It has the trappings of a vanity book: a Saudi big shot (currently the ambassador to Great Britain, formerly a minister of industry) publishes a slender tome of musings on the events of 1990-91 without sources, bibliography, or any pretense to offering a new interpretation. Yet, contrary to expectation, The Gulf Crisis is a gem, full of intelligence and insights. Reading it resembles nothing so much as spending a long evening in the company of a savvy Middle Easterner who's willing to open up and explain the world from his perspective.
Algosaibi provides some new information (Saddam Husayn told King Fahd of his intent to invade Iran back in 1980 and Fahd discouraged him), but mostly it's his even-tempered analysis that's so enlightening. He portrays Saddam Husayn's decision to invade Kuwait as an adventurer's greatest wager; the Iraqi leader could not retreat because, like a gambler betting everything on one number at the roulette table, he could "only stand helpless, waiting for the wheel to stop." Algosaibi accounts for each Arab leader's choice to go with Saddam or against him; his analysis of Yasir 'Arafat's "emotional, excitable" personality and the role it plays in Palestinian politics is particularly enlightening. The chapter titled "The Unattractive 'Bedouin' and the Ugly 'Arab'" takes up the mutual prejudices between Arabic speakers of the cities and of the Arabian peninsula and sagely advises the latter to warm up to the former.
