Okay, I’ve decided which parts of Fromkin to timeline. I’m going to do chapters 23-28, chapters 35-37, chapters 41-44, chapters 46-48 and chapter 57. Basically this surgical reading emphasizes the diplomacy that lead to the Great Arab Revolt, the revolt itself, and the peace settlement in the Middle East focusing on Syria and Lebanon and a little side voyage into the Turks’ s slaughters of the Armenians and the rise of Mustafa Kamal’s Turkey.
The last two parts are important because the Maronites are quite mindful of the slaughter of the Armenians and see this as a primary motivation behind the expansion of the borders of the autonomous sanjak of Mount Lebanon into the Greater Lebanon of today. Given that this choice was a demographic disaster that has guaranteed that Lebanon will never be the Christian state the Maronite Church had hoped for, the paranoia that led to it needs some explanation. Moreover, France’s need to re-fight its war with Turkey and to eventually abandon the Treaty of Sèvres is important for our story. Re-fighting the Turks made the French vulnerable to insurrection in Syria as they had to deploy their men northward. Moreover, losing this small war meant that the French had to cede to Port of Alexandretta to the Turks. As Alexandretta was the only decent port in the Syria mandate that had not found its way into the borders of Greater Lebanon, the outcome of this war was one of the stressors that plagued the French Mandate in Syria.
Fromkin isn’t too dense, so let’s hope I can do this quickly. I have grading to do next week. Yippee.
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