6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Outstanding study of an important US strategic partnership., August 3, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Saudi Arabia and the United States: Birth of a Security Partnership (The Adst-Dacor Diplomats and Diplomacy Series) (Hardcover)
Parker Hart was a career Foreign Service Officer who had a unique viewpoint on the history and strategic importance of Saudi Arabia as an ally of the United States. His knowledge of the people and customs of the Middle East, his command of Arabic, and his genuine interest in people of all countries made him the consumate diplomat. As US Ambassador to Saudi Arabia during the critical Yemen crisis, Hart was the on-the-ground negotiator who worked tirelessly to prevent the widening of a conflict with Egypt that could have resulted in a hot war between two important countries.
Hart's life was a true-life adventure in the style of Indiana Jones; but this book is scholarly and will be most interesting to serious students of diplomacy and modern Middle East history.
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2.0 out of 5 stars
Smooth read, but deceivingly biased., November 20, 2001
This review is from: Saudi Arabia and the United States: Birth of a Security Partnership (The Adst-Dacor Diplomats and Diplomacy Series) (Hardcover)
This book examines the intertwined politics of Saudi Arabia and the United States as Hart witnessed it during the late 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s during his missions to the Arabian Peninsula. The two states at this time are actively seeking to develop diplomatic relations with the other; the United States eager to create a friend of the oil-giant, and Saudi Arabia anxiously viewing the politically and economically powerful U.S. as a vital ally in its development in the unstable Middle Eastern region as a young and suddenly rich state. While Hart writes the book as a narrative, the account is more skewed than it initially seems as becomes apparent in the chapters discussing Yemen. Consequently, assessing the book's accuracy becomes difficult as the narrative is tainted not only with the diplomatic bias of an embassy official, but also by the partiality of an influential politician who is examining an issue without an equivalent understanding of the social and political systems of the involved parties. This review will explore that concept as applied specifically to Hart's discussion of Yemen-related issues.
The book is engaging and easy to read as a result of Hart's informal style. The prologue's account of his first invitation to visit the Saudi king and the incidents that occurred on his trip is a classic example of the style used throughout the book (pp.1-9). The opening pages of chapter one epitomize Hart's ability to both entertain the reader and educate even the most elementary student of Middle Eastern history. Expertise in the subject of Saudi politics is demonstrated not only by an in-depth portrayal of various Saudi individuals and Saudi society in general, but also by a careful and competent description of the local politics. The political intricacies of Saudi Arabia are explained with a smooth simplistic language that would otherwise bewilder the untrained reader. This provides a foundation upon which the explanations and theories to U.S.-Saudi relations are based.
Hart's detailed analysis of Saudi culture and the individuals he encounters, particularly King Faisal (p.247) is indicative of his awareness of the importance of culture in diplomatic relations. He even goes so far as to criticize Egyptian President Nasser for his lack of knowledge of Saudi society, and to hold that as a factor partly responsible for his failure to generate support among the Saudi public (p.159). In Hart's discussion of Yemen, which runs throughout a greater part of the book due to its relevance to Saudi, U.S. and Egyptian politics of the era, he fails to discuss the culture of that society. At most, the "backwardness" of the nation is referred to throughout chapter six, as well as the pre-revolution royalty's proud and unthankful demeanor towards American economic assistance.
The aftermath of the 1967 Revolution resulted in the installation of a new Republican government, the first of its kind in Yemeni history. It was during this time of revolution and its aftermath that the impact of the Yemeni issue on U.S.-Saudi politics was heightened as Egypt and Jordan aligned with the revolutionaries and the old royal family, respectively. Hart failed to expand on the political strategy of the revolutionaries and the impact that their success would consequently have on the politics of Yemen. The analysis of the culture of Saudis and the detailed mannerisms of various Saudi leaders demonstrated Hart's consciousness of the importance of being aware of the local culture and the personalities of the local leaders. In the sections where Yemen was discussed, however, this was blatantly ignored. This was particularly expected of him since he was Minister to Yemen from 1961-1962 (p. xv).
Further demonstration of Hart's lack of understanding of the regional culture is his continued reference to Saudis as "Arabs" while all other peoples of the region are named with respect to their country, i.e., Egyptians, Jordanians, Yemenis, etc. While the term "Arab" as Hart technically uses it is taken as a root of the word Saudi Arabia, the implications of this label far exceeds the meaning that Hart is attempting to confine to the people of Saudi Arabian citizenship (p. 157). Basic understanding of the regional mentality would cause any writer to hesitate to use such terms with the knowledge that reference to Saudis as the sole "Arabs" of the region would infuriate all people of other citizenship but similar descent.
While the politics of the Yemeni revolution, its aftermath and its impact on U.S. and Saudi politics were extensively addressed, they were always discussed from the perspectives of Saudi Arabia, the U.S. and Egypt. The tone of the argument is set so as to imply that without the use of Yemen as a pawn between the two Arab countries and the U.S., the Yemeni revolution was doomed to fail. Never are the aspirations of the revolution discussed, and neither are the implications of these goals ever addressed. The sheer number of pages that Hart has dedicated to the 1967 Revolution and its impact on Saudi-U.S. politics leaves the reader dissatisfied. It is ludicrous for the reader to leave enlightened of the Yemeni revolution from the all perspectives but the Yemeni one.
This book is easy to read, and even entertaining for those individuals who are particularly interested in the area. Hart attempts to demonstrate his expertise in the subject matter and gain the confidence of his reader with his meticulous depiction of the Saudi political aura of the time. It is indeed deceiving of him to discuss the Yemeni revolution of 1967 in such a manner that would imply that it would not have succeeded without the intervention of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and consequently, the United States. Only one familiar with the history of Yemen would recognize this as false and exceptionally biased. It is not the terribly written and blatantly biased accounts that are dangerous to those it slanders, it is the eloquent writing of books such as "Saudi Arabia and the United States: Birth of a Security Partnership" that are ultimately the most harmful.
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3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Primary source for history U.S.-Saudi relations 1944-1995, January 19, 1999
This review is from: Saudi Arabia and the United States: Birth of a Security Partnership (The Adst-Dacor Diplomats and Diplomacy Series) (Hardcover)
With more than 50 years of a close relationship with the country and its rulers, "PT" Hart was the real expert on the subject. He backed his memories with exhaustive research in State Department records. Not the history of ARAMCO buta diplomat's diplomat description of men and events in a country celebrating its centennial (by the lunar calendar) by the first vice consul in Dhahran in 1944 and Ambassador in the crisis years of the early 1960s.
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