Applying Social Community Identity and Spatial Theory to Extend Our Understanding of Ala al-Din Khammas: The Warrior-Scholar Who Trained Saddam Hussein’s Military Leaders

Abstract

Ala’ al-Din Khammas is unique among Saddam Hussein’s generals interviewed in 2009 by U.S. military officials for his prolific publications produced while in Iraq’s military and after his retirement. His military manuals developed during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988) and distributed to Iraq’s field commanders, would be instrumental in stabilizing the southern Basra front. Khammas’ is also rare among Saddam’s officers for his effort to introduce American military works to Iraqi military officers. This study investigates Khammas’ intellectual imprint on Iraqi officers that would later confront American forces in Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. This qualitative interpretive study critically examines Khammas’ magnum opus, The Arab Art of War (1999) which argues that Arabs have their own distinct art of war worthy of careful study developed in the 7th century. It experiments with identity and spatial relationship theories of Anderson (2016), and Tuan (1990) as frameworks in a novel approach to military analysis and expands our understanding of Khammas himself and his argument of a distinct Arab art of war. Applying these theoretical frameworks make up for Khammas intense focus on battlefield tactics and identifies two overarching principles embedded throughout his work, the use of extreme contrasts in terrain and how a changing Arab identity enabled a 7th century hybrid combination of tribal and conventional war that can be called a distinct all-encompassing Arab art of war.