The preparation of the second edition has been almost as seismic as the middle east itself 1990-1991 gulf crisis. After all chapters had been written and edited, the Arab world and the world at large were faced with Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in an attempt to "correct" colonial history of border-demarcation and "state-creation".
September 11 provided a vision and a strategy to a US Presidency that until then had been groping for fresh ideas and a relevant foreign policy. The 'global war on terror' now became an article of faith for the United States. The US Government, media and think-tanks turned their attention to Islam, the Arab world and Saudi Arabia, and held them responsible for the catastrophe unleashed upon the…