Rosemary Hollis

As an undergraduate at university in London at the beginning of the 1970s, she was struck by how many of her male colleagues were fascinated by the Vietnam War. They debated whether they would have tried to dodge the draft, if they had been born American, or would have wanted to see what it was like to risk their lives and perhaps take the lives of others in a war zone. After completing a degree in History, she opted to study for an MA in War Studies.

Rosemary then travelled in North and Central America, before trying her hand at various jobs in London. It was only after she spent a year working for a Lebanese company, as a researcher investigating the history of the Arab Gulf states, that she became interested in the Middle East. To pursue her continuing interest in War Studies, she decided, aged 29, to undertake a PhD and won a fellowship to do so at George Washington University in Washington DC. The topic she chose was Britain’s adaptation to decline, as played out in the smaller Arab Gulf states in the 1970s and ‘80s.