November 14 has been an auspicious day in history. French painter Claude Monet was born on that date in 1840. It is also the birthday of American composer Aaron Copeland, first Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru in 1889, the publication date of Herman Melville's "Moby Dick", and the day Emperor Justinian died in 565, age 82. It is also the birth date of three future kings: William III of Holland and III of England, Hussein I of Jordan, and Charles Prince of Wales.

Charles just returned from a disappointing diplomatic trip to Pakistan, one which he had been looking forward to for a long time, But riddled with sectarian violence and security troubles many of the expected audiences and events had to be cancelled or reorganized at the last minute. I have always been a great fan of his, and support his succession, but he has to come down on one side of the fence and stay there. He cannot be all things to all people. If he wants respect he has to take a stand, defend it and live by it.

William of Orange never had any trouble there. He was born king of Holland without actually having that title, and died the last Stuart king. Along the way he transited his kingdom from direct rule to the parliamentary system under the House of Hanover. Religion played the major part in his rise. Willem III was born on November 14, 1650 in The Hague. Some histories say November 4, not taking into account that the English kept the Julian calendar long after the rest of Europe adopted the Gregorian. (Their year started on March 25 instead of January 1). There is therefore a 10 day difference. Eight days before his birth his father died of smallpox. William II had been a major supporter of the Stuarts, admired by his brother-m-law Charles II of England. He was born Sovereign Prince of Orange. His mother gave birth to him in full mourning, and lost the fight to name him Charles, after her father Charles I, to her mother-in-law Amalia. So the good old Orange name of William Henry he was christened. His mother, sister of Charles II, went to visit him in 1660, contacted smallpox and died there.

In her will she designated Charles as William's legal guardian. Charles pushed this off on Amalia, making sure he kept in touch with his nephew. At age 16 he was made a 'ward' of the government to prepare him for a role not yet decided. Three years later the contract was up and he was a private citizen again. His father's title of Stadholder of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders and Overijssel was suspended upon his death and the power was held by one Johan de Witt. In 1667, as William drew near his 18th birthday the pro-Orange party set to work to make him Stadholder and Captain-General. De Witt did not want the House of Orange getting its influence back, so he procured an Eternal (or Perpetual) Edict stating that any Captain-or Admiral-General could not also be named Stadholder in any province. After that this office was abolished in all provinces.

But by 1672, with things going very poorly for the Netherlands (invaded by Louis XIV with England's help) de Witt and his brother were murdered by an angry mob, possibly with William's knowledge. The Orange party now victorious, the Edict was thrown out and William was elected Stadholder of three provinces, and the other three in 1675. Now William III kept up the fight against England and France, allying himself with Spain. In 1674, making peace with England, he set out to marry his first cousin Mary, daughter of James Duke of York, Charles's successor. The wedding took place in 1677. It was pretty rocky at the start, but eventually they came to adore each other despite having no children.

James II, who was not only William's father-in-law but his uncle, came to the English throne in 1685. Seeing the writing on the wall Louis XIV had already made peace with both, but continued to be aggressive. William had joined the anti-French League of Augsburg which included the Holy Roman Empire, Sweden, Spain and several German states. William tried to get his Catholic uncle to join the League, and not offend the Protestant party at the same time. But James would have none of it. William then decided to work the Protestants by calling down James' Catholic policies. With the fear of another Bloody Mary horror show ahead of them the Protestants starting thinking invasion.

The English succession had been his wife Mary as next queen. However James' second wife Mary of Modena gave birth to a son (James Francis Edward), who displaced her. Another Catholic king was too much. The public was getting angry at James' policies. William was reluctant to invade, fearing the English would not appreciate a foreign leader. He demanded that he be 'invited' to invade first. By September, 1688 it was common knowledge his Dutch army was on the move. On November 5, 1688 his 14,352-strong army landed at Brixham. Whatever support James had had disappeared and his commanders (one Lord Churchill among them) defected to William's side. At the time William was all for leaving James on the throne, but with much limited power. James had already sent his wife and son to France, and on December 11 followed them. After his departure violent anti-Catholic riots broke out in London, and William was requested to get there fast. But James hadn't gotten far and was back in Whitehall before William could order he be kept where he was. Now what to do with James? He requested to go to Rochester. This was a major embarrassment to William, who finally saw James sail off to France.

William, under the guise of restoring order to the country, disguised his coup d'etat (and that he had basically conquered England), by putting himself up as a sovereign who had come to rescue England from a tyrant, was in a pretty iffy position. The Whigs and Tories, who had supported the "Glorious Revolution" wanted William to pay up. The Whigs wanted most of the power; the Tories wanted a free parliament. The Tories started to get a big case of the guilts over James, feeling that William had duped them into letting him steal James' crown. Choosing the next wearer of said Crown presented five different solutions. Either recall James (not really), or William could become sole monarch, pushing aside the now unofficially deposed Prince of Wales, or Mary could rule as James' Regent, or that Mary should be declared sole ruler because James had 'abdicated' his throne and the continuity had to be maintained and Parliament wouldn't have to be forced to name (elect) a successor. Since the couple could not agree on any of these the fifth alternative was to offer the throne to them jointly.

It took 31 votes in the House of Commons before the Whigs and the Tory House of Lords agreed that when James deserted his throne he had broken his contract with the people and abdicated. A regency was narrowly voted down, and William and Mary were declared King and Queen. Mary had declared to the Commons she wouldn't be queen unless William was king. William declared to the Lords he was not here to start a republic-the government was in his person for life, that he would not be second to Mary, and would accept her sister Anne as his successor if they had no children of their own. Since it was a fact that William was the boss anyway they all accepted that James II had indeed violated the Constitution by flagrantly imposing Catholic rule. So, although the Tories believed that the monarchy was a sacred institution ordained by God and that mere man replacing one king with another was probably illegal, and a sin to boot, they didn't want James back either.

Their Coronation took place in Westminster Abbey in 1689 by the Archbishop of London (the Archbishop of Canterbury had refused to recognize James' 'abdication'). On that day the much more divided Convention of the Estates of Scotland finally declared James II was no longer King of Scotland and offered the couple the Scottish crown. which they accepted. William became William II of Scotland on May 11.

William encouraged passing the Act of Toleration (religious toleration that did not extend to non-Christians, Catholics or non-believers in the Holy Trinity). In 1689 the Bill of Rights was passed. It established restrictions on the royal prerogative- the sovereign could not suspend laws passed by parliament; he could not levy taxes without its consent; deny his Protestant subjects the right to bear arms; interfere with elections; punish any House members for comments made in debate; inflict cruel or unusual punishments or exact excessive bail. William was not all that thrilled with all this but he went along with it anyway. This Bill settled the succession too: which ever one of them died first the other would continue to reign alone; after that Princess Anne, then her children would rule; unless there were children William might have with a second wife. No non-Protestant, or any prospective successor who married a Catholic, would ever rule. And so it stands to this day.

William spent most of his life on the battlefield. Three centuries later, on November 14, 1935, King Hussein bin Talal I of the Hashemite kingdom was born. He too was centre-stage as he worked, with limited success, to introduce democracy to the Arab world. His revolution, the Six Day War with Israel in June, 1967, was lost. Like William, Hussein was a realist who recognized his own responsibility in this failure, and never ceased until his death in 1999 to try to establish a democratic parliament into his highly divided kingdom.

Hussein wrote three books during his lifetime. Uneasy Lies the Head, Mon Metier de Roi, and My "War" with Israel. In the latter, a personal interview given after the Six Day War, His Majesty confessed to the mistakes they made in trying to organize themselves into a cohesive fighting force.

It had always been Hussein's position that the Arab world had to get together to defend itself against Israeli aggression on their borders. The western border of Jordan is the Jordan River, the Dead Sea and Jerusalem; beyond which lay Israel. To Jordan's north is Syria. To the east is Saudi Arabia. At its southwest border, across the Red Sea, was Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. On Israel's west is the Mediterranean Sea. It had always been his credo that if the Arabs were ever to get what was theirs they would have to work together
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Israel wanted to divert the Jordan for irrigation purposes. The Palestinians had no unified armed force to protect the Jordan. They figured the best plan was to do their own diverting of certain tributaries to reduce the damage the Israeli project would cause. At the same time they decided that they had to create a real coordinated armed force, which they named the United Arab Command, headed by an Egyptian General named Ali Amer. The Arab League suggested forming the Palestine Liberation Organization, and appointed one Ahmed Shukairy to lead it.

Shukairy was a shifty character. He had been a lawyer working in Jerusalem up to the partition of Palestine in 1948 (the details of this history is far beyond the scope of this article, so you'll have to do the research yourself). He launched his political career as a 'millionaire refugee' and became assistant secretary in the Arab League, then changed his citizenship to Syrian so he could represent Damascus in Cairo. In 1956 he became a Saudi citizen so he could represent them at the United Nations. Making a speech including the phrase, "throw the Jews into the sea", he set the world against Arabs. Shukairy was actually working for the socialist Egyptian government, trying to dismantle the Jordanian monarchy because it was successful, and therefore an embarrassment to them.

Hussein threw the PLO out of Jordan in 1966. It had been meant to unify Arab Palestine but under communist influence had now turned into a jumble of extremists and outcasts. He realized that China and the then USSR were not helping- instead attacking any Islamic countries that opposed them. Arab nationalism could only work within the framework of Islam. As Jordan's border with Israel was the longest it was essential that it have Arab cooperation. So his objects were to strengthen his army and develop his country. For this he pleaded with the young for revolutions in political freedom, in communications, in demographics, in ideas and hopes.

In 1967, reluctantly convinced that they had to make any defensive moves quickly because Israel was about to attack Syria, Hussein and Egypt's President Nasser signed a mutual defense treaty. Heavily armed himself but with no bodyguards Hussein flew himself to Cairo for the meeting in secret. Egypt and Syria had already signed a bilateral defense pact in April. Anxious to get this thing done Hussein suggested they just substitute 'Jordan' for 'Syria' in the documents, and signed it. Jordan's role would be to act as a diversionary force. On the flight back he took along Shukairy-a gift from Nasser.

When the Jordanian people found out they were now not so isolated they were overjoyed with their king. In June Cairo and Iraq signed a defense pact, making their alliance four-states strong. Iraqi forces were to occupy positions along the Jordan-Israel border. As he had calculated, 48 hours later, with war the next day imminent, the Jordanian army finally got down to discussing their options. Only on that Sunday evening did parts of the Iraqi brigade and a Palestinian battalion show up on the Jordanian frontier. But they never reached their designated positions before fighting broke out next morning. The Egyptian commandos had arrived but were not in place either. Jordan's 56,000 strong army was no where large enough to defend all that long border. On Monday, June 5 Hussein found out from a phone call that hostilities had begun between Egypt and Israel.

For the next two days everything that could go wrong due to poor training, lack of communications, being caught off guard, insufficient numbers, delays, false interpretations of messages, no clear target directions for bomber pilots, etc, did.. Israeli intelligence had done their job well and knew all about the Arabs 32 air bases in minute detail.

On June 5 the Israelis bombed the air base at Amman. After the two-wave attack, which lasted half an hour, had taken out all the Jordanian planes as they stood on the ground taking on fresh supplies, 12 Israeli Mystere bombers were seen heading straight for the Royal Palace.. As ten of them pealed off two came in. One was taken out by anti-aircraft guns on the Palace. The other one swooped by the trees near Hussein's office windows. A rocket exploded into the wall next to the windows. Another penetrated the conference hall. The bomber then went full circle and blasted toward the palace, machine-gunning directly into the King's office-knowing exactly where to aim. Two furious palace guards shot at the disappearing fighter. Hussein never saw this, and always denied the importance. But when his office was inspected there was no doubt if he had been sitting at his desk he would have been assassinated.

Throughout it all it had been Hussein's determination to tell the truth about their situation to his people. To that end he made it his business to be wherever the action was, not content to command from the rear. The wounded but determined troops asked him for planes so they could get revenge for the bombings that had just destroyed their vehicles and tank brigades. But Jordan had no planes fit to fly. Nasser sent Hussein a cable at 12:30am June 7 that it was Allah's will that they evacuate the west bank of the Jordan, and how much he admired Hussein's courage. Hussein cabled him back two hours later that he had ordered his troops to hold their positions. Nasser next admitted that his air force was destroyed. At 11pm on June 6 the UN had ordered an immediate and unconditional cease-fire. But a counterorder had gone out to Jordan's troops to vacate the west bank for the east bank in order to hold onto as much land as possible. At 2:30am on June 7, they were ordered to stop firing back at the Israeli cannons shooting mercilessly at them.

On June 8 Jerusalem fell. Trans-Jordan and Jordan were cut off from each other when the Israelis bombed all their connecting bridges, and established a hold on the coveted west bank lands. Broken-hearted, exhausted and utterly defeated, nevertheless King Hussein told his people via radio that even though they had been let down by their allies he knew the valour, honour and sacrifice they had all fought with, and that he was confident that they would all remain resolved to regain all they had lost.

It had been the Hashemite kings that were the first to throw foreigners off their soil, that they were the ones called upon to help the Palestinians fight off the Israelis in 1948. Jordan had always been in the forefront of protecting Arab land. For King Hussein it was not just peace but a just peace that he demanded most. In those days he may have been the only one that wanted peace at all. Knowing that any peace had to be political now, not military, Hussein spent the next 30 years trying to establish democracy in his own country. It was an uphill battle. Too many parties, too many parties opposing everything just because the other guys were for it, those who kept to sloganism from 50 years earlier and refused to acknowledge change, the battle for hearts and minds in establishing democracy as a cornerstone of pride in his people, were some of the things he was up against. In 1996 he addressed a political meeting, saying, "Every Arab citizen has the right to enjoy freedom?. He must feel safe for himself, his honor, and his dignity. He also has the right to select the platform through which to express himself, or the group which he feels would express his ambitions and ideas?"

William died mostly unlamented in 1702. Although he had converted the Dutch army from a disorganized rabble into a one of the best fighting forces in Europe, keeping Louis XIV from completing taking them over, it wasn't appreciated until long after. William was also the catalyst for the development of a formidable armed force in England. He took over supervising the Admiralty in 1693 because the Board was always quarreling among themselves. Corporations and not landed gentry were now dictating terms to the government. Religious persecution in England was ended with the Toleration Act. Censorship of the press was abolished. But as with everything both William's and Hussein's revolutions were subject to unforeseen circumstances, chance and trends.

William's legacies are well known; Hussein's dual dreams of a workable democracy within his borders and a united Arab body outside them are still to be realized. And as for Charles -what changes he may instigate will have to wait until he is crowned the next Scorpio King.

Anon-and Happy Birthday, Your Royal Highness-and many more!

Anon,.