National Geographic February 1991 [antikvár]

Report from the President DAVID C. TURNLEY, DETROIT FREE PRESS/BLACK STAR Meeting the Need: A New Middle East Map In the weeks following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait last sum-mer, we received hundreds of requests for maps of the Middle East. Some of the requests came from doctors and nurses and other reservists being sent to the region, some from parents of sons and daughters in the armed forces, and others from teachers beginning the new school year with students full of questions. One call came from a woman who had just been released from occupied Kuwait. "The Iraqis had taken away her husband, and she had been hiding in an attic with other wives for weeks," says Amy R. Weaver, a staff mem-ber who spoke with her. "She wanted a map so that she could visu-alize where her husband was being held—if he got word to her." To all those who asked, we rushed an up-to-date political map of the region. In this issue of National Geographic you will find that same map combined with a concise summary of historical conditions behind the current crisis— 50,000 copies of which we are donating to the armed forces for distribution both here in the U. S. and on station in the Middle East. Americans, unfortunately, know too little about this vital area. "We assume that all people in the region are Arabs, that all Arabs are alike, that all Muslims are alike," says Middle East expert Christine Helms, our adviser for the map text. Most nations in the region are conglomerations of various ethnie groups, and adhérents of Islam can be as différent as a Jordanian Bédouin and an Iranian oil engineer. We shake our heads at the insta-bility of the Middle East. But Americans forget, Helms says, that today's borders were imposed by foreign powers less than 80 years ago, that oil wealth has completely rearranged relations among Arab nations in the past three decades, and that the future belongs to the 60 percent of the population who are under 20 years old—a group less likely to accept the political arrangements of the past. At the height of the war between Iran and Iraq a few years ago, a Gallup survey commissioned by the Society discovered that 75 percent of all Americans could not find the Persian Gulf on a world map. We are committed to reversing that trend—not only through spécial maps such as this one but also through our many Geography Education programs. As part of our tradition of public service, for example, we are giving 5,000 copies of the new sixth édition of the National Geographic Atlas of the World to needy schools across the country. I hope this map of the Middle East is just what you've been look-ing for to help you understand this region of continuing importance.