Absolutely wonderful article. I was so excited when I saw the title because I've been a huge fan of Aurens since the age of 16, and I'm 23 now. What he did during WWI carries a lot of lessons for us today. However, if we were to openly take cues from Lawrence, we would have to admit that we are "nation building" which is not a very popular idea stateside.

Also, Lawrence often worked in ways that broke with the interests of other nations because they did not reflect what he thought was best for the Arabs. I think he was very much a man working on his own, removed from national interests. If he were involved in Afghanistan today, I'm sure he wouldn't be very popular with American foreign policy makers.

T. E. Lawrence as the author states was an acute observer intimately in touch with the Arab language, culture, and traditions besides being highly sensitive to their political aspirations. An innovative soul like Lawrence (a prodigy if not a genius) seems to be everything that the line up of American generals from Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan are not.

The British Army was always interesting in that intellectual and eccentric personalities could sometimes find a home and through sheer talent exercise some influence. Whether that uniqueness still exists in the British Army is hard to say (I doubt it in this era of doctrinal uniformity) but a Slim, Wingate, or Lawrence were a refreshing exception to the normal plodding brass hats whining for more resources with their heads in a bag.

overall very good article, however, I would strongly disagree with John's last part, regarding his assertion that we are " ignoring local culture" "imposing western norms" and "failing to work with local populations." The civil affairs component of US and allied forces is quite large, working with local institutions, rebuilding them covering a wide array of civil society projects, judicial, political, grassroots, economic, etc. In addition, there are dozens of major NGO's also assisting in all these areas, as well as a UN Mission which does the same work. So, the image John is creating here is that we are "all" military in Afghanistan, completely ignoring the local and nation building. That's simply not true, but such large and comprehensive projects takes a lot of time to come to fruition as i witnessed our civil society building efforts in Bosnia first hand over 12 years.

The man certainly did a remarkably job of documenting a successful doctrine of desert guerrilla warfare, and his battlefield successes speak for themselves. The Arab nations that came out of the whirlwind Lawrence made possible and turned against the Ottoman Empire speak for themselves, too, and they speak poorly of themselves and that part of the legacy of T.E. Lawrence as well.
Emulating Lawrence's pragmatism might replicate his accomplishments against Turkey and the Great War's Central Powers, but it might later replicate the Arab nations' corruption, unwholesome and primitive religious orthodoxy and nationalistic jihad against Israel as well.
Armchair strategists and fans of historical adventure would do well to read the entirety of "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" and meet the Arabs and the smoky backroom deals and compromises made with them by desperate Britain and its man on the scene as well as his victories.

While T.E. Lawrence did 'win' in the sense that the Ottoman Empire was defeated by the Arabs. However as Mr. Hulsman points out on page 4, his attempts at 'nation building' failed, not by any real fault of his but by the English and French empires. The reason that Japan and Germany were 'built' so well after World War II was that both nations had fully realized governments and national unity and all that was required was a new bureaucracy to replace the defeated one.

Japan and Germany's lesson cannot be applied to Afghanistan or Iraq, and really neither can Lawrence's in the Middle East. So far the United States has been totally against Lawrence's advice of doing away with arbitrary lines on the map drawn by the world powers in favor of the local realities on the ground. Neither Iraq nor Afghanistan have or have ever had a sense of national unity or a population that sees itself as part of the 'national' process.

So again, define 'win' is winning making sure that Iraq and Afghanistan are unified within their previous context with some sort of national unity government or is winning allowing the forces of self determination to build a nation that may or may not be a 'nationally' unified entity within the boundaries that we set as Iraq and Afghanistan on the map.

Part of the problem in both is that the ideas of 'Iraq' and 'Afghanistan' have always been imposed by Imperial Powers .

Lawrence's ultimate goals were never realized. His "win" was in the Arab Revolt. His attempts at nation building failed for a number of reasons.

Lawrence of Arabia may have heroically led the Hashemites in guerrilla war in the Middle East during WWI, but this was merely for diversion and the Entente powers just hoped for some kind of chaos in the Southern reaches of the crumbling Ottoman Empire. Henry MacMahon brokered a deal with the Hashemites that included, in exchange for their help, independence from the Ottomans in the form of their own unified, Arab state which would reach from Syria all the way to Yemen.

Britain, not expecting much success from the Arabs, had no intention of granting the Hashemites independence since the Sykes-Picot Agreement had already been signed and the borders drawn by 1916. Here the facts don't line up -- T.E. Lawrence writes that he, offended at learning the news that the British planned to betray the Hashemites, used his knowledge of logistics and intelligence to coordinate the fighting force leading to significant success including the capture of Damascus, an important centre of thought. Unfortunately for them, these gains were lost, since what we now know as Syria was already promised to the French, and they just came in and routed Faisal's army in 1920.

T.E. Lawrence knew about the betrayal well before his help was enlisted to coordinate logistics for the Hashemites. Attempt to save some face, he contends in his memoir that he had no idea. On top of that, after using the Hashemites as pawns in the war, Britain revoked the Hashemites’ existing territory, the Hijaz, transferring power to the Sauds at the Paris Peace Conference (1919). All this was ratified by the Ottomans in the Treaty of Sèvres.

What is the point of this article? To learn from the past imperial experiences of the British empire and to apply these learned experiences to continue the dominiation by US and some Euoprean major powers in the Middle East and Afghanistan?

Unless this kind of mistaken thinking, as if Arabs or Afghans need somebody's "help" in their nation-building, which unfortunately is mainstream inclinations the region can never be the safe nor stable. Nobody needs your's "assistance" (which means domination) in anything at all and mind your own business. What the hell you're doing in Iraq and Afghanstan by destroying their country by the stupid slogans and transforming this stupidity into some sort of political literature and feeling proud of your past genocidal experiences. You dont have the feeling of self-criticism and shame?!!