- St. John Philby
Harry St. John Bridger Philby CIE (
April 3 ,1885 –September 30 ,1960 ), also known as Jack Philby or Sheikh Abdullah (الشيخ عبدالله), his Arabic name, was anArabist ,explorer ,writer , and British colonial office intelligence operative. He was born at St. John's, Badulla, Ceylon (now calledSri Lanka ), and educated atWestminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he studiedoriental languages under E.G. Browne, and was a friend and classmate ofJawaharlal Nehru , later prime Minister ofIndia . Philby's sonKim Philby became famous for being a British intelligence agent who was adouble agent for theSoviet Union .In his travels he also took great interest in birdlife and he gave a scientific name to the Arabian
Woodpecker ("Desertipicus" (now "Dendrocopos") "dorae"), as well as a subspecies (no longer valid) of anowl ("Otus scops pamelae"). Most of his birds were named after women whom he admired. He contributed numerous specimens to theBritish Museum . He also contributed to the draft of a book on the birds ofArabia byGeorge Latimer Bates . However, it was never published, but was made use of in a work on the same subject byRichard Meinertzhagen . Philby is remembered inornithology by the name ofPhilby's Partridge ("Alectoris philbyi"). [Morrison-Scott, T. C. S. 1939 Some Arabian Mammals Collected by Mr. H. St. J. B. Philby, C.I.E. NovitatesZoologicae, 41: 181-211.] [Pocock, R I 1935 The Mammals Collected in S. E. Arabia by Mr. Bartram Thomas and Mr. H. St. J. Philby. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., Ser. 10, 15: 441-67.]As he states in his autobiography, he "became something of a fanatic" and "the first Socialist to join the Indian Civil Service", and was posted to
Lahore in the Punjab in 1908. He acquired fluency in Urdu, Punjabi, Baluchi, Persian, and eventually Arabic languages. Philby married his first wife in September 1910, with his distant cousin Bernard Law Montgomery, latercommander-in-chief of Allied armies duringWorld War II , as best man. He also later married an Arab woman fromSaudi Arabia .Arab Revolt Philby is one of the lesser known but most influential persons in the modern history of the
Middle East . In late 1915Percy Cox , chief political officer of the small BritishMesopotamia n expeditionary force, recruited Philby as head of the finance branch of the British administration inBaghdad , a job which included fixing compensation for property and business owners. Their mission was twofold: (1) organize theArab Revolt against theOttoman Turks ; (2) protect the oilfields nearBasra and theShatt al Arab , which was the only source of oil for theRoyal Navy . The revolt was organized with the promise of creating a unified Arab state, or Arab Federation, fromAleppo inSyria toAden inYemen .Gertrude Bell of the British Military Intelligence Department was his first controller and taught him the finer arts ofespionage . In 1916 he became officiating Revenue Commissioner for Occupied Territories.In November 1917, Philby was sent to the interior of the
Arabian peninsula as head of a mission toIbn Saud . TheWahabbi chieftain and bitter enemy of Sherif Hussein was sending raids against the Hashemite ruler of theHejaz , leader of the revolt. For more than 700 years the non-TurkicHashemite dynasty held title asSharif of Mecca .Philby secretly began to favour Ibn Saud over Sherif Hussein as "King of the Arabs", a difference with British policy, which was promising support for the Hashemite dynasty in the post-Ottoman world. On return Philby completed the crossing from
Riyadh toJeddah by the "backdoor" route, thus demonstrating Ibn Saud was in control of the Arabian highlands, whereas Sherif Hussein could not guarantee safe passage. Later he was awarded theRoyal Geographical Society Founders Gold Medal for the desert journey. Back in Jeddah he met with an embarrassed Sheriff Hussein.On
7 November 1918 , four days before the Armistice, Britain and France issued theAnglo-French Declaration to the Arabs assuringself-determination . Philby felt the betrayal of this assurance, along with the Balfour Declaration,Sykes-Picot Agreement , and other diplomatic maneuverers broke faith with the promise of a single unified Arab nation in exchange for aligning themselves with the Allies in the war against the Ottoman Turks andCentral Powers .Philby argued that Ibn Saud was a "democrat" guiding his affairs "by mutual counsel" as laid out in the
Quran (Surah 62:37), in contrast toLord Curzon 's "Hussein policy".British policy on Arab affairs was wracked by rivalries between the Foreign Office and the India Office.After the Great Iraqi Revolution of 1920 Philby was appointed Minister of Internal Security in the
British Mandate of Iraq . He roughed out a democratic constitution complete with elected assembly and republican president.In November 1921, Philby was named chief head of the Secret Service for the
British Mandate of Palestine , or what is now all ofJordan ,Israel , and Palestine. He worked withT. E. Lawrence for a while, but did not share Lawrence's views on the Hashemites. Here he met his American counterpart,Allen Dulles , who was stationed inIstanbul . At the end of 1922, Philby traveled toLondon for extensive meetings with all involved in the Palestinian question. They wereWinston Churchill , King George, the Prince of Wales,Baron Rothschild ,Wickham Steed , andChaim Weizmann , the head of theZionist movement.Ibn Saud adviser
Philby was of the view that both British and the Saudi family's interests would be best served by uniting the Arabian peninsula under one government from the
Red Sea to thePersian Gulf , with the Saudis supplanting the Hashemites as Islamic "Keepers of the Holy Places" while protecting shipping lanes on the Suez–Aden–Bombay route of the British Empire. Philby was forced to resign his post in 1924 on differences of allowing Jewish immigration to Palestine. He was found to be in unauthorized correspondence with Ibn Saud, which carried with it the connotation of espionage, sending information he gained in his post to Ibn Saud. He had "gone native". The Secret Service, however, continued to pay Philby for another five years.Shortly after his resignation, Ibn Saud began to call for the overthrow of the Hashemite dynasty. Philby was able to advise Ibn Saud how far he could go in occupying all Arabia without incurring the wrath of the British government, then the principal power in the Middle East. By 1925, in the words of Philby, Ibn Saud brought unprecedented order into Arabia. Philby was put in charge of arranging Ibn Saud's coronation as king of the newly created state of
Saudi Arabia .Philby settled in
Jeddah and became partners in a trading company. Over the next few years he became famous as an international writer and explorer. Philby personally mapped on camelback what is now the Saudi–Yemeni border on theRub' al Khali where 126 degree Fahrenheit / 52 degree Celsius daytime temperatures are not uncommon.In his unique position he became Ibn Saud's chief adviser in dealing with the
British Empire and Western powers. He converted toIslam in 1930. In 1931 Philby invitedCharles R. Crane to Jeddah to facilitate exploration of the kingdom's subsoil assets. Crane was accompanied by noted historianGeorge Antonius , who acted as translator. In May 1933Standard Oil of California (SOCAL) concluded negotiations with Philby for a 60-year contract to obtain the exclusive concession for exploration and extraction of oil in the Hasa region along the Persian Gulf. This marked the beginning of the decline of British influence in the region and the start of American influence. The personal contacts between the United States and Saudi Arabia were largely channeled through the person of Philby.Meanwhile, at Cambridge, Philby's son, Kim, was being recruited by the
OGPU of theSoviet Union . In recent years the theory has been propounded that Kim was recruited in particular to spy on his father, who had such powerful influence over the founder of the Saudi state and its connections with Britain and with American oil interests.By 1934, in an effort to safeguard the port of
Aden , Britain had no fewer than 1,400 "peace treaties" with the various tribal rulers of the hinterlands of what becameYemen . Philby undermined British influence in the region, however, by facilitating the entry ofUnited States commercial interests, followed by a political alliance between the United States and the Saud dynasty.In 1936 SOCAL and Texaco pooled their assets together "
East of Suez " into what later becameARAMCO (Arabian–American Oil Company). The United StatesState Department describes ARAMCO as the richest commercial prize in the history of the planet. Philby represented Saudi interests.In 1937 when the
Spanish Civil War broke out, Philby arranged for his son,Kim Philby , to become a war correspondent for "The Times ". The same year Philby began quiet negotiations with Ben-Gurion to allow unlimitedJewish immigration toPalestine under Ibn Saud's protection.Later Philby began secret negotiations with
Germany andSpain , concerning Saudi Arabia's role in the event of a generalEurope an war. These discussions would allow neutral Saudi Arabia to sell oil to neutral Spain, which then would be transported to Germany. John Loftus, who worked in theUnited States Department of Justice Office of Special Investigations Nazi-hunting unit, claimsAdolf Eichmann , while on a mission to the Middle East, met with Philby "during the mid-1930s".It is very likely that Philby's relationship to Ibn Saud was an important inspiration for the Arabic novelist
Abdulrahman Munif in the writing of the novel "Variations on Night and Day" (Arabic: "Taqāsīm al-layl wan-nahār" تقاسيم الليل والنهار). The description of the relationship between Hamilton (Philby), sultan Khureybit (Ibn Saud ) and amir Fanar (Faisal of Saudi Arabia ) forms the backbone of the novel.Philby Plan
At a February 1939 meeting in London with Ben-Gurion and Weizman, Philby offered substantial Jewish immigration to Palestine if they would support Ibn Saud's son and eventual successor, Faisal, as King of Palestine. Months later, accompanied by Saudi foreign affairs official Fuad Bey Hamza, Philby proposed to Weizmann and Moshe Shertok (later Sharett) that they pay Ibn Saud £20 million to be used to resettle Palestinian Arabs. Weizman said he would discuss the plan with President Roosevelt. Kim Philby also was present at this meeting.
According to Philby the Zionist leadership accepted the "Philby Plan" in early October. However because of the kingdom's special status as home of the Islamic holy places, the plan was denied when Philby leaked it. The matter was not taken up again for another three years.
Meanwhile Philby ran for election to the House of Commons for the British People's Party declaring, "no cause whatever is worth the spilling of human blood" and "protection of the small man against big business". He lost and soon thereafter the war began. Because of his activities, when he travelled to
Bombay he was arrested on3 August 1940 underDefence Regulation 18B and taken to England.Friends such as
John Maynard Keynes intervened, and after seven months he was released; it is not known precisely who arranged this. Shortly thereafter Jack Philby recommended his son Kim to Valentine "Vee Vee" Vivian,MI6 deputy chief, who recruited him into the British secret service.When Harold Hoskins of the U.S State Department visited Ibn Saud in August 1943, he asked if the king would be willing to have an intermediary meet with Chaim Weizmann. In anger Ibn Saud responded he was insulted by the suggestion that he could be bribed for £20 million to accept resettlement of Arabs from Palestine. Hoskins reports the king said Weizmann told him the promise of payment would be "guaranteed by President Roosevelt." A month later Weizmann, in a letter to
Sumner Welles wrote: "It is conceived on big lines, large enough to satisfy the legitimate aspirations of both Arabs and Jews, and the strategic and economic interests of the United States; . . . properly managed, Mr. Philby's scheme offers an approach which should not be abandoned."When the war ended he returned to Arabia. In 1945 at the age of sixty he purchased his second wife, a 16-year-old girl, from the slave market at
Taif , about forty miles south ofMecca . He continued work with ARAMCO. Talk in the king's circle was that Philby was an agent of British Secret service, a Zionist spy, and a communist. Philby began to provoke a series of spectacular arguments with the king. He claimed the disagreements were caused by the corruption and decadence that oil money brought the kingdom.ARAMCO learned from Philby a great deal about Arabia framed in a manner to strike a sympathetic response in the American people. ARAMCO and the
CIA at the time were a revolving door for the same personnel. There were no other sources of information about Saudi Arabia available to the American public. It was portrayed as "a mirror image of the Old West, a wide, unfenced land where nature was unsubdued, religion was simple and fundamental, and the law of the gun prevailed—the desert of Arabia, as America's last frontier." Fact|date=August 2008Suez Crisis After Ibn Saud's death in 1953 Philby openly criticized the successor King Saud, saying the royal family's morals were being picked up "in the gutters of the West". He was exiled to
Lebanon in 1955. In exile he wrote:". . . the true basis of Arab hostility to Jewish immigration into Palestine is
xenophobia , and instinctive perception that the vast majority of central andeastern Europe an Jews, seeking admission . . . are notSemites at all. . . . Whatever political repercussions of their settlement may be, their advent is regarded as a menace to the Semitic culture of Arabia . . . the European Jew of today, with his secular outlook . . . is regarded as an unwelcome intruder within the gates of Arabia".While in Beirut he reconciled with Kim, and the two lived together. The son was reemployed by MI6 as an outside informer on retainer, with the assignment to spy on his father.
Jack Philby helped further his son's career by introducing him to his extensive network of contacts in the Middle East. Jack introduced him to President
Camille Chamoun of Lebanon. Both were sympathetic to Nasser during theSuez Crisis of August 1956. Between Jack's access to ARAMCO and Kim's access to British intelligence there was little they did not know about Operation Musketeer, the French and British plan to capture the Suez Canal. The Soviet Union exposed the entire plan in theUnited Nations and threatened Britain and France with "long-range guided missiles equipped with atomic warheads."In 1955 Jack reconciled with the royal family and returned to live in Riyadh. In 1960, on a visit to Kim in Beirut, while in bed with Kim at his side, he said "God, I'm bored" and died. He is buried in the Muslim cemetery in
Beirut .Works
*Philby, Harry. "The heart of Arabia; a record of travel & exploration". (London: Constable) 1922.
*Philby, Harry. "Arabia of the Wahhabis". (London: Constable) 1928.
*Philby, Harry. "Arabia". (London: Ernest Benn) 1930.
*Philby, Harry. "The empty quarter: being a description of the great south desert of Arabia known as Rub 'al Khali" (London: Constable & Company Ltd) 1933. [http://www.archive.org/details/TheEmptyQuarter scanned book]
*Philby, Harry. "Harun al Rashid" (London: P. Davies) 1933.
*Philby, Harry. "Routes in south-west Arabia [map] : From surveys made in 1936" (Methuen & Co Ltd) 1936.
*Philby, Harry. "Sheba's daughters; being a record of travel in Southern Arabia" (London: Methuen & Co Ltd) 1939.
*Philby, Harry. "A Pilgrim in Arabia" (London: The Golden Cockerel Press), [1943] .
*Philby, Harry. "The Background of Islam: being a sketch of Arabian history in pre-Islamic times" (Alexandria: Whitehead Morris) 1947.
*Philby, Harry. "Arabian Days, an autobiography" (London: R. Hale) 1948.
*Philby, Harry. "Arabian Highlands" (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press) 1952. [http://www.archive.org/details/arabianhighlands008654mbp scanned book]
*Philby, Harry. "Arabian Jubilee" (London: Hale) [1952]
*Philby, Harry. "Saudi Arabia" (London: Benn) 1955.
*Philby, Harry. "The Land of Midian". (London: Ernest Bean Limited) 1957.
*Philby, Harry. "Forty Years in the Wilderness" (London: R. Hale) c1957.
*Philby, Harry. "Arabian Oil Ventures" (Washington: Middle East Institute) 1964.External links
* [http://www.rgs.org/HomePage.htm Royal Geographical Society]
* [http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/197401/into.the.highlands.htm]
* [http://www.sant.ox.ac.uk/mec/meca.shtml Middle East Centre Archive, St Antony's College]Notes
Sources
*"Kingmakers: the Invention of the Modern Middle East", Karl E. Meyer and Shareen Blair Brysac, W.W. Norton (2008)
*"Princes of Darkness", Laurent Murawiec, Rowman and Littlefield (2005)
*"Oxford Dictionary of National Biography", Oxford University Press (2004)
*"Arabian Jubilee", H. StJ. B. Philby, Robert Hale, (1952)
*"Philby of Arabia", Elizabeth Monroe, Pitman Publishing (1973)
*"The Secret War Against the Jews", John Loftus and Mark Aarons, St. Martin's Press (1994)
*"Arabia, the Gulf and the West" Basic Books (1980)
*"The House of Saud", David Holden and Richard Johns, Holt Rinehart and Winston (1981)
*"The Philby Conspiracy", Bruce Page, David Leitch andPhillip Knightley , Doubleday (1968)
*"Saudi Arabia and the United States, 1931-2002" by Josh Pollack (2002)
*"Treason in the Blood: Harry St. John Philby, Kim Philby, and the Spy Case of the Century", byAnthony Cave Brown , 1994,Boston , Houghton Mifflin.
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