Web Letters: The Triumph of Williams's Tragedy

I have frequently quoted and expressed my admiration for Avi Shlaim's book The Iron Wall, Israel and the Arab World. He is commonly called a "revisionist" historian, but he is, in fact, a real historian that replaces national myths with rigorous scholarship. As he states in the preface, "I have tried to provide a critical analysis of Israeli foreign policy and not simply a chronology of events. Like the British historian E.H. Carr, I believe that the main task of a historian is not to record but to evaluate. Carr also describes the writing of history as a perpetual dialogue between the historian and his sources" (p.xii). It is my opinion that Shlaim tries to tell the truth, even when it hurts. One would like one's people and country to be perfect. But myths perpetuate problems, and solutions to problems are based on facts.

I read Williams's book while pursing an undergraduate degree in history in the late '60s, and didn't like it. Williams sought evidence for his preconceptions and did not have a dialogue with his sources. Sometimes American foreign policy has failed tragically, and sometimes it has been a success. A dialogue with your sources will produce the reasons for the successes and failures. You need to know this information so the failures will be repeated!

Pervis James Casey

Riverside, CA