with its neighbors." This forthrightness is evident throughout Pollack's significant albeit highly specialized military history of the tactical and strategic performance of six key Arab states Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Syria during the post-World War II era. Each broad analysis covers the strategies and goals of both the various militaries and their adversaries to provide a full political context. Pollack achieves the dual purpose of analyzing the factors that have consistently hindered these armed forces and providing a robust assessment of their strengths and weaknesses during various battles. Since the experiences of these forces continue to shape military action around the world, this important overview belongs in all military research libraries and larger university libraries. Dale Farris, Groves, TX
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review
"A much needed analysis of Arab military capabilities... A well-researched and thoughtful book. It is a 'must read' at the Pentagon, U.S. Central Command, and in all military and intelligence organizations that work on the Middle East." Middle East Journal "An extremely valuable, compendious, and convincing military history of the contemporary Arab world, making this book a standard work of reference." Foreign Affairs "[A] classic study." Newsweek "This encyclopedic study will be of great interest to scholars, military planners and analysts, and policy makers. A must-read with Middle East 'military balance' studies, particularly those by Anthony H. Cordesman." Choice "Pollack achieves the dual purpose of analyzing the factors that have consistently hindered these armed forces and providing a robust assessment of their strengths and weaknesses during various battles. Since the experiences of these forces continue to shape military action around the world, this important overview belongs in all military research libraries and larger university libraries."--Library Journal "A frank and statistically based historical assessment of Iraq's performance in war, along with the performances of Egypt, Jordan, Libya, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness, 1948-1991 begins with the first of Egypt's engagements with Israel, and ends with the Gulf War, devoting a chapter each to the aforementioned nations ... and focusing on everything from preparedness to unit cohesion."--Publishers Weekly "classic study." Fareed Zakaria's "World View" column in the April 7 issue of Newswee

Customer Reviews

a superb military history of the Middle East
The main thesis of Pollack's book is that the Arab armies lose wars because of the low quality of the junior officer corps. The first army that Pollack evaluates is the Egyptian army from 1948-1991. Pollack states the main reason for the severe defeat suffered by the Egyptians in 1967 was due to the poor quality of lower ranking officers. These Egyptian lieutenants, majors, and colonels failed to react to Israeli manuevers or look for routes of escape. However Pollack praises the Egyptian high command's decision to move forces closer to the Israeli border because if they waited behind defensive works, the Egyptian army would have been outmaneuvered by the Israelis. When planning for the 1973 war the Egyptian high command planned every detail of the lower officers moves for the upcoming offensive. The end result was that the Egyptian army was suuccesful in the opening phases of the offensive but faced defeat in the unplanned later phases of the conflict.Pollack thinks that the Egyptian high command made the right move in staying in the Northern Sinai and not retreating because the Egyptian army lacked the maneuver skills to implement the later option. The second that Pollack details is the Iraqi army that faced problems similiar to the Egyptian army. In the opening phases of the Iran-Iraq the Iraqi army was outmaneuvered by Iranin forces because of the medicore qaulity of the Iraqi forces. The Iraqi high command compensated for this weakness by carefully planning every operation in minute detail. This soon led to the later Iraqi victories against the Iranians although the Iraqi junior officers still suffered from poor intiative. Because of the above mentioned weaknesses the Iraqi army was swiftly defeated by the United States during the Gulf War, but Pollack states that the Iraqi high command saved the Iraqi army from complete destruction by sacrificing some units of the elite Republican Guard against the American armored forces so that a great percentage of the Iraqi army could escape. The the third army that Pollack details is the Jordainin army from 1948-1991. The Jordanian army was able to defeat the Israelis in the 1948 war because it was officered by British officers thereby escaping the previously mentioned weaknesses of the Iraqi and Egyptian armies. But once the British officers were replaced by Arabs in 1956, this led to the poor showing of Jordanian forces in 1967. The forth army mentioned is the Libyans that had similiar problems with their junior officers and this caused the Libyan defeat in Chad during the late eighties. The Saudi Arabian army which had exactly the same problems as the above mentioned armies was more ineffective since the Saudis never bothered to learn the technical skills to run a mechanized army. The final army that Pollack describes in the book is the Syrian army and how the poor quality of Syrian lower officers led to defeat in it's wars against Israel. The inefffectiveness of the Syrian officer corps allowed the Israelis were able to outflank the Syrians by moving into the Northern Golan Heights during the 1967 war. In planning their moves against the Israelis in the 1973 war, the Syrians copied from Soviet tactics by massing their forces on both flanks of the Israeli army in the Golan Heights but the Syrians restrained the moves of their lower officers to react personally to any Israeli moves. The end result was the near destruction of the Syrian army that was only saved by last minute reinforcements from Iraq and Jordan. During the 1982 war in Lebanon the Syria commandos performed well but the vast majority of the Syrian regular forces performed poorly. I would reccomend this book to anyone interested into the reason why the Arabs lose in war.

Excellent, but perhaps better for afficionados
The Middle East has been, regrettably, one of the most active "laboratories" of war-fighting since WWII. The lessons learned from the numerous conflicts there have had tremendous influence on the development of the concepts of maneuver warfare which are so central to current Western military doctrine. The success of that developmental process has been manifestly evident in the Coalition (essentially U.S.)-Iraqi conflicts of 1991 and 2003. Pollack's book, which is well-summarized by the other reviewers, is a fairly technical survey of the course of each of the individual Middle-East conflicts, with an eye towards elucidating the causes for the defeats of the Arab militaries in each of those wars. His analytic style will be familiar to those who have read his other, more politically charged, book, The Threatening Storm. He proposes hypotheses for Arab military ineffectiveness in his introduction, and then proceeds to evaluate the degree to which performance of each country in each conflict supports or refutes each of those hypotheses. It is a very logical, detailed method of argument which has an aura of inevitability in its conclusions. However, some in the general readership may find it a bit dry. There are few anecdotes of small unit action to liven up the narrative, which reads more like a War College document than a popular history.

The conclusions have also been summarized by the other reviewers. As I see it, Pollack proposes that Arab military ineffectiveness stems mainly from an inability of smaller units, either on land or in the air, to engage in the free-flowing maneuver and combined-arms co-ordination required for tactical success on the modern battlefield. He proposes that problems reliably using and maintaining sophisticated modern weapons systems are also significant, but the root cause is the inflexibility of the small unit. Pollack attributes this mainly to failings of the junior officer corps, but I would like to have seen a discussion of the role of the non-commissioned officers in Arab armies, since the ability of Western NCOs is a major factor in the strength of Western militaries.

Pollack does not propose an explanation for the limitations he identified. It would be fascinating to read an evaluation of his conclusions in light of the Arab Development Report, to assess the degree to which the military deficiencies are indirect manifestations of aspects of Arab culture. My own hypothesis (although I am certainly no expert) is the observed limitations arise from an absence of a technological, machine-oriented, society that emphasizes individual empowerment and action, an inherent conservatism that values the collective (umma) at the expense of personal initiative, and an system of personal worth and honor that limits the ability to recognize and convey negative information. In other words, many of the factors that are at the heart of criticisms of Western (and especially U.S.) society by the Arab world are those that are associated with Western success, and Arab failure, in modern war.

Of course, as Pollack points out, the nature of war is not static. And there may come a time in the future when Arab militaries are more effective, politically if not tactically or operationally. For instance, the development of asymmetric warfare takes advantage of Arab personal courage and willingness to sacrifice for the collective, and suicide bomber vests are not sophisticated weapons systems. But, without a significant restructuring of Arab society, it is hard to see how the limitations detailed so mercilessly in this book will be overcome in a way that will allow the Arabs to prevail on a conventional battlefield.

Excellent book, well-summarized by other reviews
After reading "The Threatening Storm", I bought this for further background and to continue to assess the quality of Pollack's research. This seems a detailed and objective analysis.

Pollack analyzes each of the Arab armies, and finds, as noted in other reviews, that Arab soldiers have often been incredibly brave, but with tactical leadership uneven at best, and often truly awful.

I take away from this that at least part of the problem is not just that lower-ranking officers are not good, but that the common problem has been *architectural*. That is, the structures and motivations of these governments have almost never allowed for independence and initiative at the lower levels. In some cases, it is clear that various rulers never wanted the military to be too independent, and this resulted in a rigid centralized-control approach.

Hence, perhaps it is possible this is a military problem, i.e., train better tactical leadership, but the consistency of the problem makes me think that it is more of a government/society issue, where the existing structures simply don't encourage the long-term existence of flexible troops.

In any case, fine analysis with comprehensive military history of the era.