Politics and the Military in Jordan

A Study of the Arab Legion, 1921-1957

P.J. Vatikiotis

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN:
  9781138706477
• eBook ISBN:
  9781351783033
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Regional Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Amidst the turmoil in the Middle East, Jordan has presented a striking example of relative stability, and in this study, first published in 1967, Professor Vatikiotis sets out to show just how far Jordan's stability depends on its army. The Jordan Arab Army, for long better known as the Arab Legion, was one of the best small fighting forces in the Middle East. Raised in 1921 by the late King Abdullah, the legion helped him to pacify the tribes and establish and extend his rule and authority over a fractious society in a region of vast desert expanses. The Legion then expanded into a disciplined military institution, but whereas the armies of several Arab states were involved in coups, the Jordan Arab Army has no such record. In this book, the author examines the particular historical conditions from which a state emerged in Jordan, and the role of the Arab Legion in its creation and consolidation.

CHAPTER I

Introduction

A NUMBER of formulations about civil-military relations in the state have been in existence for a very long time. One of these relates to the possible role of the military in a situation of political instability—the provision of national leaders, sometimes saviours, in times of extreme national crisis. Another relates to the role of the army in the quelling of domestic political disturbances and in the defence of national frontiers against external aggression by the organised and disciplined use of force. Such military activity constitutes the ultimate sanction and coercive measure at the disposal of the legitimately constituted authority in the state.

These formulations are relevant to the study of the military in a polity where the functions and jurisdiction of its component institutions are legally and constitutionally allocated and specified. Under these conditions, a disturbance of the accepted norm in civil-military relations is considered deviant, an anomaly, and a reflection of serious trouble in the system. But in polities where these conditions do not obtain, it is somewhat unrealistic to study civil-military relations with the same assumptions. Much of what is said by Westerners about the role of the military, specifically its political involvement, in under-developed countries derives from the initial conception of the military as strictly an arm of the state, possessing specific functions and duties. We do not readily conceive of conspiracies among its ranks, because we do not expect it to govern, but only to serve government.¹ This fundamental attitude immediately gives rise to a number of other assumptions: for instance, a young man chooses the army for a career because he is primarily motivated by, among other things, service to his nation and state—to his country. He joins, that is, a professional organisation—the officer corps—of which he is presumably proud. He is above all loyal to his commander, to his regiment, and to his sovereign, whether that sovereign is institutionally and legitimately vested in a monarchy or a republic. The matter of serving “King and Country”, “God and Fatherland”, rests upon there being a prolonged socialisation (e.g., education, communal activity) of individuals and groups which inculcates in the members of the political community the veneration of these national and patriotic symbols. This process itself must, moreover, be expressed in workable institutions.²

One hardly expects such symbols of loyalty and structures for the institutional expression of allegiance to be developed—or even to exist—in societies, or countries, where the idea of a nation-state is so recent; or in regions where many sovereign states have emerged, or were deliberately created, in geographical contiguity to one another, amidst what their inhabitants consider to be one umma (their spiritual notion of the nation determined by the universalist tradition of Islam); where the tribal members of this “nation” find it difficult by custom and tradition to recognise legal boundaries that restrict their free movement; and where until recently the principle of legitimacy and the basis of loyalty were based upon a religious identity and determined by membership in a religious community. For many centuries the ideological commitment of this religious community carried with it the assumption of a universal political realm. The commitment was rigid and ambitious, whereas its political dominion was never realised. Nevertheless, it withstood the pressure and rejected the idea of the nation-state until barely seventy-five years ago. When the nation-state as the organisational unit of a sovereign political order finally came to these societies less than fifty years ago, it was largely the result of a combination of circumstances and the outcome of a series of events upon neither of which the native general public had great influence or control. Nor did they appear to have a choice in the matter of their new political order. Two European Great Powers—Britain and France—practically imposed a new political order in the area known as the Fertile Crescent, consisting of quasi-autonomous and mandated territories.

The break-up of the Ottoman Empire in 1918 represented the destruction of the last great Muslim imperial order. It also marked the rejection by Muslim leaders of that time of a rigid Islamic ideology with universalist political claims. A small group of educated Arabs throughout the Arab provinces of this empire which constituted the Fertile Crescent had, since the 1870s and more actively since the turn of the century, begun a revival of an Arab sentiment of identity distinct from the Ottoman one and sought to achieve autonomy within that great empire via decentralisation. At the instigation of Britain in the Great War and with her financial support an Arab Revolt was raised by the Sharif Husayn of Mecca—a religious-dynastic leader—against their ruler-caliph in Istanbul. Some Arab officers serving in the Ottoman armies joined this revolt. With the imminent destruction of the Empire at the hands of the Allies, and with the encouragement of wartime British promises of an Arab kingdom, initial Arab aspirations for autonomy were quickly transformed to demands for independence in an Arab dynastic state.

The subsequent fragmentation at the end of the war of the greater Arab state (desired and expected by the leaders of the Arab Revolt, 1916–1918) was dictated by the interests of the Great Powers. It produced such states as Iraq, Greater Lebanon, Syria, Transjordan. Except in Lebanon perhaps, there were in these states no mature developed political institutions to cope with the problems of independence. The people living in them had been subjects of the Ottoman Sultan, who was represented in the various areas by governors and other officials appointed from Istanbul. The administrative machinery of government was supervised by high Turkish, as well as Arab, Ottoman officials assisted by many local Arabs in its service. When a parliament came into being in Istanbul in 1908, Arab representatives from such provinces as the Hejaz, Syria, and Iraq were elected to it. At the same time political groups and parties with Arab separatist and nationalist aspirations were then of recent origin and secretly organised to avoid detection and persecution by the Ottoman authorities. Originally, these aimed at securing further political rights for the Arabs from the Ottoman Padishah.

In the territory which came to be known after the First World War as Transjordan political inexperience was coupled to a tribal society which comprised both settled and nomadic beduin tribes. Ever since the destruction of Mamluk power in Egypt and Syria by the Ottoman Turks in 1517, this area remained the unruly domain of warring tribes. It was only with the greatest of difficulty that the Ottoman authorities were able, from time to time, to extend their influence and impose their control upon this area south of Syria and east of Palestine. Raiding between tribes, and the raiding by tribes of settled communities of cultivators in villages and small towns, were common occurrences. The regions in the north-west and all lands lying west of Kerak and Ma‛an in the south were frequent victims of beduin raids. So were the government garrisons established by the Turkish authorities in the nineteenth century when they sought to extend their control southwards in order to protect the pilgrimage route to Mecca. The tribesman—both settled and nomadic—was rarely willing to pay taxes. Rather the beduin taxed the cultivator in the form of blackmail payment in return for leaving him unmolested. The willingness of the beduin to pay tax symbolised and meant submission to the representative of central power. This did occur occasionally. It usually followed a punitive military expedition by Ottoman forces against a particular tribe or group. But tribal defeat and temporary submission to central authority were usually accompanied by a government subsidy to the tribal chief, who in turn promised to keep his tribe in check for a while. Thus, while the effective pacification of the tribes in Transjordan by the Ottoman authorities was never really achieved, relations between these groups continued to be expressed in tribal customary law and practice, not in any elaborate codified legal arrangements.³

Under these conditions it is essential to realise that political control over tribal society could be achieved by the dual use of force and conciliation. The Ottomans had employed both approaches, but without total or continued success. The latter technique took the form of financial concessions (subsidies to tribal chiefs, and often outright bribes) by the government, and special privileges with regard to land and administration. Where Ottoman power and administration were able to establish themselves certain tribal groups tended to settle down to agricultural pursuits and to become sedentary communities in villages or towns. After the establishment of the Amir Abdullah in Amman in 1921, the same pattern with regard to the tribal issue was followed. But, as will be shown, with greater success. Side by side with force, the Amir in Amman bestowed upon tribal chiefs honorific titles and appointed some of them to positions in his incipient central government. Within less than a decade after his founding of the Principality, the more restless and truculent tribes in the south and east had been pacified. Most of them settled as part of a larger state entity. All these developments took place in Jordan, and to a great extent, if not primarily, through the efforts of the Arab Legion, assisted in the early years (1921–1930) by the Royal Air Force (RAF). Where the Ottomans had previously failed, Amir Abdullah and his Arab Legion, with British help, succeeded.⁴

While Jordan has been an independent sovereign state only since 1946, its army dates back in one form or another to 1921. The army, that is, preceded the emergence of a sovereign independent state in Jordan. In fact, one could argue in this case that the army created the state.⁵ More significant still, the army was a vehicle and an instrument for the pacification and integration of a predominantly tribal society into a state to whose central authority the tribes became responsive and to whose administrative control they became subjected. The army has transformed nomadic and semi-nomadic tribesmen into disciplined soldiers and officers responsive to rational command and capable of sustained organised life. If restraint, both social and individual, is a mark of civilisation, then the army civilised the tribesman towards a measure of modernity by diverting his sense of tribal collectivity and esprit de corps into a sense of loyalty and a feeling of allegiance for a paramount chief—the monarch. From an occasional raider of other tribes or of settled agricultural communities for pillage and plunder, the tribesman has been transformed in the Legion into an expert professional in the organised and disciplined use of force for purposes determined and ordered by a central government. Instead of serving the Banu Sakhr, the Huweitat, the Majali, the Ma‘āyiṭa, the Tarawina, or the Shamayila, the Mutair, Shammar, Ruwwala, or Aneiza tribes, he now serves the King and his government in Amman.

Although there are differences in the organisation and structure as well as operational history of the Legion between its early years and in the 1950s, the clear distinction in terms of its political role in the country must be emphasised. The evolution of the Legion from a police and gendarmerie force to a sophisticated army can, as was suggested above, be traced through distinct stages in its growth. From a “praetorian guard”⁶ of a prince-ruler in the very early days (roughly 1921–1925) the Legion has developed since that time into an army of some importance to both Jordan and the neighbouring Arab states. The garrison state east of the river Jordan, maintained by the Legionnaires, who were trained and commanded by British officers, was enlarged when the Legion secured in 1948 a portion of Central Palestine. When this new territory west of the river Jordan was annexed and officially incorporated into the expanded Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in April 1950, it posed new problems for both the government and the army. While this event was soon followed by a generally turbulent political period (1950–1956) for the country, it hastened the expansion and accelerated the transformation of the Legion itself from a corps d’élite to a substantial military institution. The intricate technical requirements for the logistical and administrative support organisations of a modern army entailed new departures in the recruitment and training methods for the Legion, not dissimilar to the deliberate measures taken by the civilian government in integrating a new population and society from the West Bank into the Kingdom’s political life and establishment.

In its earlier history the function of the Legion was mainly to extend and impose the authority of Amman, i.e. of Prince Abdullah, over a fractious society. It also had to contend with tribal raids and inter-tribal conflict. Having done this its role was to maintain order and effective security. With the expansion of the kingdom’s territory and the infusion of a new population, the political role of the Legion acquired new dimensions: namely, to prevent any successful challenge to the authority of its Commander-in-Chief, King Abdullah, and, after him, that of his grandson. In short, it now had the major task of protecting the dynasty, its regime and establishment from internal and external threats. But, for the first time also, this joining of Palestinians to Transjordanians exposed the Legion itself to new and dangerous political currents. The process of expansion itself, which became essential for the creation of a larger, more self-sufficient military institution carried similar dangers.

This process, however, cannot be investigated generally over the last forty-five years of the history of Transjordan and Jordan without distinguishing different stages in the development of the Legion. Thus one can study the Arab Legion as primarily an internal security police and desert patrol force in the period 1921–1940. Then, during the Second World War, the Legion presents itself as a military force consisting of a number of garrison units helping to guard British installations and communications in the Middle East. In the Palestine War in 1948 the Arab Legion appeared mainly as a corps d’élite fighting force. It consisted then of some five operational regiments, but lacked fully developed or elaborate technical and supporting services. Nor was it backed up by a force of reservists recruited from a system of national conscription. Most interesting and relevant for the purposes of this study is therefore the description of the transformation of the Legion from this state into an efficient military force during its period of greatest expansion from 1948 to 1956. From a body of eight to ten thousand men the Legion grew by 1956 into an establishment of some 25,000 officers and men. This included three Brigade Groups, a Division Headquarters, an Artillery Corps, Signal Corps, and Engineer Corps, together with an incipient Air Arm in the process of becoming a Royal Air Force.⁷

While it may be argued that many states in the Fertile Crescent were artificial creations of the European Powers who came to control the area at the end of World War I, Transjordan was perhaps the most artificial of them all. This beginning is now most interesting in itself as regards the Legion, for the maintenance of the State of Jordan is very much an accomplishment of the Legion. It is even more interesting today when related to the political changes that have accompanied the integration of that part of Palestine secured by the Legion in 1948. Although most of the integration so far has been undertaken in the civilian institutions of government, in the economic, financial, educational and social fields of state and national endeavour, some of it is being done in and through the Jordan Army. To have to depend now upon native—and largely ex-Palestinian—t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• PREFACE
• CHRONOLOGY
• Chapter I: INTRODUCTION
• PART I
• PART II
• PART III
• CONCLUSION
• EPILOGUE
• APPENDIX
• INDEX
• MAP OF JORDAN AND ITS BOUNDARIES