Youssef Aboul-Enein

Youssef served as Country Director for North Africa and Egypt, Assistant Country Director for the Arabian Gulf, and Special Advisor on Islamist Militancy at the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy from 2002 to 2006. He advised the Deputy Assistant Secretary to the Secretary of Defense on matters involving US defense policy towards the Middle East. From 2006 until his active-duty retirement in 2022, Youssef was Senior Counter-Terrorism Advisor and Subject Matter Expert on Militant Islamist Ideologies at DIAs Defense Combating Terrorism Center (DCTC). At DCTC, he advised on an array of Counter-Terrorism intelligence products up to the Presidential Daily Brief, prepared congressional testimony, and served as an expert government witness in various trials, most notably in the courts martial trial United States v. PFC Bradley Manning. Youssef provided linguistic support to the President of the United States and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2014 meetings that gave rise to Operation Inherent Resolve, the counter-ISIS coalition. He has advised interagency government attorneys prosecuting Guantanamo detainees.

Ala’ al-Din Khammas is unique among Saddam Hussein’s generals interviewed in 2009 by U.S. military officials for his prolific publications produced while in Iraq’s military and after his retirement. His military manuals developed during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988) and distributed to Iraq’s field commanders, would be instrumental in stabilizing the southern Basra front. Khammas’ is also rare among Saddam’s officers for his effort to introduce American military works to Iraqi military officers. This study investigates Khammas’ intellectual imprint on Iraqi officers that would later confront American forces in Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. This qualitative interpretive study critically examines Khammas’ magnum opus, The Arab Art of War (1999) which argues that Arabs have their own distinct art of war worthy of careful study developed in the 7th century. It experiments with identity and spatial relationship theories of Anderson (2016), and Tuan (1990) as frameworks in a novel approach to military analysis and expands our understanding of Khammas himself and his argument of a distinct Arab art of war. Applying these theoretical frameworks make up for Khammas intense focus on battlefield tactics and identifies two overarching principles embedded throughout his work, the use of extreme contrasts in terrain and how a changing Arab identity enabled a 7th century hybrid combination of tribal and conventional war that can be called a distinct all-encompassing Arab art of war.

This work answers 101 essential questions on the Middle East, Islam, the Arab Spring, al-Qa’ida, and ISIS. It is for those wanting to begin an intellectual immersion into the complexities of the region from pre-biblical times to the post-Arab Spring. The authors have carefully focused on what the deploying soldier, sailor, Marine, coast guardsman or airman needs to know before arriving in the Middle East, including the nuances inherent in a region that is the crossroads of three continents (Europe, Asia, and Africa) and how previous global powers interacted and left their mark. While developed and written for Americans about to deploy to combat zones and areas of operation, it is also of use to a wider audience of Americans serious about the challenges of the region.

Central to CDR Youssef Aboul-Enein's career has been the mission to introduce America's military leaders to Arabic works of military significance. Just like American military leaders who had an obsession for all things Russian during the Cold War in order to understand the Soviets, the war on al-Qaida and the complex nuances of the Arab Spring demand a deeper comprehension of the Middle East from direct sources. The memoirs of General Mohamed Fawzi, Egyptian War Minister from 1967 to 1971, were first published in 1984, but his work has not ben translated and remains undiscovered by English speaking readers. Many in the United States Armed Services have yet to be introduced to his ideas, perspectives, and the seeds by which the 1973 Yom-Kippur War were laid. In this new contribution to his series of essays written for Infantry Journal, Aboul-Enein has determined to bring to life the military thoughts of this Arab War Minister. This book is a joint Infantry-Naval Institute Press project that has condensed the entire collection of essays on Fawzi to a single volume, to provide future generations of America’s military leaders with access his ideas. Fawzi is unique among Arab generals for his scathing critique of his own armed forces, and from his critical examination of what went wrong in 1967, he was able to slowly resurrect the Egyptian Armed Forces to a level that enabled Sadat to consider an offensive in 1973. This Egyptian general will provide insights into the level of Soviet cooperation and military aid provided Egypt after the 1967 Six-Day War, known simply in Arabic by one word, al-Naksah (the setback), not to be confused with the 1948 Arab-Israeli War known by one word, al-Nakbah (the catastrophe). While Fawzi lapses into conspiracy, indulges in wishful thinking, and employs the language of pan-Arabism on occasion, much like Soviet military theorists couched their ideas in Marxist-Leninist rhetoric, this will not stop serious American students of war from recognizing his brilliance about the lessons learned from the crushing defeat of Egyptian arms in the 1967 Six-Day War.