Khalil & Herbert

As WWI was coming to an end, Turkish commander Khalil Pasha met Lawrence of Arabia and British liaison officer Aubrey Herbert. Khalil remarked with great percipience that Britain and Turkey ought not to be enemies, “after all, gentlemen, our interest as Empire builders are much the same as yours. There is nothing that need stand between us.” “Only a million dead Armenians,” Herbert replied. Lawrence biographer and friend Robert Graves suspected that the answer had been Lawrence’s.

As WWI was coming to an end, Turkish commander Khalil Pasha met Lawrence of Arabia and British liaison officer Aubrey Herbert. Khalil remarked with great percipience that Britain and Turkey ought not to be enemies, “after all, gentlemen, our interest as Empire builders are much the same as yours. There is nothing that need stand between us.” “Only a million dead Armenians,” Herbert replied. Lawrence biographer and friend Robert Graves suspected that the answer had been Lawrence’s.