Lawrence's Guerilla Warfare Insights

Introduction

In the Science of Guerilla Warfare, Thomas Edward Lawrence narrates a personal experience as a British military officer assigned at Arabia during the Arab Revolt against the Turks of 1916 to 1918, during the First World War. The story is created in form of an essay in which Lawrence shares his idea and analysis of how he organized an unconventional warfare from a perspective of a learned military officer. T. E. Lawrence’s narrative is convincing and gives the reader varying military theories so that one could comprehend instances of undertaking the guerilla warfare, but it has some weaknesses that spur to question the validity of claims and bewilder the reader’s assiduity.

Lawrence starts the narrative by stating the essence is not to present only facts and analysis of the Arab Revolt against the Turks, but to provide personal accounts of the measures he undertook to promote the Arabs tribesmen win the war against the Turks. He provides a theoretical framework to comprehend guerilla warfare as a political movement expedited via unconventional stratagems rather than military approach augmenting to typical warfare. This work was acquired first hand by Lawrence since he experienced it as a Leader of the Arabs during the Arab Revolt against the Turks between the years 1916 and 1918. The historic event, in turn, acquires value from the fact that it furtherance was guided by the constructive pertinence of the concepts Lawrence set forth.

Lawrence has profoundly explained the plans that eventually defeated the Turkish Army, was to attack the military materials that seem to be scarce, claiming that ‘the aim should be to destroy not the army but the materials’. Eventually, over thirty-five thousand Turkish soldiers became casualties resulting from the scientific guerilla warfare. The intention was to convince the Turks that they could not sojourn, rather than drive them out, which could have been difficult. So Lawrence worked with tribesmen who were inexperienced to attack the Turks in Median and about Mecca.

The study relies entirely on the experiences of the author; Lawrence, according to Stang (2016), describes his background that he studied modern military theories and histories. In 1907, Lawrence entered Jesus College at Oxford University with a prospect of studying modern history. Lawrence affection for military courses, in the year 1909 he spent time in Middle Eastern specifically in Lebanon and Syria undertaking researches on Crusader castles. On return to England, Lawrence graduated after completion of his thesis that was entitled ‘The Influence of the Crusades on European Military Architecture- to the End of the 17th Century.’ As the World War one was on the horizon, in 1915, Lawrence was enlisted by the British Army to assist in mapping the Sinai Peninsula, which exposed him to a British officer capable of systematically evaluating the military value of terrain. Thus, all the information illustrated and strengthened by the awareness Lawrence accumulated before he was assigned to the Arab Spring.

The author of this article from his background has joined the British Army as a lieutenant, and since he was quite knowledgeable of the Middle East, in due time during the First World War, he was assigned in Cairo in an intelligence branch and proved his capacity by amassing knowledge of the Ottomans Empire and its placements. The steady flow of intelligence information of policies and, military function attuned Lawrence to elevated matters of warfare, specifically in 1915, when the cities of Median and Mecca offered the British an alliance against the Ottomans. Therefore, all arguments throughout the essay are illustrated and bolstered with the examples of acquired knowledge and personal experiences.

As described above Lawrence’s main purpose was to write about the theoretical concepts of guerilla warfare. He has relied extensively on the military theory of irregular warfare, and for him to do this he had to appreciate how Arabs engage in warfare. Cruceru (2014), has claimed that ‘for any military expeditions, may it be conventional or unconventional warfare, the most far-reaching method of inquisition is to institute the type of war on which they are supposed to embark on, neither creating it for, nor attempting to change it into, an entity that is foreign to its kind.’ Such a concept makes Lawrence’s work credible and persuasive. He elaborates on how he employed this concept and admirably he succeeded. The idea was that the Arabian people lacked the materials and people to engage in a conventional war, thus they have to resort to a strategy of a different mindset and tactics. As Lawrence would say during the revolt, “the terrain better suited out tactics and we waited for them.” The method is meant to attack various sections of the opponent’s army mostly with hit and run tactics and the Arabs had rooted practices of guerilla warfare.

Overall, Lawrence’s writing on Science of Guerilla Warfare develops a positive impression on theoretical aspects of unconventional warfare and also captivates the reader’s attention with the edginess of the themes he discusses. However, there are weaknesses that put in jeopardy the quality of Lawrence’s work. First, he is a survivor of the Arab Revolt against the Turks of 1916 through to 1918. He has described that he was captured and imprisoned in 1917 and released the following year. It indicates that however, the Arabs won against the Turks in 1918, he was not there to ensure that actually his theoretical guerilla warfare tactics he tries to convince the reader facilitated the triumph. It also leads to biases since the author claim that only he made it possible for the Arabs to win the war against the Turks. This assumption serves as a minor proneness of his work meaning that some events he has to describe might be exaggerated.

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Conclusion

Persuasive writing of Thomas Edward Lawrence on the Science of Guerilla Warfare allows the revelation of a historical event specifically the dark times of the First World War. He has illustrated theories of conditional warfare that the Turks undertook and the unconditional warfare that he himself organized the Arab tribesmen is compelling and routinely sustained. Lawrence has managed to illustrate the theories with his personal experiences and accumulated knowledge and observation in the Middle East. However, Lawrence’s writing is weakened by the presence bias and the overextended assumptions.

References

Cruceru, V., 2014. On contemporary warfare: short review of specific concepts. Land Forces Academy Review, 19(3), p.231.

Lawrence, T.E., 2014. Science of guerrilla warfare. In Strategic Studies (pp. 275-283). Routledge.

Stang, C., 2016. The Waking Dream of TE Lawrence: Essays on his life, literature, and legacy. Springer.