MY chiefs were astonished at such favourable news,
but promised help, and meanwhile sent me back, much against my will,
into Arabia. I reached Feisal’s camp on the day the Turks carried the
defences of Jebel Subh. By their so doing the entire basis of my
confidence in a tribal war was destroyed.
We havered for a while by Yenbo, hoping to retrieve
the position: but the tribesmen proved to be useless for assault, and we
saw that if the Revolt was to endure we must invent a new plan of
campaign at once.
This was hazardous, as the promised British
military experts had not yet arrived. However, we decided that to regain
the initiative we must ignore the main body of the enemy, and
concentrate far off on his railway flank. The first step towards this
was to move our base to Wejh: which we proceeded to do in the grand
manner.
