Sykes-Picot agreement is not to blame for Middle East’s problems

[LuckyTheDog]

The Sykes-Picot agreement turns 100 this week. Named after its negotiators, Sir Mark Sykes and Francois Georges-Picot, the secret wartime deal proposed dividing the Middle East between Britain and France, down an extraordinary line.

To quote Sykes verbatim, it ran "from the E in Acre to the last K in Kirkuk", and its vestiges are still visible today, in Syria's border with Jordan and western Iraq.

Sykes would surely have been astonished to know that, a century later, we are still discussing his deal with Picot. For he had originally proposed the agreement in December 1915 as an expedient to avert a row.

The French were angry because they had discovered that, behind their backs their British allies had offered the Arabs territory they wanted themselves. That put their creaky wartime alliance with Britain under added strain.


MORE HERE: http://yonside.com/sykes-picot-is-not-to-blame-for-middle-easts-problems/

[leveymg]

1. Excellent and sweeping analysis.

A must read if you want to understand the intricacies of Great Power rivalries and oil politics in the region that have aggravated the underlying Sunni-Shiia and ethnic divisions. Thanks for posting this.