The 14 July Revolution of 1958 brought General Abd al-Karim Qasim to power in Iraq, and along with him an ‘Iraq first’ vision for the country’s development. The civic nationalism (wataniyya) advocated by Qasim was then replaced in 1963 with a succession of regimes that sought to align Iraq with Arab nationalist and Pan-Arab sentiment (qawmiyya) across West Asia and North Africa. An analysis of the Regional Training Centre for Conservation of Cultural Property in Arab Countries (‘the Centre’), administered in Baghdad by UNESCO and funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), offers insights on the position of foreign development expertise in heritage management and nationalism in Iraq from this period until the formal assumption to power of Saddam Hussein in 1979. This study considers how Western claims to authority—particularly in the field of archaeology and heritage management—were mediated and received by Iraqis and Arab trainees during a period characterised by development imperialism and competing nationalisms. Although the Centre, intended to promote a sort of Pan-Arab unity for the purposes of heritage conservation, was originally supported by UNESCO, UNDP, and all Arab Member States, challenges soon emerged which saw the different parties scramble to preserve their separate interests. Ultimately, an internationalist vision for Iraqi heritage conservation was undermined by several factors, including the disillusionment of UNESCO with Arab competency, which threatened to disenfranchise Iraqis from the development of their country’s heritage management. This chapter draws primarily from the Iraqi archives of UNESCO, supplemented by administrative reports of UNDP, USAID, and the US House of Representatives, the UK National Archives, and the Middle East & North African Newspapers collection.