Anglo-American Relations in Palestine 1919-1925: An Experiment in Realpolitik

Sometime before 11 November 1918, the Ottoman Empire expired. Happily, Europe’s “sick man” did not die unattended; a host of kin survived to divide the legacy. Among the prospective inheritors were two giants, the United States and Great Britain. For Britain, her driving force was the maintenance of Empire. For the United States, mixed motives of idealism, business enterprise and preservation of historic isolationist prerogatives resulted in the development of a policy that was often hesitant and myopic. A spirit of internationalism did not prevail in the case of either nation and, as a result, Middle East problems were exacerbated, as is demonstrated in this article.

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