Christopher Catherwood

A Brief History of The Middle East (Brief History)

Who was Winston Churchill? Even fifty years after his death, he is one of the most iconic figures in British history. As a young man he was a maverick journalist; his many positions in politics before 1940 marked him as a courageous but foolhardy man. Yet it is Churchill’s record in war, which has recently been questioned, that confirms his genius as a military commander and national leader—someone who understood the dangers of Nazi Germany before 1939 and someone uniquely capable to lead the empire through the turmoil of the Second World War. Christopher Catherwood argues that it was Churchill’s stand in 1940-41 that saved Britain and that only he was able to bring together the allies that eventually defeated Hitler in 1945. Catherwood has produced a challenging yet lively reassessment of the life and career of Winston Churchill, lion of British history and flawed hero.

A Biography of Winston Churchill

His Finest Hour

As Britain's colonial secretary in the 1920s, Winston Churchill made a mistake with calamitous consequences and unseen repercussions extending into the twenty-first century. Christopher Catherwood, scholar and adviser to Tony Blair's government, examines Churchill's creation of the artificial monarchy of Iraq after World War One, forcing together unfriendly peoples—Sunni Muslim Kurds and Arabs, and Shiite Muslims—under a single ruler. Defying a global wave of nationalistic sentiment and the desire of subjugated peoples to rule themselves, Churchill put together the broken pieces of the Ottoman Empire and unwittingly created a Middle Eastern powder keg. Inducing Arabs under the thumb of the Ottoman Turks to rebel against rule from Constantinople, the British during WWI convinced the Hashemite clan that they would rule over Syria. However, Britain had already promised the territory to the French. To make amends after the Great War, Churchill created the nation called Iraq and made the Hashemite leader, Feisel, king of a land to which he had no connections. Catherwood examines Churchill's decision, which resulted in a 1958 military coup against the Iraqi Hashemite government and a series of increasingly bloody regimes until the ultimate nightmare of Ba'athist party rule under Saddam Hussein. Photographs and maps are included.

How Winston Churchill Created Modern Iraq

Churchill's Folly

Explores the link between religion and war, focusing on the philosophies that have allowed zealous followers of the world's major religions to shed blood in the name of God since the Middle Ages.

Making War in the Name of God

An overview of the global evangelical Christian movement, including its historical roots, doctrinal distinctives, current strength, influence in politics and society, and teaching about the future.

What They Believe, Where They Are, and Their Politics

The Evangelicals

With over sixty million casualties World War II was the bloodiest conflict in history. In this incisive introduction, Christopher Catherwood covers all the key battles, while giving the wider story behind them. He also brings a fresh angle to the conflict, emphasising the huge impact of the preceding Sino-Japanese War on World War II and the relative unimportance of the British campaign in Africa. From the impact of the Hiroshima bombing to the horrors wreaked by the Red Army and the Nazis, Catherwood makes clear the legacy of the war today. Full of text-boxes revealing key details about intelligence, weaponry, and the social milieu of the conflict, there is no better brief introduction.

A Beginner's Guide

World War II

An intimate, and sure to be controversial, look at the wartime triumphs and failures of Winston Churchill, this work examines the decisions and policies the Prime Minister made in the vital months between June 1940 and December 1941.

Winston Churchill

The history of the Christian church is far more than a dull list of dates. This brief summary will whet your appetite to discover more about the story of Christianity.

A Crash Course for the Curious

Church History

Crash Course on Church History

Leslie Alan Horvitz

Entries address topics related to genocide, crimes against humanity and peace, and human rights violations; profile perpetrators including Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, and Idi Amin; and discuss institutions set up to prosecute these crimes in countries around the world.

Encyclopedia of War Crimes and Genocide

The true story of Winston Churchill’s fateful decision to side with the Communist Partisans of Yugoslavia in World War II—and seal that nation’s fate. One of Winston Churchill’s most controversial decisions during the Second World War concerned the United Kingdom’s role in Yugoslavia. In 1943, he switched Special Operations Executive support from the Cetniks, loyal to Yugoslavia’s exiled royal government, to Tito and his Communist Partisan guerrillas. That choice led to a Communist regime in Yugoslavia that lasted until Tito’s death in 1980, and resulted in the horrific ethnic violence of the Balkan wars in the 1990s. Until now, the story has been that SOE was infiltrated by Communists and that Churchill was duped into abandoning the royalists. However, the recently deposited papers of Sir Bill Deakin—Churchill’s former assistant and an SOE operative in Yugoslavia—reveal that the decision was based on solid evidence and made in Britain’s best military interests. Here, Christopher Catherwood, advised by Deakin himself, has written a definitive history of the SOE in Yugoslavia. Catherwood can now demonstrate that one of Churchill’s most significant and consequential decisions of the Second World War was not the terrible mistake that historians have portrayed—but rather an absolute necessity.

SOE, Bletchley Park and Supporting the Yugoslav Communists in World War II

Churchill and Tito

As Colonial Secretary in the 1920s Winston Churchill made a decision regarding the Middle East that was to have calamitous consequences. Scholar and strategic policy consultant, Christopher Catherwood discusses how Churchill created an artificial monarchy of Iraq after the First World War, forcing three radically different peoples to combine under a single ruler. Today's map of the Middle East, the rise of Saddam Hussein and Gulf Wars of 1991 and 2003 are the unwitting legacy of a conference led by Churchill in Cairo in 1921. Inducing Arabs under the rule of the Ottoman Turks to rebel against their oppressors - abetted by T. E. Lawrence - the British and French during the First World War convinced the Hashemite clan that they would rule over Syria. In fact, Britain had already promised the territory to the French. Partly to make amends and partly for pragmatic economic reasons, Churchill created a single nation state, Iraq, and made the Hashemite leader Feisel king of a land with which he had no connection. Catherwood dissects Churchill's decision - the results of which continue to cause terrible grief to Iraq's indigenous peoples and anxiety to the rest of the world.

Imperialism and the Creation of Modern Iraq

Winston's Folly

Western civilization began in the Middle East: Judaism and Christianity, as well as Islam, were born there. For over a millennium, the Islamic empires were ahead of the West in learning, technology and medicine, and were militarily far more powerful. It took another three hundred centuries for the West to catch up, and overtake, the Middle East. Why does it seem different now? Why does Osama bin Laden see 1918, with the fall of the Ottoman Empire, as the year everything changed? These issues are explained in historical detail here, in a way that deliberately seeks to go behind the rhetoric to the roots of present conflicts. A Brief History of the Middle East is essential reading for an intelligent reader wanting to understand what one of the world's key regions is all about. Fully updated with a new section on the Iraq Invasion of 2003, the question of Iran and the full context of the Isreali/Palestine conflict.

Christopher Catherwood

About

Books

Join the club