T.E. Lawrence, a master of guerrilla warfare.

There have been many examinations of the life and exploits of Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO, better known as T.E. Lawrence, or even more so as “Lawrence of Arabia”. In this writer’s opinion, there can not be enough examinations of such an outstanding existence as the one lived by T.E. Lawrence. Perhaps the readers here will not learn anything new about the man from this short piece, but if all that you take from this piece is a reminder that such a human lived, and lived well, then that is enough. Obviously there are a great many things that we in our community of “freedomistas” and liberty lovers, or dare I call us guerrilla partisans at the risk of triggering an “ERPO”, can learn and apply to our cause going forward.

Born in Wales in 1888, T.E. Lawrence went on to become a British Army intelligence officer during World War I. He was sent to Saudi Arabia in 1916 where he eventually became involved in the Arab Revolt and the Sinai and Palestine Campaign. He used his strategic genius to guide guerrilla activities, counseled factions to work together, planned and executed guerrilla activities and worked up to the level of military advisor for high ranking personnel. Upon his arrival in the theatre, he quickly recognized that the forces he was fighting with were not at the level of the regular Turkish/Ottoman troops, and he therefore convinced and committed the local tribesmen to guerrilla warfare with great success.

In examining Lawrence’s writings and writings about him, we see the foundation of what it is to operate as a guerrilla force. Attacking supply lines, communications, striking the enemy at their weak points while avoiding their strengths. Lawrence was able to embed himself with the local Arab populations, blend in well (despite being unmistakably a white Brit) by learning “their language their manners and their mentality”, as said by General Allenby, and live amongst them for months at a time with little to no support from higher up any chain of command. If there is to be a “Guerrilla Warfare 101” textbook, let it be the life of T.E. Lawrence, or maybe more so, his autobiography “Revolt in the Desert”.

Having read several substantial texts on Lawrence, one takes notice of a favorite tactic, that is the destruction of railroads used by the Ottomans to move troops from one stronghold to another. On at least several occasions, Lawrence himself used explosives to destroy rails and trains, allowing his small band of Bedouin Arabs to outmatch larger numbers of soldiers who were focused on trying to escape the wreckage. This caused the Ottomans to commit larger amounts of resources to defending areas that otherwise had little strategic value. When the Ottomans moved soldiers to a location, Lawrence and his wild band of fighters would simply relocate and attack the next vulnerable target.

Likewise was his strategy against communication wires. It was an easy target that required minimal resources, minimal manpower, short time and just a small risk, while the Ottomans had to once again commit resources to repairing and defending the lines. Resources that were moved by rail. The main objective is to magnify your advantages, mitigate your disadvantages, while neutralizing or avoiding your enemy’s strengths and punishing their weaknesses. Only a few small victories by a guerrilla force can effectively demoralize a larger and well equipped enemy. Lawrence used this to great effect.

Another key point to be learned from Lawrence is a lesson in OPSEC. Operating in a guerrilla environment means one needs to be practicing OPSEC at all times, and Lawrence was a master at it, even keeping the details of some of his missions a secret from his own superiors.

Something else we can observe is how adept he was at climbing the hierarchy of whatever local leadership was in place, and getting himself into a position of great influence and trust. I’ve said before to people who know me that if you want to be famous or well known, get yourself elected to office. But if you want to have some real influence, find who is in charge and become their advisor. Lawrence was a natural at this, at one point gaining enough influence to convince military leadership of how to go about fighting in the theatre during the Arab Revolt.

I highly recommend reading T.E. Lawrence’s writings. There has possibly not been a better representation of a true guerrilla warrior in modern times, and it behooves us all to absorb what we can from the greats that came before us if we stand any chance at regaining what our enemies seek to take away.

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7 Comments

  1. Mad Mick October 1, 2019 at 16:08

    While I agree that TE was an incredible “G”, i’d look to Michael Collins and The Squad, and ultimately the IRA on modern guerrilla warfare.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Collins_(Irish_leader)

    IMHO, they laid the foundation for modern, relevant to our time, operations against a State actor.

    Good reads too:

    The Squad: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1856354695/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1856354695&linkCode=as2&tag=j3st3r13-20&linkId=8936a9b21b73fb2976c33f92ea0747bd

    Fry the Brain: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0971413398/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0971413398&linkCode=as2&tag=j3st3r13-20&linkId=58d26dfbcbbd26c60061789b8db344cf

    As always Gray Man, your articles are timely and appreciated.

    Thank you.

    • Gray Man October 1, 2019 at 22:42

      Good links, and thanks for the good words. It’s important to identify and learn from those who’ve been where we want to go, or those who’ve been where we expect to end up. Look at these figures and identify some of the common patterns that lead to their success.

  2. formwiz October 2, 2019 at 19:19

    I’m assuming you read Seven Pillars.

    Lawrence had a couple of things going for him in the fitting in dept. First, at 5’4″, he was eye-to-eye with the Arabs, second, he was fluent in Arabic from his years at Oxford, third, he was also an expert in the history and culture of the region, but most importantly, he had incredible endurance and the ability to soak up lots of punishment without turning a hair (an unintended gift from his mother who beat the Hell out of him when he was young; Lawrence steeled himself to show no outward indication of any pain (that’s what he meant when he wrote the Turks at Deraa took “the citadel of my integrity”, meaning they had beaten him so badly he couldn’t hold back)) which wowed the Arabs.

    Like MacArthur, he was a master of hit ’em where they ain’t and understood an enemy who feared leaving his forts waiting for the big attack was as good as a dead one.

  3. boer6 October 2, 2019 at 19:34

    GM,

    Splendid summary.

    Lawrence was a creature of his time and I would suggest if they had not managed to serendipitously send a classicist and medievalist to rouse the medievalist Arabs to rebellion, the British would have failed.

    He expertly plied the three pillars of successful insurgency: grievances (real or perceived), legitimacy and narrative.

    Lawrence, Collins and Lettow-Vorbeck achieved Peak Guerrilla between 1916-22. Desert, urban and jungle motifs (respectively) on how it is done with daunting odds, imbalanced force calculus, home turf, redneck engineering and sheer pluck.

    I agree with Mad Mick, it is no mean coincidence that Bloody Sunday (21NOV1920) and British release of Eire under Free State conditions (6DEC1921) occurred within a little over a year of each other. Churchill’s Amritsar speech [finest oration in that murderous rascal’s career in my opinion] on 8JUL1920 also set the conditions for the perfect storm that was British imperial exhaustion after a war that sundered their Empire. Collins expertly steered 800+ years of occupational resentment against the empire and they blinked.

    Cordially,

    Bill Buppert

  4. Michael Gladius October 2, 2019 at 19:50

    Lawrence was a skilled man, but he also benefited from several advantages unique to his war. First, he was operating in deserts and dry (read: non-farming) regions with minimal infrastructure, and so his cutting of the railroads was more effective, since there were no alternate routes.

    Secondly, Lawrence had the benefit of joining on to an already-existing rebellion, and building up up. He did not have to start the revolt, organize the tribes, or any other beginner’s work. Arab tribalism is very tight-knit, and the fragmentation of individuals and families we see today is unheard of in that part of the world.

    Third, Lawrence did receive support from the British and French. These included air assets, armored cars, tanks, and towed artillery. It was much bigger than Arab raiders on camels. In many ways, it bears resemblance to the mixture of regulars and irregulars used by the North Vietnamese. https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/arab-revolt-1916-18-complex-desert-campaign

    And fourthly, he was fighting the Ottoman Empire, the “sick man of Europe.” The Ottomans actually suffered worse setbacks from losing equipment than losing manpower, since their industry was minimal.

  5. Anonymous October 3, 2019 at 02:08

    5

  6. Bryce Sharper October 6, 2019 at 16:38

    MIchael Gladius, thanks for that link. It seems that empires like the Ottoman empire can’t die without killing a lot of people:

    The Hejaz region of Arabia (in modern-day Saudi Arabia) had been under Ottoman control since the sixteenth century but Hussein recognised that the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) or “Young Turk” government was focused on extending its control throughout the Ottoman provinces.[i] The immediate pre-war years saw a crackdown on dissenters in Syria and Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) and this forced Hussein’s hand.

    So there was repression of native peoples near the core of the empire (Syrians) and also it’s periphery (Mesopotamia). Recall also the Armenian genocide at the core of the Ottoman empire at the same time, which was curiously omitted from that SWJ article.

    It will be interesting to see how the restiveness and disorder at the periphery of the American empire will proceed to the core. This has greatly accelerated in my lifetime.

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