File 756/1917 Pt 2-3 ‘ARAB BULLETIN Nos 66-114’ [‎232r] (472/834)

THE ARAB BULLETIN.
Our hundredth number offers occasion and excuse for a
retrospect of the career of the Arab Bulletin since it started more
than two years ago. It has changed its character in some
respects during that period, as it has changed its name: for it
began as “Arab Bureau Summaries” published under the
authority of the Foreign Office, but in connection with the
General Staffs at that time. The Arab Bureau which had barely
attained to a separate existence, was dovetailed into the Military
Intelligence Office, Cairo, directed by Brig.-Gen. G. F. Clayton,
and widely known by its telegraphic address, “Intrusive.”
The Headquarters of the General Staff, then at Ismailia, issued
an Intelligence Bulletin, and to this “Arab Bureau Summaries”
were originally intended to be a supplement, the first suggestion
of them having been made by Captain, now Lieut.-Colonel
T. E. Lawrence.
Half-a-dozen numbers followed the General Staff model,
being typewritten by the Roneo process. The idea of printing
soon arose, partly owing to imperfect execution of the reproduc
tive process, which made the sheets difficult to read, but more
from the existence of a small confidential military staff at the
Government Press, which, having at that time light work, was
able to take on the printing of the Arab Bureau Summaries as
its chief duty. For the first number so printed, a new name,
“ Arab Bulletin ” was adopted, and when the earlier typewritten
issues were printed off immediately afterwards to complete the
set, the name was made restrospective.
It had been proposed at first to issue numbers, not every
day like the Intelligence Bulletin of the General Staff, but at
short irregular intervals, as necessary matter came in. Seven
numbers accordingly appeared in twenty-four days of June 1916.
But the adoption of printing inevitably retarded production,
though the Press gave every facility, and by October the Bulletin
had fallen to four numbers a month. A year later even this rate
proved for a time impossible to maintain, as the confidential
work thrown by the General Staff and the Admiralty on the
Government Press increased rapidly. The difficulties became so
o-reat in the latter part of 1917, that the Bulletin was on the
point of either returning to Roneo or disappearing altogether.
Fortunately, however, other pressure decreased at the Press, and
it became possible again to produce a weekly issue. On the
whole this rate has been sustained up to the present, the Press
doing its part regularly and promptly if the Editor does likewise.
Since it was as easv to write it in decent English as in bad,
and much more agreeable, the Arab Bulletin had from the first
a literary tinge not always present in Intelligence Summaries.
This quality turned, in one respect, to its disadvantage. Coupled
with good type and paper, it seems to have impaired the respect
paid to the' confidential character of the Bulletin by some of its