Great Syrian Revolt

This article describes the Syrian revolt in the 1920s. See also Syrian uprising (2011–present).

Great Syrian Revolt
Sultan Pasha al Atrash, leading his armies against the French Mandate, 1926.
Date July 1925 – June 1927 Location French Mandate for Syria and Lebanon Result French victory
Belligerents
France	Syrian insurgents
Commanders and leaders
Maurice Sarrail Roger Michaud Maurice Gamelin Henry de Jouvenel Charles Andréa	Sultan Pasha al-Atrash

Dead bodies of Syrian rebels, killed by the French Army in 1925, and placed in Marjeh Square.

The Great Syrian Revolt (Arabic: الثورة السورية الكبرى‎) or Great Druze Revolt (1925–1927) was a general uprising across Syria and Lebanon aimed at getting rid of the French, who had been in control of the region since the end of World War I. The uprising was not centrally-coordinated; rather, it was attempted by multiple factions – among them Sunni, Druze, and Christian – with the common goal of ending French rule. The revolt was ultimately put down by French forces.

Background

At its peak, the Ottoman Empire stretched from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf in the east. In Europe, it controlled the Balkans, and twice threatened to conquer Vienna. Unlike modern nation-states, which ostensibly rule populations that identify themselves as residents of the political entity that rules them, the Ottoman Empire ruled groups of people that identified as belonging to a separate entity. Even the word “Ottoman” refers exclusively to the ruling family, the House of Osman, not even to the ruling ethnic group, the Turks.

In 1925, the Ottomans were no longer in control of Syria, but little had changed in the ethnic makeup of the region for several centuries. During World War I, the Ottoman Empire had fought with Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the victorious powers had effectively dismembered it. A few of its former territories immediately achieved independence, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, but other areas that could not quickly be carved into nation-states were turned into mandates under the rule of European powers. By 1925, the French had been ruling the Mandate of Syria for seven years.

The idea of independence was itself nothing new. In 1918, Faisal ibn al-Husain had founded a kingdom of Syria and Iraq, and though he was driven out of the Mandate of Syria by the French two years later, most Syrian nationalists chose not to follow him to Iraq, but to remain in Syria and advocate for independence.

The years between 1920 and 1925 were not by any means peaceful. Rather, they were marked by small, localized, sporadic revolts against French rule. From 1920-1921, the Alawites and the Bedouin revolted. They were followed in 1921 by insurrections among the nobles of Aleppo and the inhabitants of the Hauran, a region in southwestern Syria. In 1923, in an effort to forestall a similar revolt on the part of the Druze population, the French negotiated a separate treaty that subsequent years would show to have been unsuccessful.

Sultan Pasha al-Atrash leading his army against the French forces in 1925.

French forces entered Damascus on July 25, 1920 after the Battle of Maysalun. King Faisal fled to Jordan and General Henri Gouraud became High Commissioner. Upon arrival, the French partitioned Syria into five states: Damascus, Aleppo, Alawite State (Latakia), Greater Lebanon, and Jabal el Druze.

Causes

Alienation of the Elite

One of the major reasons behind the outbreak of the Great Syrian Revolt was the French relationship with the local elites. The Ottoman Empire, especially in its final centuries, had allowed a large amount of authority to devolve to the local level, and much of the day-to-day administrative functions were carried out by local notables. Indeed, the Ottoman Empire had long institutionalized a similar concept, the millet system, whereby people of different religious affiliations were held to different legal standards (sharia law applying to Muslims, for example, but not Jews, Catholics, or Orthodox Christians).

The European powers, however, had little grasp of the intricacies of Ottoman government, and failed to recognize that the disappearance of national authority did not mean that administration ceased to exist on a local level. In the Mandate of Syria, the French assumed that the Syrians were incapable of practicing self-government, and so instituted a system which ostensibly served to train Syrians in that responsibility. French administrators were assigned to all levels of government, and their role was, officially, to train Syrian counterparts in that particular function.

The reality of the situation was very different. Instead of teaching, the advisors performed the functions of that office. The effects were negative. Local rulers resented being treated as if they did not know how to perform the functions they had been performing for centuries, and they were opposed to the usurpation of their power. Further, authority had traditionally resided in the hands of a few families, and European administrators, having abandoned systems of caste and class, undermined their position by opening up offices to the general public.

Failure to Secure the Loyalty of Tribes

Outside of cities, the French were not entirely successful in winning over nomadic populations, many of whom raised the standard of revolt in 1925. The Ottoman Empire had initiated the process of tribal sedentarization, but it was not until the French Mandate of Syria that tribes began to lose their nomadic lifestyle.

After World War I, the territory that tribes would wander was divided between Turkey, the Mandate of Syria, and the Mandate of Mesopotamia, each of which were controlled by different powers, thereby limiting their freedom of movement. In Syria, the process of industrialization was swift; roads were quickly built, and cars and buses became commonplace. The situation for nomads was also exacerbated by the influx of minorities from the new country of Turkey, namely Armenians and Kurds, who settled in the Mandate’s northern regions.

To pacify, or at least control, the tribes, the French instituted several restrictive measures; for example, tribes could not carry arms in settled areas, and had to pay lump taxes on livestock. Additionally, the French attempted to bribe tribal leaders, but while this worked in some cases, it caused resentment in others, and when the Great Syrian Revolt broke out in 1925, thousands of tribesmen were eager to fight against the French.

Nationalist Sentiment

Syrian nationalism was fostered in Faisal’s short-lived Iraqi-Syrian union, but after French forces ejected him from Syria, Syrian nationalists affiliated with his government fled the country to avoid death sentences, arrest, and harassment by the French. Some went to Amman, where they found Amir Abdullah sympathetic to their cause, but under increasing pressure from the British, the young Abdullah drove them from Transjordan, where they rejoined other Syrian nationalists at Cairo. In 1921, the Syrian-Palestinian Congress was founded.

In 1925, high commissioner General Maurice Sarrail, in preparation for upcoming elections, allowed the organization of political parties, and the Syrian factions of the Syrian-Palestinian Congress, which had proved itself an ineffectual body, returned to Syria. There, they founded the People’s Party in Damascus, which was characterized by an intelligentsia leadership that was antagonistic toward local elites, with no social or economic programs, with support organized around individuals. Though unprepared for and not expecting an uprising, the nationalist elements in Damascus were eager to participate when one arose.

Mistreatment of the Druze Population

The spark that ignited the Great Syrian Revolt was the treatment of French officials of the Druze population. In 1923, the leaders of Jabal al-Druze, a region in the southeast of the Mandate of Syria, had come to an agreement with French authorities, hoping for the same degree of autonomy they had enjoyed under the Ottoman Empire.

Druze society was governed by a council of notables, the majlis, who selected one of their number to a limited executive position. Traditionally, this role had been dominated by the al-Atrash family since the defeat of the Lebanese Druze in 1860, but in 1923, shortly after the agreement made with the French, Selim al-Atrash resigned. Seizing upon the disunity of the al-Atrash family in selecting a successor, the majlis struck at their power by choosing a French officer of the Service des Renseignements, Captain Carbillet. Though he was initially only appointed for three months, his term was later extended indefinitely.

Captain Carbillet embarked upon a series of successful modernization reforms, but in the process, he collected Druze taxes in full, disarmed the population, and used the forced labor of prisoners and peasants, upsetting a significant minority. In the meantime, Sultan al-Atrash, the most ambitious member of the al-Atrash family, sent a delegation to Beirut to inform the French High Commissioner, General Maurice Sarrail, that Captain Carbillet’s actions were antagonizing most of the Druze population. Instead of hearing the delegates, Sarrail imprisoned them without cause, and upon hearing of this, the Druze returned their support to the al-Atrash family, which by this point was backing Sultan al-Atrash, and rebelled against the French, and indirectly against the majlis who had elevated them to power.

Revolution

On August 23, 1925 Sultan Pasha al-Atrash officially declared revolution against France. Calling upon Syria's various ethnic and religious communities to oppose the foreign domination of their land, al-Atrash managed to enlist the aid of large sections of the population in a revolt that now spread throughout Syria, led by such notable figures as Hasan Al-Kharratt, Nasib al-Bakri, Abdul Rahman ash-Shahbandar and Fawzi al-Qawiqji.

Fighting began with the Battle of al-Kafr on July 21, 1925, the Battle of al-Mazra'a on August 2–3, 1925, and the subsequent battles of Salkhad, Almsifarh and Suwayda. After initial rebel victories against the French, France sent thousands of troops to Syria and Lebanon from Morocco and Senegal, equipped with modern weapons, compared to the meagre supplies of the rebels. This dramatically altered the results and allowed the French to regain many cities, although fierce resistance lasted until the spring of 1927. The French sentenced Sultan al-Atrash and other national leaders to death, but al-Atrash escaped with the rebels to Transjordan and was eventually pardoned. In 1937, after the signing of the Franco-Syrian Treaty, he returned to Syria where he was met with a huge public reception.

The Course of the War

Initially, the French were ill-equipped to respond to the outbreak of violence. In 1925, the amount of French troops in the Mandate of Syria was at its lowest ever, numbering only 14,397 men and officers, with an additional 5,902 Syrian auxiliaries, down from 70,000 in 1920. In 1924, the French representative reporting to the Permanent Mandates Commission in 1924 wrote that “the little state of Djebel-Druze [is] of small importance and [has] only about 50,000 inhabitants.” Consequently, the Druze, when they revolted in September of 1925 met with great success, and after a series of victories, including the annihilation of a French relief column, captured the fort at al-Suwayda.

Instead of engaging the Druze in the winter, the French decided to temporarily withdraw, a decision noted by the new high commissioner, Henry de Jouvenel, to be a tactical error, as it underrepresented French military strength and encouraged a regional rebellion to achieve national dimensions. Indeed, the weak immediate response of the French invited the intervention of disaffected local elite, tribesmen, and loosely-connected nationalists based in Damascus.

First to seize upon the opportunity presented by the revolt were the nomadic tribes, which used the absence of French authority – troops had been drawn away to concentrate on the rebelling region – to pray upon farmers and merchants, thereby creating an atmosphere of sympathy for the rebellious Druze.

The nationalists seized upon the Druze revolt in relatively short order, forging an alliance with Sultan al-Atrash within six weeks of the uprising’s commencement, and establishing a National Provisional Government in Jabal-Druze with al-Atrash as President and Dr. Abd al-Rahman Shahbandar, leader of the People’s Party, as Vice President.

In response to the outbreak of violence, Jouvenal declared free and popular elections for every area that had not been affected by the rebellion in the beginning of 1926. Most elections were held peacefully. However, in two cities, Homs and Hama, the local elites refused to allow elections to be held. This was followed in September of 1926 by a full-fledged insurrection. French forces rushed to put down the new threat, which gave the rebellion added life elsewhere. At the time, the lack of troops meant that for the French to focus on Homs and Hama, they had to neglect other regions, allowing the revolt to spread. Within two months the Homs-Hama region fell, but the conflict there bought rebels elsewhere much-needed breathing room, and taught the rebels in Damascus a valuable lesson about troop placement.

Despite the revolts in Homs and Hama, the turn-out for the elections suggested to the French that the Syrian people had a desire for peace; in the rural areas around Homs and Hama, where no violence was reported, voter turn-out was 95%. Further, it revealed that the many of the belligerents were local elites, and when full amnesty was again offered in February of 1926, the entire country, with the exception of Jebal-Druze and Damascus, was pacified.

The lessons the rebels learned from Homs and Hama were many, and were what sustained the rebellion for a further year and a half. Homs and Hama were lost because the rebels concentrated their forces in the face of overwhelming French firepower, because they fortified their position and waited for the French to arrive, and because they made no attempt to sever French lines of communication. In Damascus, the rebels were dispersed, so that no random artillery fire would defeat them. Further, when the Druze attacked Damascus, they did so from multiple directions. Both groups repeatedly cut French lines of communication, and while the French suffered few difficulties in restoring them, the psychological effect the destruction had on them was significant.

Despite the breadth of the rebellion and the initial rebel successes, the dedication of the French made its defeat inevitable. By early 1926, they had increased their troop numbers to 50,000, roughly the size of the total Druze population. By the spring, much of Damascus had been destroyed by artillery fire, and the nationalist leadership had been forced into exile. In the spring of the following year, the Druze were decisively defeated, and Sultan al-Atrash went into exile in Transjordan to escape the death penalty.

Results

The Great Syrian Revolt, while a loss for the rebels, did result in changes in the French attitude toward imperialism. Direct rule was believed to be too costly, and in Syria, the threat of military intervention was replaced with diplomatic negotiation. A softer approach to Syrian rule was taken, and in March of 1928, just a year after the rebellion was put down, a general amnesty was announced for Syrian rebels. A small addendum was attached, decreeing that the rebellion’s leadership, including Sultan al-Atrash and Dr. Shahbandar, would not be allowed to return.

The impact on Syria itself was profoundly negative. At least 6,000 rebels were killed, and over 100,000 were left homeless, a fifth of which made its way to Damascus. After two years of war, the city was ill-equipped to deal with the influx of displaced Syrians, and Hama was similarly devastated. Across Syria, towns and farms had suffered significant damage, and agriculture and commerce temporarily ceased.

See also

• Syrian uprising (2011–present)
• Army of the Levant
• List of modern conflicts in the Middle East

Further reading

• Anne-Marie Bianquis et Elizabeth Picard, Damas, miroir brisé d'un orient arabe, édition Autrement, Paris 1993.
• Lenka Bokova, La confrontation franco-syrienne à l'époque du mandat - 1925-1927, éditions l'Harmattan, Paris, 1990
• Général Andréa, La Révolte druze et l'insurrection de Damas, 1925-1926, éditions Payot, 1937
• Le Livre d'or des troupes du Levant : 1918-1936. <Avant-propos du général Huntziger.>, Préfacier Huntziger, Charles Léon Clément, Gal. (S. l.), Imprimerie du Bureau typographique des troupes du Levant, 1937.

References

Bibliography

Miller, Joyce Laverty (1977). "The Syrian Revolt of 1925". International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. 8 (4): 545–563. doi:10.1017/S0020743800026118. {{cite journal}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)