ABSTRACT
The conquest of Baghdad on March 11, 1917, was a remarkable achievement. Full credit for it should go to Gen. Sir Stanley Maude, who had an extraordinary gift for organization and had built the army into an effective fighting machine. In the course of the years, the British accomplished more than what the Turkish officials had done in a century. Baghdad was changed unrecognizably. The main thoroughfare was macadamized and lighted. A police force was organized. The depth of the antagonism toward non-Muslims transpires from a letter from Ibn Saud, the sheikh of Najd, to Lt. Gen. Aylmer Haldane, commander of the expeditionary force in Mesopotamia in 1920. That Cox did single out the Jews as the most reliable element on whom the British could count is not surprising. They were the wealthiest element in Baghdad and constituted more than a third of the population.
