Glubb gained a commission in the Royal Engineers in 1915. On the Western Front of World War I, he suffered a shattered jaw. In later years, this would lead to his Arab nickname of Abu Hunaik, meaning "the father of the little jaw".[4] In 1920, he was transferred to Iraq, which Britain had started governing under a League of Nations Mandate following the war. In 1922, he was posted to Ramadi "to maintain a rickety floating bridge over the river Euphrates, carried on boats made of reeds daubed with bitumen", as he later put it.[5]
The Arab Legion
He became an officer of the Arab Legion, subsequently known as the Jordanian Armed Forces, in 1930. In 1931, he formed the Desert Patrol – a force consisting exclusively of Bedouin – to curb the raiding problem that plagued the southern part of Jordan. Within a few years he had persuaded the Bedouin to abandon their habit of raiding neighbouring tribes. He also took part in suppressing the Ikhwan revolt.[citation needed]
In 1939, Glubb succeeded Frederick G. Peake as the commander of the Arab Legion. During this period, he transformed the Legion into the best-trained force in the Arab world. During World War II he led attacks on Axis-aligned Arab forces in Iraq, and on Vichy forces in Lebanon and Syria.[6]
In 1938, Glubb married Muriel Rosemary Forbes, the daughter of physician James Graham Forbes. The couple had a son, Godfrey Peter Manley (known as Faris Glubb), named after the Crusader King Godfrey of Bouillon, born in Jerusalem in 1939. Another son was born in May 1940 but lived only a few days. In 1944, they adopted Naomi, a Bedouin girl who was then three months old. In 1948, they adopted two Palestinian refugee children called Atalla, renamed John and Mary.[citation needed]
During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the Arab Legion was considered the strongest Arab army involved in the war.[7] In May 1948, Glubb led the Arab Legion across the River Jordan to occupy the West Bank. Despite some negotiation and understanding between the Jewish Agency and King Abdullah, severe fighting took place in Kfar Etzion (May 1948), Jerusalem and Latrun (May–July 1948). According to Avi Shlaim,
Rumours that Abdullah was once again in contact with the Jewish leaders further damaged his standing in the Arab world. His many critics suggested that he was prepared to compromise the Arab claim to the whole of Palestine as long as he could acquire part of Palestine for himself. 'The internecine struggles of the Arabs,' reported Glubb, 'are more in the minds of Arab politicians than the struggle against the Jews. Azzam Pasha, the mufti and the Syrian government would sooner see the Jews get the whole of Palestine than that King Abdullah should benefit.'[8]
Glubb (right) with King Abdullah (left) the day before the King's assassination, 19 July 1951
Glubb remained in charge of the defence of the West Bank following the armistice in March 1949. In 1952, differences emerged between Glubb and the newly acceded King Hussein I, especially over defence arrangements, the promotion of Arab officers and the funding of the Legion. Arab nationalists believed that Glubb's first loyalty was to the United Kingdom and that he had attempted to pressure Hussein into joining the Baghdad Pact.[6]
Hussein, wanting to distance himself from the British and to disprove the contention that Glubb was the actual ruler of Jordan, dismissed Glubb and several other British senior officers from the Arab Legion on 1 March 1956.[9] Despite his decommission, which was forced upon him by public opinion, Glubb remained a close friend of the King.
Later life
He spent the remainder of his life writing books and articles, mostly on the Middle East and on his experiences with the Arabs.
Writing in The Reporter, Ray Alan commented that the book was more than just an apologia; while it provided "no serious political analysis or social observation", it did offer interesting insights into the period, even if Glubb was out of touch with later trends in Middle Eastern politics. What Alan found more surprising was that Glubb also had hardly anything new to say about the 1948 Palestine war "in which he had star billing," instead lapsing into self-justifying propaganda. Alan ends his review with a long quotation from T. E. Lawrence, in which he reflects on what role a foreigner may play, and prays to God that "men will not, for love of the glamour of strangeness, go out to prostitute themselves and their talents in serving another race", but will let them "take what action or reaction they please from [his] silent example".[27]
Writing in the Saturday Review, Carl Hermann Voss commented that Glubb served with and for the Arabs for 36 years, 17 of them for King Abdullah of Jordan. The portrait photograph is captioned "Glubb Pasha—'I ... failed hopelessly.'" Voss calls the book well written no matter how subjective.
Legacy
In his 1993 poetry collection, Out of Danger, James Fenton mentions Glubb Pasha in "Here Come the Drum Majorettes!":
There's a Gleb on a steppe in a dacha. There's a Glob on a dig on the slack side. There's a Glubb in the sand (he's a pasha).[30]
Writings
The source for the following bibliography is Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2005. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2005, except *.
(With Henry Field) The Yezidis, Sulubba, and Other Tribes of Iraq and Adjacent Regions, G. Banta, 1943.
↑ Budby (11 July 2010), [89029] St Dunstan, Mayfield: Glubb Pasha Window, retrieved 25 August 2025– via Flickr, For in thee is the well of life and in thy light shall we see light. In memory of John Bagot Glubb KCB CMG DSO OBE MC Glubb Pasha 1897–1986. This window is placed here by his wife Rosemary and family. A life of service and love.
Alon, Yoav. "British Colonialism and Orientalism in Arabia: Glubb Pasha in Transjordan, 1930-1946." British Scholar 3.1 (2010): 105–126.
Bradshaw, Tancred. The Glubb Reports: Glubb Pasha and Britain's Empire Project in the Middle East 1920-1956 (Springer, 2016).
Hughes, Matthew. "The Conduct of Operations: Glubb Pasha, the Arab Legion, and the First Arab–Israeli War, 1948–49." War in History 26.4 (2019): 539–562. online
Jevon, Graham. Glubb Pasha and the Arab Legion: Britain, Jordan and the End of Empire in the Middle East (2017).
Jevon, Graham. Jordan, "Palestine and the British World System, 1945-57: Glubb Pasha and the Arab Legion" (PhD. Diss. Oxford University, 2014) online.
Lunt, James, "Glubb, Sir John Bagot (1897–1986)", rev., Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, ISBN0-00-272638-6
Lunt, James D. Glubb Pasha, a Biography: Lieutenant-General Sir John Bagot Glubb, Commander of the Arab Legion, 1939-1956 (Harvill Press, 1984).
Meyer, Karl E.; Brysac, Shareen Blair, Kingmakers: the Invention of the Modern Middle East, W.W. Norton, 2008, ISBN978-0-393-06199-4 pp 259–92.
Royle, Trevor. Glubb Pasha: The Life and Times of Sir John Bagot Glubb, Commander of the Arab Legion (Little, Brown, 1991).
Shlaim, A. (2001). "Israel and the Arab Coalition in 1948" in E. L. Rogan, A. Shlaim, C. Tripp, J. A. Clancy-Smith, I. Gershoni, R. Owen, Y. Sayigh & J. E. Tucker (Eds.), The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948 (pp.79–103). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN0-521-79476-5
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