REGIONAL FEARS OF WESTERN 

PRIMACY AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. 

MIDDLE EASTERN BASING POLICY

W. Andrew Terrill

December 2006

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The views expressed in this report are those of the author and do 

not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department 

of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government. 

This report is cleared for public release; distribution is unlimited.

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A number of friends and colleagues provided useful comments on 

earlier drafts of this work. I would particularly like to thank Professor 

Larry Goodson, U.S. Army War College; Professor Steven Metz of the 

Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College; Professor Jeffrey 

Record, U.S. Air War College; and Ms. Sarah Womar. Rear Admiral 

(ret.) John Sigler, currently of the National Defense University, 

also provided me with a great deal of helpful insight that was of 

enormous value in pursuing this effort. An old friend from my own 

military service, Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Friedenberg rendered 

tremendous assistance to me during my 2006 visit to Kuwait where 

he serves as U.S. Defense Attaché. I would also like to thank another 

friend, Colonel Brian R. Kerins, USAF, for providing valuable 

support to me on repeated embassy-assisted travel to the United 

Arab Emirates. I am especially grateful to Commander John J. Arnold 

and Lieutenant Colonel Christopher J. Beoddy of the U.S. Embassy 

in Qatar for their help on multiple visits to that country. Most of 

all, I would like to thank my research assistant, Mary J. Elias, who 

showed incredible energy and enthusiasm in helping me with this 

monograph. This work benefited greatly from her resourcefulness 

and initiative. Naturally, any and all mistakes of fact, opinion, and 

speculation within this work are entirely my own.

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forwarded to: Director, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War 

College, 122 Forbes Ave, Carlisle, PA 17013-5244. 

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ISBN 1-58487-265-9
iii

FOREWORD

The United States has a core national interest in 

maintaining peace and stability in the Middle East as 

well as containing or eliminating threats emanating from 

that region. Yet, if most American strategic analysts can 

agree on this assumption and these goals, there is often 

disagreement on the ways to best achieve them. In this 

monograph, Dr. W. Andrew Terrill presents his analysis 

of how the United States and other Western states might 

best address their military cooperation and basing needs 

within the Middle East, while still respecting and working 

with an understanding of regional and especially Arab 

history and concerns. He also provides the reader with 

policy recommendations based upon his analysis.

This monograph is not intended to be an exhaustive 

examination of all U.S. basing activities or military 

cooperation in the Middle East. It also does not include 

a discussion of Israel, which would be a separate 

and important study in and of itself. Rather, it is an 

examination of other Middle Eastern (and especially 

Arab) views about Western military facilities in their 

region and foreign soldiers on their soil. Dr. Terrill traces 

the historical background of Western bases in the Middle 

East, noting how these facilities often were used by the 

Western powers to dominate local client states. Such 

policies of domination were especially conspicuous in 

the 1940s due to British (and later American) efforts to 

confront the Nazi menace in that part of the world. These 

policies, however necessary at the time, were greeted 

with a predictable backlash in the 1950s by populist Arab 

nationalists. The U.S. and British military presence in the 

region declined dramatically in the decades that followed, 

but the Western military involvement once again became 

prominent and noticeable in the 1990s, following changes 
iv

in regional security arrangements inspired by Saddam 

Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait. 

New versions of old concerns about Western forces 

became prominent in contemporary times, and yet the 

idea of a Western withdrawal from the region is also of 

serious concern to a number of Arab leaders. Currently, 

the United States seeks to help defend its many allies in 

the region without doing so in a way that inadvertently 

encourages radicalism in the area or adds to the 

discomfort level of our regional supporters and allies. Dr. 

Terrill clearly believes that this can be done, but that such 

tasks must be approached with delicacy and a reasonable 

sensitivity to local concerns. States that appear to be 

treated like client governments inevitably will have to 

prove to their population and the world that they are not 

de-facto colonies.

The Strategic Studies Institute is pleased to offer this 

monograph as a contribution to the national security 

discourse on this important subject, as our nation continues 

to grapple with a variety of problems associated with the 

U.S. presence in the Middle East. This analysis should be 

especially useful to U.S. military strategic leaders as they 

seek to address the complicated interplay of issues related 

to Middle Eastern security in what our local allies would 

see as a politically acceptable and constructive manner. 

A more general reading audience also might be struck by 

the number of solid allies that the United States has in the 

region and the continuing need to work effectively with 

these nations and to treat them with the respect that allies 

clearly deserve.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

Director

Strategic Studies Institute 
v

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR

W. ANDREW TERRILL joined the Strategic Studies 

Institute (SSI) in October 2001, and is a Middle 

East specialist. Prior to his appointment, he served 

as a Middle East nonproliferation analyst for the 

International Assessments Division of the Lawrence 

Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). In 1998-

99, Dr. Terrill also served as a Visiting Professor at 

the U.S. Air War College on assignment from LLNL. 

He is a former faculty member at Old Dominion 

University in Norfolk, Virginia, and has taught 

adjunct at a variety of other colleges and universities. 

He is a retired U.S. Army Reserve lieutenant colonel 

and Foreign Area Officer (Middle East). Dr. Terrill 

has published in numerous academic journals on 

topics including nuclear proliferation, the Iran-Iraq 

War, Operation DESERT STORM, Middle Eastern 

chemical weapons, and ballistic missile proliferation, 

terrorism, and commando operations. Since 1994, 

at U.S. State Department invitation, Dr. Terrill has 

participated in the Middle Eastern Arms Control 

and Regional Security (ACRS) Track 2 talks, which 

are part of the Middle East Peace Process. He holds a 

B.A. from California State Polytechnic University and 

an M.A. from the University of California, Riverside, 

both in Political Science. Dr Terrill also holds a Ph.D. 

in International Relations from Claremont Graduate 

University, Claremont, California.

vii

SUMMARY

The Arab World has maintained a long and 

problematic history with Western military bases on 

its territory. Until at least the 1940s, imperial powers 

often maintained that these bases were designed to 

defend regional nations against foreign invaders, but 

they also were used to pressure and sometimes control 

client governments. However necessary and important 

such pressure might have been during World War II, 

it was still a series of infringements on sovereignty 

that formed an important backdrop for Arab views 

on U.S. basing issues. Nationalist ferment against 

foreign bases was a key component of Arab politics 

throughout the 1950s and 1960s. In response to these 

regional political concerns, as well as changing Western 

military requirements and economic pressures, the 

U.S. and British military presence in the Middle East 

declined steadily, and a number of major Western 

bases were evacuated. By the early 1970s, the U.S. and 

British military presence in the area had been scaled 

down dramatically, and other issues had become more 

prominent in Arab-American relations. 

The 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait introduced a 

major shock into the Arab system, and Saudi Arabia 

allowed large numbers of U.S. and other troops to 

be stationed on its soil as a prelude to the liberation 

of Kuwait in 1991. Significant numbers of U.S. forces 

remained in Saudi Arabia for another 12 years 

following Saddam’s 1991 defeat by coalition forces, 

establishing a new military reality in the region. 

Additionally, Bahrain and Oman strengthened existing 

agreements with the United States in the aftermath of 

Operation DESERT STORM, while Kuwait, the United 
viii

Arab Emirates, and Qatar negotiated new security 

agreements. Nevertheless, in the years following 1991, 

many of the old concerns about the political meaning of 

a Western military presence in the region re-emerged. 

Saudi Arabia, in particular, began to repeat the earlier 

pattern whereby large and important Arab states often 

find it embarrassing to rely too publicly on the West 

for their military security. Additionally, these same 

states may have difficulty presenting themselves as 

important voices within the Arab World if they appear 

to be disproportionately influenced by the West and 

dependent on it for national security concerns. The 

United States and Saudi Arabia eventually reached 

an agreement for the withdrawal of almost all U.S. 

military forces in 2003, although the two countries 

remain close, and the United States continues to be a 

major arms supplier to the Saudis. 

A variety of large or strategically placed Arab 

states, including Egypt and Jordan, maintain close 

military relations with the United States, although 

for nationalistic reasons they stop short of allowing 

permanent bases. The strong exception to the general 

Arab disapproval of U.S. bases in the Middle East 

has remained the more welcoming approach of the 

smaller Arab Gulf states. Some of these nations at 

times deliberately have sought to attract a U.S. military 

presence which they viewed as vital to their defense. 

It is, therefore, useful to continue to nurture current 

basing arrangements with friendly Arab countries of the 

Gulf which accept a U.S. presence as vital to their own 

national security and perhaps their national survival. 

Such states include Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United 

Arab Emirates, and under certain circumstances, 

Oman. These countries have proven their friendship 

and their willingness to work with the United States 

under a variety of circumstances. 
ix

It is also important for the United States to continue 

to maintain strong military links to other significant 

Arab allies that do not involve permanent bases or 

even placement of military stocks for future use. 

Strong military ties with Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, 

and others are valuable for the security of the region, 

and can be especially important during times of crisis 

when these nations can help the United States through 

their political influence, intelligence sharing, and 

temporary use of their military facilities. The support 

of these countries also may be necessary to ensure that 

other states permitting U.S. basing are not criticized 

mercilessly or humiliated in front of their publics and 

the world. 

It should be emphasized further that the United 

States must not place serious hope in the prospect 

of long-term military bases in Iraq unless there is 

overwhelming political sentiment within that country 

favoring these bases. The development of such 

sentiment appears extremely unlikely. Iraq has a 

sensitivity about Western domination that is grounded 

firmly in its historical experience, and this is a history 

which contemporary Iraqis have not forgotten. 

Moreover, Iraq is a large and prominent Arab state 

which seeks a major voice in regional politics. An 

ongoing U.S. military presence in Iraq could serve to 

undermine the credibility of the Iraqis in asserting that 

voice. Any Iraqi government seeking permanent bases 

would almost certainly hurt itself with its own public. 

Finally, despite the strong and important relations 

that the United States has with a variety of Gulf Arab 

allies providing basing rights, it would be a mistake 

to treat these relationships too casually. A constant 

temptation for a superpower is to assert its own 

concerns at the expense of its allies, and justify such 
x

actions by the disparity in power. Unfortunately, 

allies that depend on the United States for their own 

security can become especially resentful of U.S. actions 

because their frustration and that of their publics are 

compounded by that dependency. These frustrations 

can create problems later that could have been avoided, 

and every effort must be made to do so. A number of 

states within the region respond exceptionally well to 

high level consultation and simply a willingness to 

listen to their points of view. Many within the Gulf 

also appreciated the U.S. administration’s willingness 

to stand up for the value of the United Arab Emirates 

alliance during the Dubai Ports World controversy. 

All of these states understand the dangers posed by 

Iran, although they must sometimes go through the 

motions of showing respect for the Iranian presence in 

the region. None of these states trust Iran, and while 

the U.S. approach to regional security may sometimes 

be a source of aggravation, it is viewed widely as an 

indispensable presence.
1

REGIONAL FEARS OF WESTERN PRIMACY

AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. MIDDLE EASTERN 

BASING POLICY

The British and Americans had failed in all their efforts to 

persuade Egypt to join some sort of military partnership. 

Whether described as “mutual defence” or “regional 

defence,” it had always come down to the same thing—

committing Egypt (and other Arab countries if they 

followed the Egyptian example) to an unequal alliance 

which would certainly perpetuate the stationing of 

foreign troops on Egyptian soil and very likely to involve 

Egypt in a war with [America’s enemies]. 

Mohamed Heikal, 19871

Iran reacted strongly in 2004 when the eighth edition of 

the National Geographic atlas was released with the term 

Arabian Gulf in parenthesis beside the more commonly 

used Persian Gulf. Tehran banned that edition of the 

atlas, as well as National Geographic journalists, until the 

map for the Gulf region was changed.

Kuwait Times, May 4, 20062

I cannot defend Qatar if a big power attacks. We need 

the U.S. here in Qatar, and the U.S. needs us.

Qatari Foreign Minister

Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassem al-Thani, 20023

INTRODUCTION

In August 1945, the United States emerged from 

World War II as a global superpower with a military 

presence throughout key strategic areas of the world. 

Additionally, as a result of this war and the later Cold 

War, Washington enjoyed a massive global military 
2

presence characterized by large numbers of formal 

and informal alliances as well as a U.S. presence at 

numerous bases throughout the world.4 Some of these 

bases were developed for long-term use with a huge 

infrastructure and thousands of troops stationed there. 

Moreover, the United States emerged from World War 

II in an occasionally tense but usually close alliance 

with the United Kingdom, and to a lesser extent France, 

the two major colonial powers in the Middle East and 

North Africa. 

In the years 1945-91, the dominant U.S. considerations in seeking, establishing, and maintaining 

overseas basing rights and facilities centered on 

containing the military and political power of the Soviet 

Union and the People’s Republic of China. A related 

concern was to guarantee long-term U.S. and Western 

access to key economic resources and most especially 

petroleum and other energy resources.5 The demise of 

the Soviet Union in December 1991, as well as ongoing 

U.S. progress in improving relations with both Russia 

and China, has led to a re-evaluation of the strategic 

logic of U.S. basing strategy in various parts of the 

world, including Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. In 

the aftermath of these events, a variety of policymakers 

and strategic thinkers began to conclude that changes 

in the international political system have helped to 

undercut key strategic rationales for those overseas 

bases formerly used within the context of Cold War 

strategy.6 This shift has created a situation whereby 

both the United States and the nations providing 

basing rights to U.S. forces are seeking a new common 

understanding on a variety of basing issues, including 

the threats these facilities are meant to oppose and 

the conditions under which such forces will be used 

to support military operations against hostile forces. 
3

Under these new conditions, the United States has 

announced that as many as 70,000 additional troops 

will be withdrawn from Europe and Asia.7 Large standing armies in areas of potential Cold War confrontation will be replaced by “expeditionary” forces which 

will be sent to areas of crisis when this is determined 

to be necessary. To support the expeditionary forces, 

smaller bases sometimes described as “lily pads” are 

considered useful.8

The United States remains a superpower with 

worldwide interests despite global political changes 

and the movement to reconfigure its military presence 

abroad. This status is reflected in strong U.S. security 

concerns in the Middle East and U.S. interest in 

supporting a number of important allies in the region. 

These partnerships are closely linked to the emergence 

and evolution of post-Cold War security issues and 

threats to the welfare of the regions in question. In the 

Middle East, and especially the Gulf region, strong U.S. 

security ties to regional states are influenced heavily 

by ongoing problems with Iran, the rise of terrorism, 

and the danger of regionwide instability and political 

unrest. There is also uncertainty over ways in which 

post-Saddam Iraq’s political future might have security 

repercussions for neighboring states. Consequently, a 

U.S. presence elsewhere in the region will be important 

in addressing these problems, even in the aftermath of 

an eventual withdrawal from Iraq. It is, therefore, vital 

that the United States continues to maintain a presence 

in the region despite the receding threat from Russia 

and the as of yet unrealized dangers from any other 

extra-regional power.

Unfortunately, even in cases of overlapping 

Western and local interests, basing agreements 

often can be sensitive issues in the Middle East, and 
4

especially in the Arab World, due to long-standing 

concerns about potential Western domination of the 

region. While many Middle Eastern nations need and 

desire U.S. military support and sometimes even a U.S. 

presence in their country, there is often a price that 

Arab governments must pay with their own publics 

once they provide such facilities to Western nations. 

To understand some of the sensitivities that exist about 

U.S. bases in the Middle East, it is important to examine 

the recent history of the region and the attitudes that 

have been influenced by past Arab experience with 

Western forces stationed on their territory. Moreover, 

the combination of an evolving strategic situation, 

historical sensitivities, and new regional concerns 

about U.S. willingness to exercise military power have 

all led to a situation whereby the United States must 

be especially thoughtful in considering how and under 

what conditions to deploy its forces in this region. In 

order to protect itself and its allies, the United States will 

need a basing and military presence policy based on a 

firm understanding of regional politics and historical 

sensitivities.

WESTERN BASES IN THE ARAB WORLD 

FROM WORLD WAR II UNTIL OPERATION 

DESERT STORM

Although the United States clearly did not emerge 

as a global superpower until after World War II, the 

war itself was a particularly important era for relations 

between the Arab World and the West. While many 

of the Arab states were not formal colonies, they 

often were controlled through a variety of political 

devices, including widespread foreign political 

manipulation and intimidation of local governments. 
5

Treaties between the imperial power and the client 

states were usually imposed by the outside power and 

designed to ensure continued Western influence over 

the local Arab states.9 The presence of Western forces 

in a variety of Arab countries helped to ensure that 

unequal power relationships were enforced strongly. 

At the conflict’s initiation in September 1939, many 

Arab states were nominally independent but still 

very much dominated by colonial powers. As the war 

continued, some Arab leaders impressed by German 

victories became interested in pressing the limits of 

their own sovereignty with the more powerful Western 

states, particularly the United Kingdom. At one point 

in early 1941, German and Italian forces advanced to 

within 60 miles of Alexandria, Egypt, casting doubt 

on British longevity in the region.10 At least some Arab 

leaders doubted that it was in their interests to join the 

United Kingdom in its seemingly inevitable defeat, 

while others viewed intra-European conflicts as an 

opportunity for their countries to break free of some of 

the constraints of foreign control.

World War II was also a time when the British, in 

particular, were focused heavily on their own national 

survival and had little patience with Arab sensitivities 

over sovereignty issues. Hence, any Arab nationalist 

actions or agitation that were deemed to threaten British 

war aims were suppressed quickly and harshly to the 

extent that it was in the United Kingdom’s power to do 

so. Additionally, many British leaders, and particularly 

Prime Minister Winston Churchill, remained interested 

in maintaining a strong and vibrant British Empire well 

into the post-war era. Correspondingly, the United 

Kingdom appeared to be offering very little to its Arab 

allies, protectorates, and colonies in the post-War era 

beyond a return to the pre-war status quo.11 Moreover, 
6

although the United Kingdom imported most of its 

oil from the United States during the war, both British 

and American officials understood the importance 

of Middle Eastern oil, and both increasingly were 

interested in assuring their own post-war access to this 

resource.12

In this environment, real and imagined Western 

intrigue often was viewed as dominating local politics. 

Iraq, on the eve of World War II, was an important 

example of a society whose citizens, often correctly, 

saw a British hand in all major domestic events. 

Sometimes, however, this concern was extended into 

unsubstantiated theories such as those surrounding 

the death of Ghazi Ibn Fiesal, the young second king 

of Iraq. Ghazi had made radio broadcasts from 1937 

until his death in 1939 denouncing French rule in 

Syria, British-supported Zionist activities in Palestine, 

and British influence in the Gulf. According to British 

sources, King Ghazi later died on April 4, 1939, as the 

result of a high-speed automobile accident that centered 

on the use of alcohol.13 Nevertheless, Arab nationalists 

throughout the country suspected or believed that he 

was murdered because of his willingness to oppose 

British interests.14 Regardless of whether he was 

murdered or not, Ghazi’s death may have been a 

welcome development for the British, and tended to 

feed the belief that the British were prepared to do 

whatever they deemed necessary to keep their puppet 

leaders in line. The belief that Ghazi was murdered 

persists among some Arab authors into contemporary 

times.15

Later, in a much less equivocal move, the antiBritish, but also nationalist, Iraqi Prime Minister 

Rashid ‘Ali al Kaylani was ousted by British 

military intervention in April 1941 after a prolonged 
7

constitutional crisis.16 While not a soldier himself, 

Rashid ‘Ali had been reinstalled in power through a 

pro-German coup in collaboration with nationalist 

army officers. The group he represented previously 

had explored the possibility of obtaining German aid 

to fight the British. London therefore was provoked 

deeply by nationalist agitation, threats to its nationals, 

actions against pro-British Iraqis, and Baghdad’s 

newfound interest in support from Nazi Germany. 

The British correspondingly chose to address the issue 

through military intervention. Some of the forces used 

to defeat Rashid ‘Ali and his supporters were airlifted 

to the British-controlled air base at Habbaniyah, Iraq, 

while others came from Jordan (then Tranjordan), 

including units from the tough and capable Britishled Arab Legion.17 Iraq remained under occupation 

until 1945, and London reinstated a pro-British Iraqi 

leadership prior to the departure of British and Empire 

troops from Iraq at that time. Thus, in the April 1941 

countercoup, the Habbaniyah Air Base was not used 

to protect Iraq from a foreign enemy but rather to help 

enable a foreign power to occupy Iraq. Under these 

circumstances, nationalist resentment was inevitable 

regardless of how justified British actions may have 

been in struggling against the Nazi menace. 

Elsewhere in the Gulf area, Reza Shah of Iran was 

dethroned by the British military in August 1941 and 

deported to South Africa, where he died 3 years later 

in 1944. Reza Shah had been impressed enormously 

with European fascism, and was openly friendly to 

Nazi Germany, thereby sealing his fate so far as the 

British were concerned. He was succeeded by his 21-

year-old son, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who was to be 

Iran’s last shah.18 The son was viewed by the British as 

a weak and insecure youth who would be intimidated 

by the example of his father’s dethronement. Like 
8

Rashid Ali, the old shah was seen as being too open 

to German overtures. While Iran is not an Arab 

country, this display of raw power against a large and 

nominally independent state nevertheless was viewed 

with considerable apprehension throughout the Arab 

World and the wider region.

Another well-known and important example of 

British primacy over a large and important Middle 

Eastern state involves Anglo-Egyptian relations. 

Again, wartime strategy dominated the British strategic outlook as they desperately defended Egypt’s 

Suez Canal from advancing German and Italian 

forces. At various points in time, the British position 

in Egypt appeared on the verge of collapsing, and 

the British were briskly and harshly unsympathetic 

to any efforts to assert the prerogatives of Egypt’s 

formal independence. On February 4, 1942, British 

Ambassador to Egypt Sir Miles Lampson (later Lord 

Killearn) ordered Egyptian King Farouk to dismiss 

his pro-Axis Prime Minister and appoint an official 

supportive of British goals.19 Lampson made his 

demands while the king’s palace was surrounded by 

British military units, including armored vehicles. The 

king was given the stark choice of submitting to British 

demands or being arrested. Farouk, having no dignified 

alternative, chose the former in a major humiliation for 

both the king and Egypt.20 At least one senior Egyptian 

officer offered his resignation to the king because of 

the army’s failure to defend him, but Farouk declined 

this offer.21 He understood that there was little that the 

Egyptian military could do because of the powerful 

British military presence within Egypt. 

Following the end of World War II, the Western 

presence in the Middle East appeared less heavyhanded but was still significant and included Western 
9

forces being stationed at regional military bases. The 

United States also increasingly was interested in 

military facilities within the Arab World. Earlier, in 

1943, Saudi King Abdul Aziz granted U.S. rights to 

build an air base in Dhahran in eastern Saudi Arabia. 

In the aftermath of the war, this facility expanded to 

become an important Strategic Air Command (SAC) 

asset. Additionally, the U.S. Navy visited the Saudi 

port of Damman in 1948 and began using port facilities 

in Bahrain in 1949.22

The other major U.S. air base in the Arab World 

during this time frame was Wheelus Air Base in 

Libya, a country which became independent under 

a conservative monarchy in December 1951. Libya 

concluded a treaty of friendship and alliance with the 

United Kingdom in 1953, while in 1954 the Libyans 

agreed to provide the United States with basing 

rights in exchange for economic aid. Wheelus, near 

Tripoli, became the centerpiece of this effort and was 

considered a strategically valuable Cold War base. The 

facility eventually became one of the largest SAC bases 

outside of the continental United States. Additionally, 

the Libyans set aside ranges in the desert to be used by 

U.S. aircraft on practice bombing runs. These bombing 

ranges were particularly valuable since Libya’s 

uncluttered airspace, clear weather, and large areas of 

uninhabited land greatly facilitated training missions.23

USAF units practiced tactics for both nuclear and nonnuclear attacks at Wheelus. 

The Cold War, which began under President Harry 

Truman, reached a new intensity during President 

Dwight Eisenhower’s administration (1953-60). In this 

increasingly vitriolic conflict, U.S. Secretary of State 

John Foster Dulles asserted that neutralism was immoral in the fight against international communism 
10

and that any decent state would follow the U.S. lead 

in its efforts to fight this menace.24 This outlook is 

seen to echo in contemporary American arguments 

on international terrorism that “you are either with us 

or against us.”25 Nevertheless, even during the Cold 

War, such arguments often were received poorly by 

various Arab publics more concerned about ending the 

vestiges of colonialism rather than becoming part of an 

international confrontation between the United States 

and the communist powers. Many Arabs believed that 

Arab and Western interests diverged significantly on 

issues involving Israel, oil, arms sales to the region, and 

foreign relations, among other concerns. If Arab states 

remained under Western domination, then, according 

to this logic, Arab interests would be ignored in favor 

of often conflicting Western interests. Additionally, 

the 1950s often were seen as something of a heyday for 

an interventionist Central Intelligence Agency, with 

an August 1953 intervention to restore Iranian Shah 

Mohammed Reza Pahlavi to power as a centerpiece of 

this effort.26 Iran’s proximity to the Arab World made 

this intervention a vivid example to a number of Arab 

states. A more overt demonstration of U.S. power 

came in 1958 when U.S. Marines invaded Lebanon and 

became briefly involved in internal Lebanese politics 

under the Eisenhower Doctrine.27 This doctrine stated 

the United States had the right to intervene in any 

country threatened by international communism. The 

suggestion that Lebanon was threatened in such a way 

was, nevertheless, a significant stretch.28

The 1950s also saw the rise of strong Arab nationalist 

leaders, the most important of whom was President 

Gamal Abdul Nasser of Egypt (1918-70). Until Nasser, 

many, if not most, Arabs remained uncertain that one 

of their own leaders could challenge the West openly 
11

on important issues and remain in power. Yet, Nasser 

confronted the West on a variety of levels, gaining 

enormous popularity in the process. He emerged as 

an early advocate of neutralism or nonalignment and 

became one of the towering figures associated with 

that movement.29 A central component of that ideology 

was to deny the former colonial powers basing 

rights in nonaligned countries under all but the most 

exceptional circumstances. Moreover, the Egyptian 

president moved rapidly to implement his approach 

by negotiating an October 1954 agreement for the 

evacuation of British troops from the Suez Canal zone, 

where such forces had been stationed since 1882.30

President Nasser’s daughter, Dr. Huda Abdel Nasser, 

later stated that her father was “opposed to alliances 

between strong and weak countries because they 

inevitably led to the strong country taking advantage 

of the situation and imposing its own agenda on the 

weak country.”31

President Nasser’s version of Arab neutrality 

had tangible implications for U.S. strategy in the 

Middle East. In one particularly notable dispute, the 

Egyptians emerged as the central Arab opponent to 

the U.S.-supported 1955 military alliance popularly 

known as the Baghdad Pact (and later referred to as 

the Central Treaty Organization [CENTO]). Cairo’s 

“Voice of the Arabs” radio described the U.S.-favored 

Western alliance as colonialism in disguise and harshly 

denounced the regional countries that were willing 

to join the Baghdad Pact.32 This alliance included the 

United Kingdom, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Pakistan, with 

the United States as an “associate member.”33 Despite its 

limited status with the organization, the United States 

viewed the alliance as a useful vehicle for containing 

communism, while Arab nationalists often considered 
12

it to be a way of helping to secure Western domination 

of the Middle East.34 Jordan’s King Hussein actually 

signed the Baghdad Pact as a way of securing additional 

Anglo-American military aid, but the December 1955 

anti-Pact rioting was so severe in that country that 

efforts to actually work within the organization had 

to be postponed indefinitely.35 Partially out of fear of 

Egypt, Saudi Arabia also refused to consider joining 

the Baghdad Pact and falsely denied the existence of 

U.S. military facilities in Dhahran (which was now one 

of the largest air bases in the world).36 These reactions 

suggested that Cairo had now proven that it had the 

ability to thwart at least some Western priorities for 

regional basing rights.37

President Nasser’s most important test and the 

event that helped catapult him to the position of a panArab hero was the 1956 Arab-Israeli war, known in 

Egypt as the “Tripartite Aggression.” British and French 

leaders, in collusion with Israel, undertook military 

intervention against Egypt to overthrow President 

Nasser, after he announced the nationalization of the 

Suez Canal.38 The Eisenhower administration chose 

to oppose the Anglo-French-Israeli effort, which then 

floundered partially as a result of the lack of U.S. 

political and especially economic support, as well 

as strong domestic opposition within the United 

Kingdom.39 Nasser was able to remain in power as an 

Arab nationalist leader who had successfully defied 

both Israel and two former colonial powers. The 1956 

Suez War often is seen as a key point at which the United 

States displaced the old colonial powers of Britain and 

France as the major external power influencing the 

region.

A second important benchmark for the decline of 

British power in the region is the destruction of the 

pro-British Hashemite monarchy of Iraq in a 1958 
13

military coup and its replacement by a series of often 

radical Arab nationalist governments. In addition to its 

problems with the Baghdad Pact, the Iraqi monarchy 

was viewed widely as corrupt, and its destruction 

evoked little sorrow from the Iraqi masses at the time. It 

also was viewed often as harshly repressive, although 

that government’s authoritarian practices were only 

the most pale shadow of those to be undertaken by 

the totalitarian regimes to emerge later in Baghdad. 

Underscoring the monarchy’s lack of legitimacy, no 

Iraqi army units rose to its defense as it faced military 

overthrow.40 After the 1958 military coup, the British 

were evicted peacefully from the Habbaniyah Air Base 

and its associated strategic radar installations.41 Iraq 

also immediately stopped sending representatives 

to Baghdad Pact meetings and formally withdrew 

from the treaty in 1959. This removal of the British 

military presence from Iraq, 17 years after the Rashid 

‘Ali coup, had enormous nationalist significance and 

was deeply popular in Iraq. Huge crowds filled the 

streets, shouting enthusiastic slogans supporting the 

revolution, condemning the old regime, and displaying 

anti-British emotions that have been described by two 

leading Iraq scholars as “almost uncontrollable.”42

For a brief time, the Iraqi coup leader and later head 

of state, Brigadier Abdul Karim Qasim, emerged as a 

political rival to Nasser for Arab leadership.43

Western military bases in the Arab World 

continued to be an important issue throughout the 

1960s and the 1970s, although such concerns often 

were displaced by the larger issue of U.S. differences 

with the Arab World over U.S. support for Israel. Such 

concerns also were mitigated by the ongoing process 

of Western withdrawal from regional bases in the 

face of nationalist opposition and other concerns. The 
14

Saudis continued to show exceptional sensitivity over 

the U.S. Air Force use of the Dhahran Air Base and 

made it clear that they did not wish to renew the lease 

when it came up in 1962. The President John Kennedy 

administration correspondingly evacuated U.S. forces 

from the facility at that time.44 This change was not a 

major problem for U.S.-Saudi relations since the United 

States increasingly was interested in intercontinental 

ballistic missiles and bombers, rather than regional air 

bases, serving as the backbone of SAC. Dhahran’s value 

as a SAC base had been declining correspondingly for 

years. The Saudi unease over Dhahran throughout this 

period nevertheless was an important indicator of the 

sensitivity of the issue of U.S. military forces on Arab 

soil. 

In an interesting blend of the basing issue and the 

Arab-Israeli conflict, U.S. forces felt compelled to give 

Libyan officials a comprehensive tour of the Wheelus 

Air Base in June 1967 to reassure the Arab World 

that this facility was not being used by U.S. forces 

for combat missions against Egypt and in support of 

Israel during the Six-Day War.45 President Nasser had 

claimed that U.S. and British forces were flying such 

missions as part of the overall war effort on the Israeli 

side. The claim, which was later retracted, was made 

in the hope of justifying the unfolding Arab defeat and 

gaining stronger Soviet assistance for the Egyptians. 

This linkage of Western basing with problems with 

Israel seems to have illustrated the depth of ongoing 

suspicions that such facilities might not always be 

utilized to support Arab interests. 

Later, in September 1969, the United States evacuated Wheelus Air Base after a then young Muhammar 

Qadhafi took power by ousting the elderly pro-Western 

King Idris. This evacuation was a key demand of the 
15

new Libyan nationalist regime, which had taken its 

inspiration from President Nasser.46 This demand was 

facilitated by the expiration of the U.S.-Libyan basing 

agreement in 1970, and the unwillingness of the new 

regime to even discuss the possibility of extending it. 

The last U.S. military forces left Wheelus on June 11, 

1970, a date that was later celebrated in Libya as a 

national holiday.47 Egypt naturally approved of the 

Libyan decision, but the Egyptians, nevertheless, had 

to make an exception to their own concerns about 

neutrality by improving their military ties with the 

Soviet Union in the aftermath of the 1967 Arab-Israeli 

War in order to prepare for renewed military conflict 

with Israel. In December 1969, the Soviets controlled 

six Egyptian airfields and had up to 20,000 military 

personnel in Egypt.48 Later, as a result of serious political 

difficulties and a desire for diplomatic flexibility, 

Soviet personnel were expelled by Nasser’s successor, 

President Anwar Sadat, in the summer of 1972.49

The British also were engaged in a process of 

withdrawal from many of their Middle Eastern 

bases in the time frame between 1967 and 1971. The 

decision to withdraw British forces was based heavily 

on financial considerations and by the strategic 

implications of Indian independence in 1949. While 

Gulf oil remained an important consideration for the 

British, its protection did not seem to require a large 

ongoing British military commitment. Additionally, 

the United Kingdom expected to continue business 

ties with the newly independent governments of the 

Gulf in such states as Bahrain, Qatar, and the United 

Arab Emirates. All of these states became independent 

in 1971. Another state that became independent as a 

result of the British military withdrawal from areas east 

of Suez was the People’s Republic of South Yemen. In 
16

1967 British troops withdrew from this former colony 

and protectorate and gave up the large and important 

British naval base at Aden.50

The 1978-79 Iranian revolution eliminated an 

important U.S. non-Arab ally that provided key 

intelligence facilities to the United States.51 The ouster 

of the shah also replaced a friendly monarch with an 

angry Islamic regime whose leaders bore a special 

grudge with the United States due to previous U.S. 

support of the Iranian monarchy. This unfortunate 

development was complicated further by the initial 

Iranian interest in exporting its revolution to other 

states in the region.52 Moreover, the Iranians tended to 

ridicule U.S. allies in the region as unfit for leadership 

and supporting what they contemptuously described 

as “American Islam.” In response to a variety of world 

events, including the fall of the Iranian monarchy 

and especially the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, 

President Jimmy Carter enunciated the “Carter 

Doctrine” in 1979.53 In presenting this doctrine to the 

public, President Carter stated, “An attempt by any 

outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region 

will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of 

the United States of America, and such an assault will 

be repelled by any means necessary, including military 

force.”54 When President Carter made these statements, 

the United States was importing approximately 43 

percent of its annual requirement for oil, and the U.S. 

military presence in the Persian Gulf was centered on a 

limited number of ships and naval personnel stationed 

in Bahrain.55

Surprisingly, the Carter doctrine did not lead to a 

sweeping expansion of U.S. forces in the Gulf region, 

despite the President’s decision to place it under U.S. 

military protection. Instead, Carter sought to help 
17

defend the area in nonintrusive ways with the formation of the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force 

(RDJTF) which was to become U.S. Central Command 

(CENTCOM) in 1983.56 American diplomats also 

negotiated new access agreements to facilities in Kenya, 

Somalia, and the British-controlled island of Diego 

Garcia in the Indian Ocean.57 The only Gulf country 

from which they obtained a new access agreement 

was Oman.58 Even by the late 1980s, the U.S. military 

presence in the Middle East clearly was limited. 

A handful of U.S. naval warships were stationed 

at Bahrain, with occasional port visits conducted 

elsewhere in the region. 

The large and important Bright Star exercises, hosted by Egypt, also began in 1981, and have continued to 

serve as a cornerstone of U.S. regional security policy.59

Elsewhere, military protection for Saudi Arabia was 

expected to involve primarily “over the horizon” (OTH) 

support due to the Kingdom’s special sensitivity about 

Western troops and bases on its soil.60 Also in the Gulf, 

Oman maintained discreet intelligence and security 

relations with the United States and United Kingdom 

partially due to fears about revolutionary Iran.61 Most 

of the other Gulf militaries were small and linked 

to the British. The Jordanian military also provided 

support and training to a variety of Gulf states.62

Kuwait in the late 1980s was overtly neutralist, deeply 

pro-Palestinian, and had no interest in hosting U.S. 

or other foreign forces on local bases.63 The Kuwaitis 

instead chose to negotiate a defense agreement that 

depended on British military assistance sent to them 

from elsewhere in the region should they be attacked. 

The British defense agreement with Kuwait expired in 

May 1971, leaving that country with no foreign bases 

on its soil and no formal external protector.64 Kuwaitis 

eventually would pay a horrendous price for failing 
18

to address this situation when Saddam Hussein seized 

the country in 1990, claiming the independent existence 

of that country was a vestige of imperialism.

THE IMPACT OF OPERATION DESERT STORM, 

THE FALL OF THE SOVIET UNION, AND THE 

CONTAINMENT OF IRAQ

The August 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait fundamentally changed the military relationship between 

the United States and the Arab World, and led to new 

types of cooperation between the United States and 

a variety of Saddam’s Arab neighbors. According to 

journalist Bob Woodward, the Saudis were shown 

U.S. satellite imagery in the aftermath of the Kuwait 

invasion, indicating that Iraqi forces appeared to have 

been deployed for a possible military assault against 

the oil-rich Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia.65 While 

Saddam’s willingness to follow one reckless action 

with another is uncertain, the Saudis may, nevertheless, have been deeply concerned about the danger of 

an Iraqi-dominated Gulf region.66 They also had a keen 

sense of their own vulnerability. The Saudi capital of 

Riyadh is only 275 miles from the Kuwaiti border, and 

this distance could have been traversed in 3 days by 

properly supported mechanized and armored forces. 

Furthermore, the only ground force between Saddam 

and the Saudi oil fields of the Eastern Province was a 

battalion of the Saudi Arabian National Guard (SANG) 

which was comprised of only around 750 troops.67

Although this force would have been supported by the 

modern and well-equipped Royal Saudi Arabian Air 

Force, they had no chance of stopping a determined 

Iraqi attack without foreign military support. These 

concerns led to the Saudi decision to reverse previous 
19

policies and allow U.S. and other anti-Saddam coalition 

forces to be stationed in Saudi Arabia. 68

The political problems associated with the 

deployment of Western forces in Saudi Arabia were 

eased by the participation of a number of Arab states 

in the U.S.-led anti-Iraqi coalition. Two of these states, 

Egypt and Syria, even sent substantial numbers of 

troops to participate in Operations DESERT SHIELD 

and DESERT STORM, although both countries played 

only limited roles in the subsequent liberation of 

Kuwait.69 Other Arab states publicly offered their 

military and logistical facilities to support coalition 

operations. Sultan Qabus of Oman stated that “Friends 

will not stand with hands tied behind them,” indicating 

that the United States and its partners were welcome 

to use Omani facilities to resist Saddam in this time of 

crisis.70 Support for U.S. actions, nevertheless, were not 

universal in the Arab World. Jordan did not participate 

in the anti-Iraq coalition, and the Palestinian Liberation 

Organization under Yassir Arafat eventually chose to 

support Saddam politically after ineffective efforts 

to find an “Arab solution” to the crisis.71 Libya’s 

Muhammar Qadhafi, who has maintained a history 

of poor relations with the Saudis, also opposed the 

deployment of U.S. troops in the region and made 

angry speeches criticizing the Saudi Arabian king for 

permitting the American military to use his territory, 

despite the Iraqi threat to that country.72 Saddam 

responded to this Arab division by seeking to portray 

himself as an Arab nationalist leader under siege from 

the West and Western stooges, but he clearly was 

having only limited success in getting his message 

across.73

The United States and its allies administered an 

overwhelming defeat to Iraq in early 1991, which was 
20

so devastating that many within the U.S. administration 

expected it to lead to the fall of the Saddam Hussein 

regime. According to a variety of sources, including 

former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft and 

former Defense Secretary (later Vice President) Richard 

Cheney, the U.S. administration expected that the 

humiliation of such a massive defeat in a short period 

of time probably would lead to a military coup against 

Saddam.74 Moreover, any potential coup plotters 

were given strong indications that almost any Iraqi 

government resulting from such action reasonably 

could request much more liberal surrender terms 

than would have ever have been given to Saddam 

Hussein.75 Such terms could include Iraqi requests for 

the lifting of United Nations (UN) sanctions and relief 

or forgiveness from reparations to be paid to Kuwait. 

Iraqi coup leaders taking power from Saddam could, 

in most cases, credibly claim that they had no power 

to dissuade Saddam from invading Kuwait, and 

that therefore there was no justification for sanctions 

against a post-war Iraq without Saddam. With the idea 

of a coup in mind, President George H. W. Bush called 

upon the Iraqi population to overthrow the dictator. 

Unexpectedly, instead of a military coup, Iraq 

experienced anti-regime popular uprisings originating 

in the Kurdish and Shi’ite areas. Furthermore, to the 

surprise of many American observers, the Saddam 

regime managed to survive the crisis presented by these 

attacks and by the humiliation of its massive defeat. 

In part, this development occurred because Saddam 

still managed to draw enough support from Iraq’s 

Sunni Arab community to keep the government and 

the military functioning despite the serious uprisings 

in the northern and southern parts of the country. In 

particular, the Sunni-dominated military held together 
21

with no defections of company-sized units or larger to 

the rebels.76 In the face of hostile Kurdish and Shi’ite 

Arab uprisings, Iraq’s Sunni Arabs may have feared 

a national reckoning that would extend far beyond 

Saddam and his immediate circle. The decision by many 

Sunni Arabs to support Saddam rather than align with 

Shi’ites and Kurds seeking to overthrow or undermine 

his regime may have been an interesting harbinger of 

future Iraqi sectarian problems. Many Sunnis clearly 

were indicating in 1991 that they would rather live 

under Saddam than risk the possible consequences of 

a Shi’ite-dominated government. 

Saddam’s ability to remain in power for 12 more 

years after the 1991 war, while a tragedy for the Iraqi 

people, did have an unexpected side benefit for the 

United States. After the war, Saddam’s government 

was viewed internationally as a criminal regime that 

needed to be the subject of continued international 

scrutiny for its military and especially weapons of mass 

destruction (WMD)-related activities. Intrusive UNsponsored inspections for WMD programs continued 

for years in an effort to find and eliminate every last 

vestige of Saddam’s nuclear, biological, and chemical 

weapons programs. Such inspection efforts continued 

until 1998 when Saddam ordered UN inspectors to 

leave his country. This order was followed by Operation 

DESERT FOX, a 4-day U.S. and British bombing 

campaign against Iraq’s remaining WMD suspect sites. 

While conflicting accounts of the effectiveness of the 

Operation DESERT FOX raids existed at the time they 

were conducted, it is now clear that Western and UN 

policies followed by the air strikes effectively ended 

the Iraqi WMD program.77 If an Iraqi coup had taken 

place in 1991 as planned, it is doubtful that a postSaddam military government would have faced the 
22

same rigorous international scrutiny should it had 

elected to move forward on these programs. 

The survival of the Saddam Hussein regime also 

had other implications that were more complex. The 

basing of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia continued after 

1991 as a result of the remaining Iraqi threat and the 

U.S. presence there became a significant and ongoing 

source of friction between the United States and Saudi 

Arabia in the years following Operation DESERT 

STORM. Some of the concerns related specifically 

to a Western presence in the country of Islam’s two 

most holy mosques. The Saudi government also was 

criticized by some of its own citizens for being unable 

to provide for its own security after decades of massive 

arms purchases from the West.78 What had initially 

appeared as a short-term U.S. presence to deal with 

a specific threat now evolved into an increasingly 

controversial open-ended decision to retain at least 

some U.S. troops indefinitely. Kuwait, on the other 

hand, welcomed an ongoing U.S. military presence 

following the war, and the other small Gulf states of 

Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates moved 

to establish their own close military relations with the 

United States shortly thereafter. These small states 

were under no illusions about their own vulnerability 

and, unlike Saudi Arabia, felt no embarrassment about 

their interest in Western military protection. 

Additionally, the Saudi government often was 

viewed throughout the region as closely associated with 

U.S. policy in Iraq since a no-fly zone over the southern 

portion of the country was maintained from Saudi 

and Kuwaiti air bases.79 The UN sanctions imposed 

on Iraq eventually were to become deeply unpopular 

throughout the Arab World, and sanctions and nofly zones often appeared to the Arab public as two 
23

sides of the same coin.80 This problem was aggravated 

sometimes by various U.S. policy statements on 

sanctions, which many Arabs viewed as excessive and 

vindictive. When, in May 1996, for example, Secretary 

of State Madeleine Albright was asked if the human 

toll of the sanctions was an acceptable price to pay for 

containing Saddam, she answered, “I think this is a 

very hard choice. But the price--we think the price is 

worth it.”81 This remark was viewed widely as disregarding the suffering of innocent Iraqis.82

While the Iraqi threat brought the United States 

and Saudi Arabia together in 1990-91, another unifying 

external threat, the Soviet Union, crumbled during that 

same time frame. This potential adversary had been 

viewed as a mortal danger by the both countries and 

correspondingly generated U.S.-Saudi cooperation 

throughout the Cold War years. At least some Saudis, 

including King Feisal (d. 1975), believed in a bizarre 

theory of Zionist-Communist cooperation and thereby 

managed to merge what they viewed as a Soviet and 

an Israeli threat.83 Additionally, Saudi Arabia was 

involved deeply in the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan 

and cooperated closely with Western security services in 

coordinating anti-Soviet activities.84 Anti-communism 

was an important motivation for cooperation between 

Saudi Arabia and the United States and helped each 

country set aside some of their differences. The collapse 

of the Soviet Union meant that the common threats 

binding the United States and Saudi Arabia had faded 

to a crippled Iraq and an Iran with severely limited 

power projection capabilities for conventional warfare 

across the Gulf.
24

THE AFTERMATH OF THE 

SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 ATTACKS

The September 11, 2001 (9/11) terrorist attacks 

against U.S. targets served as another major turning 

point for the ways in which the United States conducted 

its foreign policy, especially in the Middle East. In the 

aftermath of the attacks, the United States emerged as an 

aroused and angry superpower responding to vicious 

and unprovoked strikes against its civilian population. 

American anger over 9/11 was viewed widely as 

justified or at least comprehensible throughout the 

world. Moreover, remarks by President Bush indicating 

that countries worldwide had to choose between the 

United States and the terrorists underscored the depth 

of the American anger. Under these circumstances, a 

variety of Arab and Muslim nations felt that they had 

to be especially attentive to U.S. requests for basing 

rights and other concessions since they did not wish 

to be viewed by the United States as insufficiently 

concerned about terrorism.

As the United States prepared to respond to the 

9/11 strikes, it moved to reinvigorate its relationships 

with a number of allies and establish new military 

relations with a variety of other nations in strategic 

locations. The government of Pakistan which had 

helped to establish the Taliban regime in Afghanistan 

now abandoned its Afghan ally and moved rapidly 

to side with the United States as it prepared for its 

upcoming war in Afghanistan. Pakistani military 

facilities including air bases correspondingly were 

made available for U.S. use.85 Moreover, the United 

States also obtained basing rights in the former Soviet 

republics of Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. 

The U.S. Secretary of Defense called the Central Asian 
25

facilities “operating bases,” rather than permanent 

bases, since they were to be used to deal with a 

specific enemy who the U.S. leadership felt could be 

destroyed quickly. These bases included the large and 

important Karshi-Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan, 

where the United States remained until receiving a 

shutdown order from the Uzbek government in July 

2005, following a severe souring of relations with the 

United States.86 In Kyrgyzstan, the United States also 

negotiated an agreement for the use of Ganci Air Base in 

late 2001.87 This facility was co-located with Manas Air 

Field on the outskirts of the capital, Bishkek. Ganci Air 

Base remains in use by U.S. forces supporting ongoing 

operations in Afghanistan.88 Kyrgyzstan later sought to 

raise the rent on this base dramatically, but then backed 

away from provoking a bilateral breech with the United 

States.89 Throughout the Afghan war, U.S. forces have 

used Tajikistan bases only for emergency landings and 

occasional refueling.90 After the war, the United States 

established bases in Afghanistan itself. The Afghans 

appear to have mixed feelings about permanent use 

of these facilities. President Karzai has stated that he 

favors a long-term “strategic relationship” with the 

United States and seems open to a permanent military 

presence in that country.91 Public opinion, however, 

seems uncertain on the issue, with key media outlets 

expressing reservations on the idea. Occasional antiAmerican riots also underscore the potentially volatile 

nature of the U.S. presence in Afghanistan.92

Problems with the U.S. military presence in Saudi 

Arabia also became more troublesome during this 

time frame. Former Central Command Commander 

General Tommy Franks in his 2004 book, An American 

Soldier, described the relationship between the United 

States and Saudi Arabia as highly charged and stated 
26

that “cultural friction remained a way of life” despite 

the fact that most U.S. military personnel in Saudi 

Arabia have been stationed in remote areas such as 

Prince Sultan Air Base in the desert south of Riyadh. 

General Franks contrasted U.S. military difficulties 

with the Saudis with the smooth military relations that 

he noted between the U.S. military and the smaller 

Arabian Gulf states “whose friendship with the United 

States was based on mutual respect.”93 Nevertheless, 

Saudi Arabia was willing to support the U.S. military 

operations in Afghanistan while seeking to conceal 

that it was doing so. During the 2001-02 Afghanistan 

War, the Saudis provided operational facilities for U.S. 

Special Operations forces at Arar, refueling facilities, 

cheap fuel, and overflight rights.94

THE 2003 INVASION OF IRAQ AND THE 

UNCERTAINTIES OF POST-SADDAM IRAQ

Planning for the 2003 invasion of Iraq led to several 

problems related to U.S. bases in the Middle East. Both 

Saudi Arabia and Turkey had major facilities which 

Pentagon planners hoped, and perhaps expected, to be 

made available to help implement U.S. plans for regime 

change in Iraq. Additionally, Kuwait was viewed as a 

vital staging point for U.S. and coalition ground forces 

planning to attack northward. Qatar and the United 

Arab Emirates, as well as various Central Asian bases, 

also were important to support a variety of air missions 

against Iraq. 

Turkey was key to the creation of a northern 

front which could be used to confuse Saddam about 

the direction of the main invasion effort, as well as 

safeguard northern Iraqi oil fields. The U.S. plan was 

to have ground forces from the 4th Infantry Division 
27

strike from Turkish territory while supported by 

significant airpower from Turkish air bases, including 

the important air base at Incirlik, approximately 250 

miles southeast of Ankara. Nevertheless, the prospect 

of a U.S.-led war against Iraq in early 2003 was deeply 

unpopular with the Turkish public. Many Turkish 

parliamentarians regarded the plan to attack Iraq as 

unjustified, and the Turkish Parliament narrowly 

refused approval of Pentagon requests to allow the 

4th Infantry Division to enter Iraq from Turkey. The 

Turks did, however, grant U.S. Air Force jets the 

right to refuel in their country on their way to Iraq.95

The Turkish example is interesting because U.S. 

policymakers strongly believed that they eventually 

would be able to strike a deal with the Turks for the 

use of their facilities in the planned ground invasion of 

Iraq.96 That they ultimately were unable to do so was a 

source of considerable frustration to many within the 

U.S. leadership. The incident reveals the danger that 

even the closest of friends may choose to withhold 

support in some situations, and no country should be 

taken for granted. One author also suggests that the 

Turks should never have been presented with such a 

sensitive request, since the possibility of a mechanized 

division and its attendant supply units being emplaced 

in Turkey and then readied to attack Iraq is something 

that could not be done in a low profile manner that 

respected Turkish public opinion.97

On the eve of the 2003 war, there was a substantial 

U.S. Air Force presence in Saudi Arabia, and the United 

States was clearly interested in using Saudi facilities 

in the upcoming conflict. U.S.-Saudi disagreements 

about the wisdom of invading Iraq were, however, 

serious and based on a fundamental clash of visions 

for the Middle East. While U.S. leadership viewed 
28

Saddam Hussein as an ongoing danger, many Saudis 

considered him much more of a spent force that had 

lost most of his capacity to threaten them.98 Moreover, 

Riyadh was never fully comfortable with the concept of 

regime change in Iraq. Saddam, as a politically isolated 

Sunni strongman, was far from the worst possible 

outcome for the Saudis. If U.S. plans for a new Iraq 

failed, Riyadh faced the possibility of a militant Shi’ite 

regime on their northern border, or even an Iraqi civil 

war with dangerous spillover potential.99 Perhaps even 

more threatening was the prospect of an American 

success in Iraq that placed a democratic government 

in Baghdad. Such a government would serve as a 

rival seeking influence in Washington and perhaps 

even cause Saudi citizens to view their monarchy 

as less attractive than the democratic alternative. 

Nevertheless, Western press sources maintain that the 

Saudis eventually allowed the United States to use 

Prince Sultan Air Base and at least two other facilities 

in the war with Iraq.100 The Saudis also are reported 

to have made the Combined Aerospace Operations 

Center (CAOC) at Prince Sultan Air Base available for 

U.S. use in supporting the war.101

In March 2003, U.S.-led forces attacked Iraq with 

the intention of overthrowing the regime of Iraqi leader 

Saddam Hussein and replacing it with a new and 

democratic system. As expected, Iraq’s conventional 

military forces were defeated rapidly by overwhelming 

U.S. firepower. The United States, however, was not 

able to implement plans for a rapid withdrawal of the 

majority of its forces once Saddam had been ousted. 

Instead, civil disorder and an emerging insurgency 

necessitated a continuing large-scale U.S. presence 

in that country. This presence was resented widely 

throughout the Arab World and harshly criticized in the 
29

Arab press in the immediate aftermath of the invasion. 

In this environment, it has become a cliché to suggest 

that virtually all Arab states passionately opposed the 

invasion of Iraq, but could not manage to dissuade 

the United States from undertaking this operation. 

Such statements are, nevertheless, overgeneralizations 

since some Arab states quietly supported the U.S. 

decision to invade Iraq, as will be documented later 

in this monograph. During the period of the Iran-Iraq 

War, Saddam often was seen throughout the region 

as a strong Arab nationalist and a defender of Arab 

interests, and his support of the Palestinians also was 

widely viewed as positive. Since his defeat in 1991, 

however, Saddam had lost a great deal of his previous 

luster as an Arab nationalist leader.102

The overwhelming hostility of the Arab masses to 

U.S. intervention in Iraq, despite the hatred of many of 

these same people for Saddam Hussein, is puzzling for 

many Americans.103 Yet, many Arabs believe that there 

are rational and indeed compelling reasons for Arab 

enemies of Saddam Hussein to regret the invasion of 

Iraq. The 2003 Iraq war initially was viewed by some 

in the Arab World as the beginning of a new approach 

to foreign policy involving U.S. preemptive strikes 

carried forward without broad international backing. 

The Iraq war was the first example of the new doctrine 

sometimes referred to as a “strategy of preemption.” 

This strategy was seen as being applicable to more than 

a single regime, and there was widespread uncertainty 

about whether the United States was planning 

additional wars after the Iraq intervention. Elites and 

media professionals throughout the Arab World also 

expressed uncertainty that the United States would be 

satisfied with simply defeating the Saddam Hussein 

regime or was instead motivated by a larger agenda, 

especially when prominent neoconservatives, outside 
30

of government, spoke of additional candidates for 

“regime change” and such things as “the establishment 

of some kind of American protectorate over the oil 

fields of Saudi Arabia.”104 As time went on, however, 

these Arab concerns at least were assuaged partially 

by a belief that problems in Iraq have undercut the 

appeal of military intervention as a response to other 

problems with various regimes in the region. 

In addition to concerns about the future of 

U.S. policy, regional states also must address the 

implications of U.S.-initiated changes that already 

have occurred. However controversial or subject to 

differing Western and regional analysis, the ouster of 

the Saddam Hussein regime fundamentally altered 

the nature of Gulf security requirements. The residual 

dangers posed by Iraqi conventional military forces to 

their neighbors now had evaporated for the indefinite 

future. The United States would no longer be required 

to rush troops to Kuwait in response to Iraq saberrattling such as had occurred in October 1994 when 

Saddam had moved a two-division force toward the 

Kuwaiti border with the apparent aim of undermining 

the sanctions regime which had been directed at 

Iraq.105 While this effort was unsuccessful in achieving 

Saddam’s goals, it did illustrate that Saddam could 

still cause at least a limited amount of trouble, and 

his continued presence in power could cause periodic 

problems. Even so, in the aftermath of Saddam’s 

removal from power, new dangers were quick to 

emerge as Iraq faced the problems of insurgency, 

terrorism, and escalating sectarian violence and ethnic 

strife. All of these problems can have potential spillover 

effects for neighboring states. 

Adding to these problems, the citizens of postSaddam Iraq were quick to show many of the 
31

sensitivities about Western domination that had 

characterized earlier Iraqi history. According to long 

time Iraq-based journalist Anthony Shadid, the rhetoric 

of a democratic Middle East, guided by a benevolent 

United States, often is “reminiscent of century-old 

colonialism to a Third World audience.”106 No foreign 

power ever entered the Arab World by claiming that 

it had come to exploit it. All colonial powers have a 

rich fabric of rhetoric suggesting that they are there to 

support the hopes and aspirations of the indigenous 

people. Some Western leaders such as British General 

Sir Stanley Maude, who led an expeditionary force 

into what is now Iraq in 1917, have used the term 

“liberation,” and contemporary Iraqis remain deeply 

familiar with their own history on these issues.107

Moreover, anti-American political agitation sometimes 

has boosted the domestic approval ratings of radical 

Iraqi leaders such as Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Sadr 

experienced a brief but notable rise in his popularity 

among Iraqis as a direct result of clashes between his 

forces and the U.S. military in 2004.108 These concerns 

about the United States appear to have declined later 

in the occupation when sectarianism threatened to 

grow to unmanageable proportions. With thousands of 

people dying each month in sectarian violence, many 

Iraqis were much more willing to support any forces 

of order.109 Additionally, some Sunnis appeared to be 

hedging their bets by supporting the insurgents while 

seeking a continued U.S. presence in Iraq.

The wider Arab World also evinced considerable 

displeasure over the U.S. presence in Iraq in the 

immediate aftermath of the invasion. The two major 

issues identified in a series of public opinion polls 

as dividing the United States and the Arab World 

are Israel/Palestine and the Iraq War. It is doubtful 
32

that large numbers of people within the Arab World 

have rejected the American point of view on Iraq 

because it has not been explained to them enough 

times or provided to them in a suitably packaged 

presentation. In a June 2005 Pew Global Attitudes 

survey, it became apparent that even popular policies 

like tsunami relief did little to reverse the magnitude 

of anti-Americanism.110 Anti-American sentiment also 

tends to spike as a result of certain events such as the 

U.S./Iraq attacks on insurgents based in Fallujah or as 

a result of Israeli crackdowns on Palestinians, which 

often are assumed to be orchestrated with the approval 

of the United States. Yet, by 2006, many commentators 

within the region reluctantly had reversed themselves 

and maintained that a precipitous U.S. withdrawal 

would remove the most important obstacle to an Iraqi 

civil war.

ONGOING TENSIONS ASSOCIATED 

WITH THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM

While differences over Israel/Palestine and Iraq 

dominated U.S.-Arab relations, other problems 

occasionally surfaced to aggravate the already strained 

set of relationships, thereby complicating U.S.-Arab 

military relations. Some of these concerns centered on 

U.S. actions outside of Iraq that have been associated 

with the Global War on Terrorism. The U.S. prison at 

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, most notably, has been of 

concern to a number of Arab countries and publics. 

A major problem here has been the recurring one of 

lurid and inflammatory overseas headlines emerging 

from questions surrounding U.S. administration of 

the Guantanamo Bay-based prison facilities. These 

questions about U.S. activities often tend to overshadow 
33

the terrorist backgrounds of many of the inmates as they 

are reported by the world media. Additionally, some 

of the attorneys for various detainees grant interviews 

in which they relay prisoner charges of U.S. military 

misconduct and abuse. The shocking and repellant 

photos associated with the Abu Ghraib scandal in Iraq 

have created an atmosphere in which many of these 

charges are taken uncritically at face value.

Additionally, a recurring stream of damaging 

stories has emerged from the prison, much of it based 

on unsubstantiated information. The rumors of Koran 

desecration, reprinted by the U.S. magazine Newsweek, 

are especially inflammatory for pious Muslims. Such 

assertions added to a general belief that the United 

States did not respect Muslim values, and the Global 

War on Terrorism was actually a war on Islam. 

Moreover, Newsweek’s decision to retract the story 

often was viewed, if erroneously, as the result of U.S. 

Government pressure on the publication rather than 

an accurate admission that the story was untrue.111

Another problem involves various ex-prisoners 

from Guantanamo who are now returning to their home 

countries with frightening claims of how they were 

treated while in custody.112 Virtually all ex-prisoners 

giving interviews strongly maintain that they are 

innocent of any terrorist or extremist ties. These claims 

frequently are treated sympathetically by the Arab 

media as well as in many European media outlets.113

Moreover, extensive criticism of the Guantanamo 

facility by European political and human rights figures 

also has been noticed by the global and Arab media 

and publics.114 European criticism is viewed widely as 

less biased than that emerging from the Middle East. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, for example, called 

upon the United States to close Guantanamo prison, 
34

although U.S. leadership responded that the prison 

“serves a purpose and is there for a reason.”115 The 

human rights organization, Amnesty International, 

also has called upon the United States to close 

Guantanamo Bay.116 Other reports of detainee abuse 

often find their way into the Western and Arab press, 

and nongovernmental organizations such as Human 

Rights Watch also have criticized the United States for 

its policies toward Muslim and Arab prisoners.117 Of 

considerably less interest to the international media is 

that some of the prisoners released from Guantanamo 

have returned to terrorist activities in Arab countries 

following their repatriation.118

An additional ongoing problem involves questions 

as to whether the U.S. image may be hurt by various 

high profile problems between Europe and the 

Arab World despite strong, continuing, public U.S.-

European differences over Middle East policy. Under 

this logic, the United States, as the perceived leader 

of the Western world, sometimes is tarnished by 

the actions of other Western states. Severe Muslim 

rioting in France in late 2005 was a reminder of some 

of the difficulty in integrating French society.119 The 

Danish cartoon controversy was even more serious. 

Moreover, many in Europe wish to keep Turkey out of 

the European Union because it is large, economically 

unequal to Europe, and, most especially, Muslim. All 

of these problems can merge into an overall view of the 

West as intolerant and unfriendly toward Muslims. 

Muslim and Arab anger about the invasion and 

occupation of Iraq also seems to have made it more 

difficult for U.S. officials to get a fair hearing for 

American policies in the war on terror, and at least 

some attempts to find common ground with Muslim 

reformers have been treated as efforts to change 
35

the subject from Iraq.120 Conversely, U.S. and Iraqi 

leaders sometimes have scolded regional leaders for 

distancing themselves from post-Saddam Iraq rather 

than taking a deeper interest in supporting efforts to 

make the Iraqi government a success. Iraqi leaders 

also have expressed disappointment that most Arab 

states have not sent ambassadors or even in some cases 

lower ranking diplomats to Iraq. President Talibani 

has called this “an insulting issue for the country,” but 

a variety of Arab states respond that Arab diplomats 

are not safe in Baghdad.121 This position is extremely 

credible since a variety of Arab diplomats in Baghdad 

have been kidnapped, assassinated, or wounded in 

attacks by terrorists. The Jordanian Embassy itself 

was bombed in August 2003, with 19 dead and 65 

wounded, although all remaining embassies in Iraq 

now appear much better protected and are thus more 

hardened targets against any future terrorist attacks.122

The Iranians, who are striving consistently to enhance 

their influence in Iraq, appointed an ambassador to 

that country in May 2006.123

No major polls of Arab and Muslim publics suggest 

that the United States is unpopular primarily because 

of its culture as often is claimed. Rather, most polls 

suggest that U.S. policies, particularly toward the 

Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Iraq, are unpopular. 

Anecdotal evidence, nevertheless, does exist that 

many Arabs are worried about the excesses of Western 

culture and the omnipresence of this culture through 

globalization. Describing conditions in their country 

prior to the 1979 revolution, Iranians referred to these 

troubles as “Westoxification.” In response to concerns 

about Western cultural penetration, President Bush has 

stated that, “Some people in Muslim cultures identify 

democracy with the worst of Western popular culture 
36

and want no part of it. And I assure them, when I speak 

about the blessings of liberty, coarse videos and crass 

commercialism are not what I have in mind.”124 Other 

Western countries with even more liberal social policies 

are nevertheless popular with the Arab World, and 

claims that the United States is disliked for its policies 

(as well as its overwhelming power to implement them) 

appear credible. France and Germany both are viewed 

positively over foreign policy issues, although this 

may change with France due to the occasional spikes 

in high profile problems that Paris seems to have with 

its Muslim population.125

POST-SADDAM BASING POLICIES IN IRAQ 

AND THE U.S. WITHDRAWAL FROM SAUDI 

ARABIA 

One of the most immediate results of the 2003 Iraq 

war has been the evacuation of almost all U.S. military 

forces from Saudi Arabia. The decision to withdraw 

U.S. combat forces was announced in April 2003 

with the apparent hope of obtaining an immediate 

foreign policy benefit from Saddam’s ouster.126 As 

a result of this policy, the United States removed 

around 200 military aircraft from Prince Sultan Air 

Base, along with their supporting troops. Less than 

500 U.S. military personnel remained in the Kingdom 

with most of these associated with military training 

missions for the Saudi armed forces.127 This move 

came after a long series of military policy problems 

taking place between the U.S. armed forces and their 

Saudi hosts, including a Saudi interest in diversifying 

their weapons purchases away from the United States 

and concerns that Saudi Arabia was being asked to 

fund too many of the costs associated with the U.S. 
37

presence. These defense specific concerns aggravated 

the more political problems involving disagreements 

over issues of Iraq, Afghanistan, and terrorism.128 The 

removal of U.S. forces from Saudi Arabia also was seen 

as depriving Osama Bin Laden and other radicals of 

a critical issue upon which to base their propaganda 

campaign against the House of Saud. On the eve of 

the invasion, Saudi Arabia was hosting around 5,000 

mostly Air Force U.S. military personnel operating 

primarily from the Prince Sultan Air Base.129 The Saudi 

Arabian government may have felt considerable relief 

at the departure of these U.S. forces from their country, 

although this did not prevent the outbreak of antiregime violence.130 Additionally, a new joint U.S.-Saudi 

interest emerged in May 2003 when terrorists from al 

Qa’ida of the Arabian Peninsula began attacking U.S. 

and Saudi government targets within the country. 

Al-Qaeda claimed in making such attacks, they were 

“attack[ing] the rear of the American Army.”131 This is 

a somewhat unusual claim since major elements of the 

U.S. Army were not in Saudi Arabia, and the U.S. Air 

Force was leaving. The attacks continued sporadically 

throughout 2003 and 2004, but the worst of them 

appeared to be over by the beginning of 2005, at which 

time the government was clearly on the offensive 

against the militants.132

It is possible that the Saudis would have sought a 

U.S. withdrawal from their country even in the absence 

of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.133 Over the years, Riyadh 

became increasingly disinterested in large-scale, 

routine, and conspicuous military cooperation with 

the United States while being reassured with regional 

developments that seemed to opt well for Saudi 

national security. In particular, Riyadh managed to 

improve its relationship with Iran, while believing that 
38

Saddam’s Iraq no longer constituted a grave offensive 

threat. The Saudis also objected to U.S. “pinprick 

raids” on Iraq, which they viewed as creating support 

for Saddam without doing anything to undermine 

his rule.134 Nevertheless, there was an ironic side 

to the 2003 withdrawal of U.S. forces from Saudi 

Arabia. While the Saudi leadership was concerned 

with hostile propaganda resulting from a large U.S. 

military presence in their country, they also became 

apprehensive when the United States developed a 

special military relationship with Qatar, including a 

massive U.S. military presence in that country.135 While 

the Saudi relationship with the United States is based 

fundamentally on oil and not bases, Riyadh may have 

worried that its influence in Washington was being 

diluted by U.S.-Qatari military ties. In the aftermath of 

the U.S. military withdrawal from Saudi Arabia, the 

smaller Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states were 

therefore to become especially important as part of U.S. 

regional strategy and thus more able to resist Saudi 

advice and pressure. The Saudis, for their part, continue to purchase large amounts of U.S. and other 

Western arms and emphasize the continuing importance 

of a U.S.-Saudi dialogue on strategic issues. 

The departure of U.S. military forces from Saudi 

Arabia has raised questions about the possibility of 

a future U.S. military presence at bases within Iraq 

for reasons beyond those of crushing the current 

insurgency and empowering a viable and survivable 

Iraqi government.136 These proposals, which seem 

to originate with neoconservative writers, appear 

misplaced, given Iraq’s long history of concern about 

Western domination and the possibility that a friendly 

Iraqi government could harm its own legitimacy 

by allowing U.S. bases to remain in that country for 
39

other than the specific need to quell current disorders. 

Moreover, this study already has suggested that large 

and important Arab countries, including but not 

confined to Iraq, consistently have displayed unease 

with Western bases. Western bases hurt the credibility 

of states seeking Arab leadership or even an important 

voice within regional politics by making those states 

appear too responsive to foreign priorities.

Key U.S. policymakers understand the delicacy of 

this situation. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 

in answer to a question at a press conference, stated 

that it was “inaccurate and unfortunate” to suggest 

that the United States was seeking permanent bases in 

Iraq.137 Other senior officials such as U.S. Ambassador 

Zalmay Khalilzad continue to insist that the United 

States does not wish to obtain permanent bases.138

As valuable as these statements are, current U.S. 

officials may not be the individuals who are most 

likely to make a final decision on whether or not to 

seek permanent bases, since the insurgency and civil 

unrest are likely to continue until at least the end of 

the current administration. It is hoped that the next 

administration will reiterate such statements upon 

taking office if the United States continues to have 

troops in Iraq at that time and should the possibility of 

permanent bases appear sufficiently unresolved as to 

require clarification. 

Additionally, the vast majority of Iraqi leaders 

have indicated that they do not support U.S. basing in 

their country beyond the time frame needed to quell 

the insurgency.139 Many Iraqi leaders call for a rapid 

withdrawal of U.S. forces, but do not give more than 

a vague time frame (if that), as a way of playing to 

public opinion without compromising their country’s 

national security.140 A few Iraqis, such as radical leader 
40

Muqtada al Sadr of the Sadr II Movement and Harith 

al Dari of the Association of Muslim Scholars, have 

indicated that they favor an immediate withdrawal 

of all U.S. forces.141 Virtually no serious U.S. policy 

experts or political leaders currently suggest that the 

United States should remain in Iraq if asked to leave 

by an elected government. Such a request seems to 

be a strong possibility should U.S. hopes for a selfconfident Iraq to emerge from the current difficulties 

be realized. 

Despite these problems, basing arrangements are 

necessary for those troops currently deployed in Iraq. 

Consequently, construction of acceptable facilities is 

continuing on the assumption that these bases will 

be of service so long as the United States remains in 

Iraq and can be turned over to Iraqi forces upon the 

U.S. departure. Currently, four of the most important 

basing locations in Iraq are Talil in the southern part 

of the country, Bilad Air Base (or Camp Anaconda) in 

central Iraq, al Asad airbase in Western Anbar province, 

and al Qayyarah in northern Iraq. All of these bases 

are some distance from major population centers and 

have vast infrastructures, and sometimes are referred 

to colloquially as “superbases.”142

The new large superbases being built by the 

United States currently have functions that are directly 

related to the suppression of the insurgency, and 

under some scenarios may remain in Iraq after the 

bulk of U.S. combat troops have departed to provide 

logistical support for the Iraqi military in assuming 

responsibility for fighting the insurgency.143 Another 

scenario described by author Fred Kaplan involves the 

possibility that U.S. troops would remain locked down 

in these bases should full scale civil war break out in 

Iraq. This policy, according to Kaplan, would give 
41

the United States “diplomatic leverage” and help to 

discourage foreign intervention by Iraq’s neighbors.144

Unfortunately, no basing scheme provides total 

security for its personnel, and wide-ranging terrorist 

activities could be expected to claim a number of 

Americans lives under such circumstances. Such a 

scenario correspondingly would require a remarkable 

level of patience and understanding from the American 

public, since the idea of leaving troops in Iraq during a 

large-scale civil war may seem utterly appalling even 

if they are locked-down in large bases that limit the 

number of casualties.

U.S. MILITARY RELATIONS WITH EGYPT 

AND JORDAN

Egypt.

Two of the most important U.S. Arab allies, Egypt 

and Jordan, do not host U.S. permanent bases but are, 

nevertheless, important defense partners. Ideally, 

these nations will continue their highly-supportive role 

as U.S. partners, and it is possible that either of these 

states could serve as a model for a stable and friendly 

post-Saddam Iraq should such an entity emerge from 

the current struggle. 

Cairo has continued to show sensitivity about any 

Western military presence on Egyptian soil except 

under crisis conditions or for joint training exercises. In 

1981, for example, negotiations were conducted to allow 

U.S. use of the Egyptian port of Ras Banas if an Arab 

state were threatened.145 Ultimately, these negotiations 

failed because the Egyptians viewed the United States 

as demanding too large a role in managing the facility, 

which was regarded as a matter of extreme sensitivity. 
42

Nevertheless, around the same time, the United States 

and Egypt began their collaboration on regional security through the large and important “Bright Star” 

military exercises. These exercises were first conducted 

in the early 1980s and have continued to be held 

periodically (usually once every 2 years) ever since. In 

addition to the United States and Egypt, the exercises 

often involve contingents from other Arab and European 

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries. 

Around 70,000 troops from 11 nations participated in 

Bright Star 2001, while Bright Star 2003 was cancelled 

due to troop requirements for the Iraq war.146 Around 

30,000 troops from 12 countries participated in Bright 

Star 2005.147 The U.S. and international contributions 

to this exercise were more limited than usual due to 

continuing commitments in Iraq and elsewhere. 

The U.S.-Egyptian security relationship probably 

reached its height in 1991 when Egyptian troops 

formed a highly visible part of the anti-Saddam 

coalition to liberate Kuwait. This relationship has 

remained steady through a series of significant political 

disagreements. Egypt publicly opposed the U.S.-led 

invasion of Afghanistan and especially the war in Iraq, 

but allowed the United States to use the Suez Canal 

and Egyptian airspace to support operations in these 

theaters. In addition, Cairo also accepted that cruise 

missiles would be fired from the Red Sea.148 Egypt also 

has been reported to have been involved in intelligence 

cooperation and other forms of cooperation with 

the United States to support the struggle against 

international terrorism.149 This close relationship with 

the United States over terrorism often is reinforced by 

Egyptian concerns about its own radical Islamists.
43

Jordan.

Jordan is also an important Arab ally of the United 

States, although it does not allow the United States to 

maintain permanent bases on its soil. Amman does, 

however, participate in a variety of joint exercises with 

the United States, and extensive military cooperation 

exists between the two countries. Like Egypt, Jordan 

publicly opposed the war in Iraq, but it has chosen to 

work with the United States despite the disagreement. 

To this end, Jordan even allowed a limited and temporary U.S. military presence on its soil in 2003 for participation in the war itself. This presence has been confirmed 

by Ambassador L. Paul Bremer in his memoirs, My 

Year in Iraq. In describing the relationship, Bremer 

stated that Jordan “had helped us considerably during 

the invasion, allowing Coalition Special Operations 

forces to operate from its territory,” although he does 

not mention numbers.150 In Cobra II, by Michael Gordon 

and retired U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant General 

Bernard Trainor, the authors state that the United 

States and Jordan engaged in lengthy negotiations 

over the size and type of U.S. force to be stationed in 

Jordan to support the hostilities. Gordon and Trainor 

suggest the eventual agreed-upon troop strength was 

5,000 U.S. soldiers, down from a U.S. request to put 

14,000 troops in the kingdom.151 During the war, the 

presence of a large number of combat soldiers in the 

kingdom remained a closely guarded secret, although 

the Jordanian government did admit that U.S. troops 

had been stationed in Jordan for potential searchand-rescue missions from its airfields and to install 

Patriot anti-missile systems.152 Nevertheless, Jordanian 

complicity with the United States was widely suspected 

at the time, and this collaboration may have been one of 
44

the reasons terrorists bombed the Jordanian Embassy 

in Iraq in 2003. 

Following Saddam’s ouster, Jordan undertook an 

ambitious U.S.-supported program to train selected 

Iraqi officers, soldiers, and policemen.153 Bremer 

called this effort “the world’s largest police training 

program.154 While the program was valuable in 

providing training and instilling professionalism, this 

effort was not enough to reform and re-build the Iraqi 

police in the short term. The election of highly sectarian 

leaders in Iraq complicated police professionalization, 

since various internal security figures sought to bring 

their favored militiamen into the interior ministry. 

Militiamen associated with the most important 

Shi’ite political parties consequently were favored for 

admission into the Interior Ministry police forces in 

a number of instances.155 Efforts at reform may have 

rolled back this practice to some extent, although 

the ultimate value of the Jordanian training program 

remains uncertain. If the program does fail, it will 

apparently do so because of the divisive nature of Iraqi 

politics rather than for any shortcomings attributable 

to the Jordanians.

THE POST-SADDAM THREAT ENVIRONMENT 

AND THE GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL

As noted earlier, a number of the smaller Gulf Arab 

states established formal bilateral security relations 

with the United States in the aftermath of the 1991 

Iraq War. These relationships were treated publicly as 

a supplement to the GCC defense framework, but in 

practice they were developed in the certain knowledge 

that the GCC could not deter aggression on its own. 

Before examining those bilateral ties, it is worth 
45

considering the nature of the GCC itself, including its 

problems with collective defense. The GCC was formed 

in May 1981 in the aftermath of the emergence of the 

Islamic Republic of Iran (1979) and the outbreak of the 

Iran-Iraq War (1980-88). The organization’s purpose 

was to help coordinate the foreign, defense, and internal 

security policies of the member states. The states that 

comprise the GCC are Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, 

Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). 

Each of these states maintains a similar type of political 

system, and all have a general interest in containing 

revolutionary ideologies, terrorists, and hostile states 

that may threaten their futures.

Despite common concerns, serious military 

cooperation among the GCC states has remained an 

elusive goal, and there is little likelihood that the GCC 

will act in a united way in any future crisis. Kuwait’s 

GCC membership was not even the shadow of a 

deterrent against an Iraqi invasion of that country in 

1990, and the other GCC states were unable to help 

Kuwait without massive reliance on U.S. and other 

military intervention. Nor does it appear that the GCC’s 

military capabilities have improved dramatically since 

that time. In a recent authoritative study, GCC military 

cooperation was described as largely a “hollow shell.”156

The same study stated that the GCC collective defense 

program is characterized by token forces and exercises, 

along with numerous meetings, speeches, reports, and 

other paperwork that has led to almost no meaningful 

progress.157 The vast majority of serious decisions about 

Gulf security issues continue to be made at a unilateral 

(or bilateral) rather than a multilateral level. Former 

CENTCOM Commander General Anthony Zinni has 

stated bilateral cooperation with the United States often 

was less difficult for these countries than multilateral 
46

cooperation with each other.158 Consequently, the 

difficulties that the Gulf Arab states have in cooperating 

with each other on any meaningful military level helps 

to ensure that each of these states will continue to need 

support from outside powers and will be particularly 

interested in maintaining strong relations with the 

United States. Furthermore, even a united GCC would 

be an unequal match for an assertive Iran or a hostile 

and mobilized Iraq, should such an entity emerge from 

the current effort to define and develop a post-Saddam 

political system. 

Yet, strong Gulf Arab ties with the United States also 

may obfuscate the fact that these links remain subject 

to disruption, downgrading, and serious domestic 

criticism within the Gulf countries. According to one 

informed observer, Gulf Arabs have the potential to 

become more anti-American than any other Arab group 

because of their strong dependence on the West.159 A 

dependency relationship with a country which they 

may see as a demanding and often unfair benefactor 

can be a serious problem for smooth relations between 

the United States and the GCC states. According to 

General Zinni, these problems also can be aggravated 

by “the usual American know it all arrogance that 

tells [the Gulf Arabs] what they ought to be doing.”160

Moreover, it would be a mistake to conclude that the 

Gulf Arabs will tolerate public disrespect indefinitely 

because of their present dependence. While the current 

leaderships of the Gulf Arab states are willing to work 

with the United States to overcome bilateral problems, 

significant portions of the populations of these countries may become more open to anti-American polemics 

and propaganda if the United States visibly treats their 

countries in disrespectful ways (as occurred during to 

Dubai Ports World controversy, to be discussed later).
47

The Gulf Arab states also have some extremely 

serious security concerns including a militant 

Iran, an uncertain future for Iraq, and a variety of 

other problems. These states thus maintain normal 

diplomatic and economic relations with Iran, while 

often worrying about Tehran’s intentions. Current 

Iranian president Mahmoud Amadinajad, in addition 

to being a hardliner on the United States and Israel, is 

known to be an extreme nationalist, who is at home 

with the idea that Iran should dominate the Gulf.161 The 

Gulf Arab states also are significantly more concerned 

about Iranian nuclear weapons ambitions than most 

other Arab countries, and Gulf Arabs are far less likely 

to dismiss the issue by expressing countervailing 

concerns about the Israeli nuclear program.162 The 

destruction of the Saddam Hussein regime and the 

uncertainty of its successor suggest that the Gulf states 

can no longer depend on strategic balance between 

Baghdad and Tehran. Additionally, the 1991 invasion 

of Kuwait suggests that a policy of trying to balance 

these two states needs to break down only once in a 

while to have catastrophic results.

The tension between Iran and the GCC states 

sometimes bubbles to the surface, and some Iranian 

officials still seem to hold a grudge for Gulf Arab support to Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war. Ali Larijani, 

the Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security 

Council (SNSC), for example, has stated, “When have 

we ever attacked a neighbouring country in the last 

150 years? We were the ones attacked by Saddam and 

then [the Gulf Arab states] backed him.”163 As harsh 

as this comment appears, it is true that most Gulf 

Arab states, and especially Kuwait, strongly backed 

Saddam Hussein in the war with Iran.164 Kuwait, to the 

leadership’s later regret, was an exceptionally strong 
48

financial and diplomatic supporter of the Iraqis during 

the war with Iran.

Some of the smaller Gulf states also may be worried 

about the stability and future of Saudi Arabia, although 

the officials of these countries would be among the 

last to admit this concern publicly. A long and bloody 

series of terrorist events in Saudi Arabia during 2004 

was viewed by some Gulf Arabs as at least suggesting 

that a radical anti-monarchist regime could emerge 

on the ashes of the House of Saud in the aftermath 

of a successful revolution. The fall of the Saudi 

monarchy would have seismic effects on the small 

countries surrounding that country, and any successor 

government would probably look with distain on the 

remaining monarchies of the Gulf.

Despite these common concerns, the smaller Gulf 

states must be considered individually since they 

maintain discrete as well as collective defense concerns 

that have led them to seek defense partnerships with 

the United States. The states, considered below, are now 

among the most important U.S. security partners. 

Qatar.

Qatar is a small and wealthy GCC monarchy with 

a long history of political and military cooperation 

with the United States and other Western states. Like 

its neighbors, Bahrain and the UAE, Qatar became 

independent from Great Britain in 1971. At the time 

of its independence, Qatar already had moved 

forward dramatically in the transition from the deeply 

impoverished state of the 1930s to one of the wealthiest 

per capita countries in the world. Currently, the Qatari 

population is almost 900,000, but less than 30 percent 

of these people are Qatari citizens. The rest are guest 

workers.165
49

Oil was discovered in Qatar in 1939, although 

exploitation was delayed by World War II. After the war, 

oil revenues began funding the radical expansion and 

modernization of the Qatari infrastructure. Eventually 

Qatar’s petroleum resources were seriously depleted, 

but these problems were rendered insignificant by 

Qatari exploitation of natural gas. Qatar is now known 

to possess the world’s third largest independent natural 

gas deposits.166 By the 1990s, Qatar’s modernization 

fed by this wealth was such that it had emerged as one 

of the world’s most lavish welfare states. Yet, because 

of limited human resources, Qatar has only a cosmetic 

capacity for self-defense. Qatar, correspondingly, 

became a rich potential prize for any aggressive regional 

power and thus has a clear need for the support of an 

external protector. It is inconceivable that this country 

could ever develop its own military resources to the 

point that they could defend the country in a military 

conflict with one of its larger neighbors. 

A key set of defining events for Qatari foreign 

policy was the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the 

subsequent 1991 war to liberate Kuwait. Following the 

1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, Doha sided decisively 

with the U.S.-led coalition. Qatar announced that it 

would allow coalition troops on its soil, and Qatari 

military forces were sent to participate in the military 

campaign to the extent that their limited numbers 

allowed. Perhaps surprisingly, given their small 

numbers, these troops found themselves involved 

in the Battle of Khafji, Saddam’s only major effort 

at offensive ground action against coalition forces 

during the war (involving the elements of two Iraqi 

divisions).167 The Qataris fought bravely during the 

battle, and at one point a force of 22 Qatari tanks and 

a battalion of Saudi infantry led two separate but 
50

unsuccessful attacks to retake the town of Khafji from 

the Iraqi force. Unfortunately, Qatari forces also made 

a number of serious tactical mistakes throughout the 

battle, including firing on Saudi armored vehicles that 

were misidentified as Iraqi.168 Khafji was not retaken 

until U.S. airpower and artillery strikes had pulverized 

the Iraqi defense thoroughly, thereby allowing Qatari 

and Saudi forces to return there on the third effort to 

take the city.169

Perhaps somewhat surprisingly for a wealthy state, 

there has been relatively little military modernization 

and expansion in the Qatari armed forces since the 1991 

war, and there has been no serious movement to begin 

purchasing militarily significant quantities of U.S. 

weapons. The size of the military also has remained 

small, with about 12,000 personnel, of which 8,500 are 

in the army. The Qataris did, however, sign a bilateral 

defense cooperation agreement with the United States 

in 1995. This agreement reverses the previous Qatari 

policy of remaining distant from the major powers, 

such as Kuwait had done prior to 1990. Moreover, Doha 

has made serious efforts to develop and consolidate 

strong U.S. military ties since 1995, and this effort is 

clearly the most important pillar of Qatar’s national 

security policy. According to the Qatari Foreign 

Minister, “We need the United States here in Qatar, 

and the United States needs us.”170 The Qataris also 

have sought to expand friendly relations and, in some 

cases, security ties with numerous Arab, European, and 

other states as a hedge against international isolation 

in a crisis. Interestingly, Qatar also maintains an overt 

and strong trading relationship with Israel, although 

Doha is careful to direct sympathy and support to the 

Palestinians as well.171

Although Qatar was publicly opposed to the 

initiation of U.S. hostilities with Iraq in 2003, this 
51

opposition never seemed all that serious and may 

have been confined to occasional vacuous rhetoric in 

public forums. Prior to the war, former Qatari Justice 

Minister Najeeb al Nauimi stated, “Anything is better 

than that man [Saddam] . . . For now, the interests 

of the Iraqis coincide with those of the Americans, 

and the Iraqi people should take advantage of this 

before the Americans change their minds.”172 Even 

more authoritatively, the emir of Qatar privately told 

the former Commander of U.S. Central Command, 

“General Franks, you have the opportunity to save 

the Iraqi people.”173 The contradiction between these 

statements and some public statements about avoiding 

war is comprehensible when considering that Qatar 

wants a special relationship with the United States, but 

does not wish to take public stands that unnecessarily 

antagonize its neighbors. Additionally, Qatari leaders 

did not wish to make belligerent statements in public 

so long as they believed that a chance remained for a 

last minute U.S.-Iraqi deal that left Saddam in power.

In an especially important display of pre-war U.S.-

Qatari cooperation, the CENTCOM forward command 

headquarters was moved to Camp as Saliya, Qatar, in 

late 2002.174 Prior to this move, Camp as Saliyah had 

served primarily as a military depot for U.S. forces 

operating in the Gulf, and it also was used as a staging 

area for U.S. forces fighting in Afghanistan.175 The 

Qataris made serious overtures to the United States to 

encourage this move despite the likely possibility of 

a new U.S.-Iraqi war. The arrangement has continued 

since that time and seems to work well. Camp as Saliyah 

on the edge of Doha, nevertheless, was not envisioned 

by either country as a permanent base. It is the smaller 

of the two major U.S. bases in Qatar and is expected to 

close over the next several years due to its position on 
52

valuable real estate and the temporary nature of many 

of its structures and facilities. U.S. forces at Camp as 

Saliyah will be stationed elsewhere in Qatar without 

any planned reduction in the total size of U.S. forces in 

that country.

Qatar’s al Udeid Air Base is a much more important 

asset for supporting U.S. strategy in the region. Al Udeid 

has the longest runway in the Middle East (15,000 feet) 

and was built by the Qataris at a cost of $1 billion.176

Since Qatar has an exceptionally small air force, it seems 

safe to assume that Doha built this facility as a way to 

improve its military relations with the United States 

and safeguard its own security by serving as a host 

country to a large and powerful U.S. military presence. 

Al Udeid played an important role in supporting U.S. 

air operations during the U.S.-led war to oust the 

Taliban regime in Afghanistan, although this was not 

well-known at the time. Additionally, the base proved 

exceptionally valuable during the conventional stage 

of the Iraq war. As the insurgency in Iraq intensified, 

the al Udeid Air base also has remained important to 

the United States to support ongoing operations in 

that country. Increased airlifts of supplies from Qatar 

to Iraq were initiated to reduce the number of more 

vulnerable supply convoys.177 The U.S. Navy also 

cooperates with Qatari authorities, who support a 

number of port visits. Currently, Qatar does not have 

an aircraft carrier capable port, although it is expanding 

its current port facilities in Doha and is expected to be 

able to accommodate a U.S. attack carrier within a few 

years, if both states find this advantageous.

The U.S.-Qatari relationship seems to be moving 

forward despite the potential problems with U.S.-

Arab relations over the continuation of the Iraq war. 

President Bush visited Qatar in June 2003 as part of a 
53

wider Middle Eastern tour. He was the first serving 

U.S. president to do so.178 In another example of good 

bilateral relations, the emir of Qatar gave $100 million 

to the U.S. victims of Hurricane Katrina in the aftermath 

of the disaster in August 2005.179 The United States 

also appears satisfied that Qatar is stable and making 

satisfactory progress toward democratic government. 

Although the current emir came to power in a coup 

d’etat against his father on June 27, 1995, he appears 

to have made considerable progress in uniting the 

population behind him.180 Qatar also is engaging in 

some efforts at political reform. In April 2003, voters 

approved a new constitution which creates a 45-

member parliament, with 30 elected members and 

the rest selected by the emir. Additionally, Qatar 

formally lifted censorship of the media in 1995 and has 

abolished its Ministry of Information, which previously 

had performed that function.181 Although informal 

censorship still exists on subjects related to Qatari 

governance, Qatar nevertheless has one of the least 

censored medias in the Middle East.182 This situation 

sometimes has angered the United States because of the 

freewheeling aspects of the al Jazeera satellite television 

network, but this highly controversial station may 

provide Qatar with the political cover to maintain its 

expanded military relationship with the United States. 

It also serves as a vehicle—really a weapon—for Qatar 

to defend itself against hostile regional criticism of its 

friendly relations with the United States and its trade 

relationship with Israel.

Serious post-Saddam threats also bind the United 

States and Qatar together. These concerns center on the 

danger of a more assertive Iran and an insufficiently 

stabilized Iraq or a new Iraqi dictatorship. Of these 

threats, Iran is the most serious Qatari concern due to its 
54

location directly across the Gulf. The Qatari leadership, 

while distrustful of Iran, also has attempted to manage 

relations with Tehran in ways that minimize friction 

between the two nations.183 These efforts appear to 

have been largely successful, and no recent serious 

tensions have occurred in the relationship between the 

two countries. Nevertheless, Qatar is aware of its own 

vulnerability to Iranian military operations should 

the Iranians feel that such attacks would be in their 

interests. 

While not a threat in the same sense as Iran, Qatar 

also has a series of ongoing problems with Saudi 

Arabia. Strong ties with the United States and a variety 

of other nations may be deemed useful in giving the 

Qataris the leverage and self-confidence to argue their 

cases more forcefully in their interactions with Riyadh. 

The Saudis at various times have become especially 

angry with Doha over such issues as the occasionally 

unfavorable portrayal of Saudi Arabia by Qatar’s al 

Jazeera satellite television.184 Relations also have been 

reported to have been strained by Saudi disapproval of 

Qatar’s economic relations with Israel.185 The Qataris, 

for their part, are unhappy with Saudi backing for a 

1996 attempted countercoup designed to reinstall the 

father of the current emir.186 Many Qatari officials also 

have expressed exasperation with the “big brother/

little brother” relationship they sometimes suggest 

characterizes Saudi Arabian attitudes toward their 

country.187

On the domestic front, Qatar has had only limited 

problems with terrorism, but it does have some.188 In 

June 2005, Jonathan Adams, a British drama teacher, 

was killed in Doha, and 12 other people were wounded 

in a suicide car bombing by an Egyptian expatriate 

working for Qatar Petroleum.189 The Qatari government 
55

responded to the attack by urging its citizens and 

expatriates to join a “Rally of Indignation” protesting 

the murder of a British citizen.190 Pro-Western posters 

were put up, and full-page ads in Qatari newspapers 

offered condolences to Adams’ widow and children. 

U.S. military leaders, including CENTCOM’s Major 

General John Castellaw, have stated in 2005 that 

Qatar is working well with the United States to fight 

terrorism.191

Qatari citizens consistently seem much more willing 

to accept a U.S. military presence than a variety of other 

Arabs, and no serious Qatari opposition to the U.S. 

presence appears to have developed despite ongoing 

U.S.-Arab differences over a variety of political and 

policy issues. U.S. policy in Qatar also seeks to avoid 

antagonizing the local culture to the greatest extent 

possible. Qataris call themselves Wahhabi Muslims, but 

their behavior and approach to Islam is nevertheless 

much less puritanical than the type of Wahhabi Islam 

found in Saudi Arabia. Women can drive cars, and 

some have chosen to wear Western-style dress. The 

current emir has stated that his two daughters are free 

to choose their own style of dress, and that one has 

chosen Western-style dress, while the other favors 

traditional clothing. The difference between the Qatari 

and Saudi outlook is sometimes ascribed to a Qatari 

history of seaborne trade which has caused them to 

have a much wider set of interactions with foreign 

values and ideas than the more insular Saudis.192

United Arab Emirates.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is a collection 

of seven emirates which have formed a federal 

government and functioned as a single state since 
56

December 1971. Prior to 1971, the UAE sheikhdoms 

were known as the Trucial States and had separate 

treaty relations with the United Kingdom (UK). The 

UK military presence in the Trucial States (except for 

a small number of military advisors) had been phased 

out over the years following the United Kingdom’s 

1967 announcement to withdraw major military units 

stationed east of Suez by 1971.193 The country itself 

currently has a population of only around three million 

people, of which up to 80 percent are resident foreigners. 

The UAE is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, 

and has been careful to structure its international 

relations to facilitate widespread international and 

particularly Western concern about any national 

security threat to the UAE. To this end, the UAE has 

invited massive Western investment and building, 

made large purchases including military purchases 

from Western countries, engaged in symbolic acts of 

friendship, and sought other forms of cooperation.194

Moreover, the UAE, and especially its constituent 

emirate of Dubai, has hosted a variety of international 

conferences, events, and festivals designed to raise the 

international profile of the state and perhaps increase 

the ranks of its international supporters.195

These precautions seem wise since serious national 

security concerns do exist. In particular, the UAE 

leadership is uneasy about Iranian intentions, and the 

Emirati leadership also is concerned that problems 

arising from Iraqi insecurity might affect the country. 

The Iranian claim to three Gulf islands which it took 

from the UAE emirates of Ras al-Khayma and Sharja 

in 1971 is a continuing problem in UAE-Iranian 

relations.196 At least some elements within the UAE 

appear to remain angry and distrustful of Iran over the 

islands issue, with both sides asserting strong claims 

of sovereignty to the area. The UAE has attempted 
57

to pursue this issue through the International Court 

of Justice, but no real progress has been made. Like 

some of the other Gulf states, the UAE has displayed a 

superficial willingness to work with the Iranians, and 

the UAE emirate of Dubai has a large ethnic Iranian 

minority. Nevertheless, Emirati pragmatism about 

Iran does not equal trust. 

In 1994 the UAE signed a military cooperation 

agreement with the United States, and it has similar 

agreements with the UK and France.197 The UAE also 

has a significantly larger and more modern military 

than most of the other small Gulf states.198 Unlike Qatar, 

UAE clearly is willing to spend significant resources 

on military modernization. To this end, the Emirati 

Ministry of Defense recently has purchased 80 F-16 

fighter aircraft from the United States, the first of which 

were delivered in May 2005. These “Desert Falcons” 

were developed with the UAE contributing $2 billion 

to the cost of new technologies associated with their 

components and systems.199 Nevertheless, the UAE 

appears to be plagued by what Middle East security 

expert Anthony Cordesman refers to as the “glitter 

factor.” Elaborating on this problem, Cordesman 

suggests that the UAE seems more determined to make 

expensive showcase purchases than to develop serious 

military capabilities.200 Such concerns are serious, 

particularly since the UAE has only limited human 

resources to apply to the needs of national defense. 

The military itself draws its manpower heavily from 

its five less wealthy northern and eastern emirates but 

also must include foreign expatriate soldiers at the 

lower enlisted ranks.201

The crisis in the international system created by 

the 9/11 attacks against the United States caused the 

UAE to seek new ways to strengthen relations with the 

United States and the West. The U.S.-UAE relationship 
58

is a core element of UAE foreign policy, and in the 

aftermath of the strikes appeared to be threatened 

because the UAE had maintained normal ties with 

the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and because two 

of the 9/11 highjackers were Emiratis.202 The ties with 

the Taliban particularly were embarrassing to the 

UAE since they resulted from an act of official policy, 

and UAE-Afghan diplomatic relations were severed 

quickly. These ties originally had been established 

at the urgings of Pakistan in 1997 before Bin Laden 

appeared to be a serious threat to the United States.203

The UAE later complied with UN sanctions initiated in 

late 2000 against the Taliban government for continuing 

to harbor Osama Bin Laden.204

A variety of U.S. commentators have raised 

concerns about pre-9/11 UAE ties with the Taliban, 

but these concerns must be placed in the context of the 

regional situation. The high point of UAE-Taliban ties 

came at the time when the upheaval in Afghanistan 

appeared to be a major distraction for Iranian foreign 

policy away from the Gulf. In August 1998, Iran 

appeared close to war with the Taliban regime after a 

Taliban unit entered the Iranian Consulate in Mazare-Sharif and murdered 11 Iranian citizens including 

diplomats, intelligence officers, and a journalist. These 

murders occurred as part of much wider massacre of 

Afghan Shi’ites (Hazaras) throughout the city in direct 

retaliation for similar treatment directed at the Taliban 

in 1997. While the crisis eventually subsided after the 

temporary massing of around 200,000 Iranian troops 

on the Afghan border, serious Iranian problems with 

their eastern flank must have been viewed with some 

favor by the UAE leadership.205

The UAE’s geopolitical reasons for flirting with Iran’s 

Taliban enemies collapsed after 9/11, and the UAE, as 
59

noted, severed diplomatic relations with Afghanistan 

within 2 weeks of the attacks. Additionally, UAE military facilities quickly were made available to the United 

States for use in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM, the 

U.S. bombing and invasion of Afghanistan. The UAE 

also moved rapidly in ordering its financial institutions 

to freeze the assets of 63 organizations and individuals 

suspected by the United States of financing terrorist 

movements.206 The UAE also was quick to welcome 

the post-Taliban transformation of Afghanistan. UAEAfghan diplomatic relations were reestablished by then 

interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai in February 2002, 

with the UAE pledging to provide economic assistance 

to the new Afghan government.207 In another act of 

solidarity, the UAE pledged $100 million in aid to the 

U.S. victims of Hurricane Katrina.208

As with some of the other Gulf states, the UAE was 

prepared to help the United States with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but the Emirati leadership also preferred 

not to emphasize that role as a hedge to avoid antagonizing other Arab states and perhaps some elements of 

their own indigenous and resident foreign population. 

U.S. officials have stated that the UAE gave valuable 

support to the war effort against Iraq by expanding the 

Dhafra Air Base near Abu Dhabi and making it available 

to coalition aircraft.209 This contribution became much 

more widely known during the controversy that 

followed the announcement of what was to be called 

the Dubai Ports World controversy when incidents of 

support to U.S. security operations in the Gulf were 

posted on the White House web site.210

Currently, the UAE is one of the most reliable 

allies that the United States has for providing military 

facilities and logistical bases for U.S. forces in the region. 

One of the most important of these facilities is the 
60

above-noted Dhafra Air Base. Around 1,500 American 

military personnel live and work at this airbase, which 

supports a variety of missions of considerable national 

security value to the United States.211 Additionally, the 

Dhafra Air Base is home to the Gulf Air Warfare Center, 

a major training facility for a variety of allied pilots.212

According to British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) 

reporting, the UAE also allows U-2 (TR-1) high altitude 

reconnaissance flights from this air base. This role was 

highlighted tragically by the BBC in June 2005 when 

they reported that one of these planes crashed after 

having completed a mission in support of U.S. troops 

in Afghanistan. According to the BBC, this aircraft 

seems to have been lost for reasons other than enemy 

fire.213

The UAE further provides important support to the 

U.S. Navy. According to the White House, the UAE’s 

Dubai port of Jebel Ali hosts hundreds of U.S. Navy 

ships and, in total, supports more U.S. Navy ship visits 

than conducted at any other non-U.S. port.214 Moreover, 

Jebel Ali is considered one of the best equipped ports 

to support U.S. Navy operations and the provisioning 

of U.S. Navy ships.215 This provisioning involves 

everything from fresh vegetables to fuel to spare parts. 

This is the only facility among the smaller Arab Gulf 

states which is able to accommodate a large U.S. attack 

aircraft carrier, although these ships also are moored 

off the coast of Bahrain, with members of the crew 

going ashore ferried back and forth by small boat.216

Jebel Ali also is well-protected by a variety of antiterrorism measures.217

The UAE does not seem to have major problems 

with terrorism, although there have been occasional 

difficulties. These problems may increase as a result of 

the UAE decision to side decisively with the United 
61

States in the war on terrorism. In March 2004, the 

embassy in Abu Dhabi and the Consulate General in 

Dubai suspended operations due to a “specific threat 

to the embassy in Abu Dhabi.”218 Moreover, the UAE 

has been directly threatened by al Qa’ida because of 

its close relations with the West and particularly the 

United States.219 It is easy to suspect that al Qa’ida has 

become progressively angrier with the UAE in period 

after 9/11 when it, as noted above, renounced ties to 

the Taliban and began to crack down on questionable 

money transactions in Dubai and other UAE banks. The 

crackdown on money laundering seems particularly 

problematic to al Qa’ida and involves the enforcement 

of major new UAE banking and financial laws.220 The 

UAE has been reported to be highly cooperative with 

U.S. security officials on financial issues, and one 

account by author Ron Suskind suggests that UAE 

officials became perhaps even somewhat overzealous 

in freezing suspect accounts.221

U.S.-UAE relations are subject to problems and 

were disrupted over the controversy that followed the 

announcement of the Dubai Ports World agreement, 

but this damage will probably not be permanent. The 

set of problems that became known as the Dubai Ports 

World controversy involved a UAE company that 

sought to acquire Britain’s Peninsular and Oriental 

Steam Navigation (P&O) Corporation in a $6.8 billion 

purchase. This purchase, by the third largest ports 

company in the world, would allow Dubai Ports 

World to take over the management of six major U.S. 

ports—Newark, New York, Baltimore, New Orleans, 

Miami, and Philadelphia. There was very little reason 

to suspect that the deal would become controversial 

since other U.S. port terminals have been managed by 

companies from the United Kingdom, China, Japan, 
62

Singapore, and Taiwan.222 Additionally, the U.S. Coast 

Guard, harbor police, U.S. Department of Customs, 

port authorities, and other U.S. security organizations 

would continue to control the physical security of the 

ports, regardless of who operated them.223 The UAE 

would not determine the workers to be hired at the 

U.S. ports, who would instead be supplied by the 

longshoreman’s union.224

Unfortunately, the agreement was controversial 

despite the safeguards that it included. According 

to U.S. reporters and public opinion specialists, 

objections over the agreement were first seized upon by 

incendiary “talk” radio commentators and soon spread 

to influence U.S. public opinion.225 This is not the place 

to examine the domestic politics of the deal except to 

note that they were severe and presented a difficult 

challenge to an administration attempting to treat an 

Arab ally with friendship and respect. In considering 

the acceptability of the deal, some critics maintained 

that the UAE was enforcing the Arab League boycott 

of Israel, and that this made them an unacceptable 

political partner for the United States.226 Such charges 

accurately reflected the formal UAE position on trade 

and other economic interactions with Israel, but they 

did not reflect the more subtle ways in which the UAE 

can do business. Nor was the UAE prepared to let the 

criticism stand. Shortly after the charges were leveled, 

the head of Zim, Israel’s largest shipping company, sent 

a letter supporting Dubai Ports World to a leading U.S. 

Senator.227 The letter, which was quickly made public, 

stated that the Board of Directors at Zim strongly 

supported the deal, had done extensive business with 

Dubai Ports World, and felt the Dubai Ports World 

was an exceptionally solid partner. The letter almost 

certainly was sent as the result of a UAE request.
63

In response to the firestorm of criticism, Dubai 

Ports World announced in March 2006 that it would 

sell the rights to operate the six U.S. terminals to a 

U.S. company within 6 months.228 The message sent to 

the Arab World over this issue was abominable. Arab 

allies would be treated with suspicion solely because 

they were Arab. Nevertheless, in a valuable effort 

to limit the damage of the DP controversy, the U.S. 

Government approved a $1.24 billion UAE takeover 

of Doncasters, a British engineering company with 

U.S. plants that supply the Department of Defense.229

President Bush also declared his personal commitment 

to improved relations with the UAE, stating, “In order 

to win the war on terror, we’ve got to strengthen our 

relationships and friendships with moderate Arab 

countries in the Middle East. The UAE is a committed 

ally in the war on terror. They are a key partner for our 

military in a critical region.”230

Kuwait.

Kuwait has a native population of just fewer than 

one million citizens and perhaps as many as two million 

foreigners within the country. It also has 10 percent 

of the world’s known oil reserves. The first of these 

large oil reserves was discovered in 1937, and massive 

infrastructure development based on oil revenues 

began after the end of World War II. Like several other 

small states in the region, Kuwait is both rich and 

vulnerable, and this vulnerability was underscored in 

the most tangible way when the country was invaded 

and brutally occupied in 1990. Kuwait has been one 

of the most important Arab allies of the United States 

since the liberation of that country in 1991. The 1990 

invasion and the subsequent Iraqi occupation were 
64

defining national traumas for Kuwait. The Kuwaitis, 

correspondingly, have made great efforts to ensure 

that such an event will never be repeated.

In the immediate aftermath of the 1991 liberation, 

the U.S.-Kuwaiti relationship often was viewed by 

both sides as a “special relationship,” with the two 

countries drawn together by, among other things, 

shared concern about Gulf security and residual Iraqi 

troublemaking. In making the decision to consolidate 

its military and political ties to the West, Kuwait 

quietly discarded security agreements based on the 

March 1991 “Damascus Declaration,” which called for 

the protection of Kuwait by the indefinite stationing 

of Egyptian and Syrian troops on its soil.231 This 

“Arab forces” security option was disregarded by 

the Kuwaitis as unreliable, expensive, and subject to 

possible politicization within the context of inter-Arab 

politics. Kuwait’s basic guarantee of security therefore 

remained dependent on its relationship with the United 

States, which it continually has sought to maintain and 

improve. On April 1, 2004, Kuwait was made a “major 

non-NATO ally,” a distinction it shares with about a 

dozen other countries, which in the Middle East include 

Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, and Israel.232 In another recent 

act of relationship maintenance, Kuwait, like many of 

the other Gulf Arab states, pledged financial assistance 

to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The Kuwaitis 

promised $100 million and an additional $400 million 

in oil products.233

The Kuwaiti leadership also attempted to modernize 

the armed forces following the 1991 war when that 

force’s military shortcomings rapidly became clear. 

Kuwaiti forces at the time of the invasion were too 

small and unprepared to serve as much of an obstacle 

when the Iraqis struck. Kuwaiti units therefore were 
65

unable to cause the Iraqis more than minor delays, and 

most of the ground forces rapidly fell apart.234 Many of 

Kuwait’s 20,000 ground troops were killed or captured, 

although up to 7,000 soldiers escaped across the Saudi 

border. Some units of the Kuwaiti Air Force operating 

from the southern part of their country attacked 

advancing Iraqi armored and mechanized units before 

their air base was overrun and they were forced to flee 

to Saudi Arabia.235 Later, during the U.S.-led offensive 

to retake that country, remaining Kuwaiti military 

units were attached to other Arab forces in supporting 

this effort.236

In the aftermath of the 1991 war, the Kuwaitis 

moved to improve their military forces as well as 

their relations with Western and other global powers, 

although Kuwait also had difficulties meeting its own 

self-defense goals. Kuwait purchased U.S.-made F-18 

Hornet aircraft and expanded its military to include a 

number of U.S.-equipped ground force brigades, but 

it also faced difficulty manning them and providing 

them with appropriate levels of maintenance and 

support. Anthony Cordesman has noted that with an 

active duty force of 11,500 soldiers, Kuwait has only 

enough troops to stand up two maneuver combat 

brigades and that Kuwaiti brigades actually resemble 

large battalions. Nevertheless, the Kuwaitis have 

made a serious effort to work through these problems. 

Cordesman also notes that Kuwaiti training as of 2003 

had been effective at the brigade and squadron level, 

and the ability of these units to deploy and fight had 

risen significantly.237

Kuwaiti concern about Iraq after 1991 also was 

reinforced periodically by threatening gestures toward 

that country by the Saddam regime. One particularly 

notable confrontation occurred in October 1994 when 
66

the Iraqis moved two Republican Guard divisions 

from areas around Baghdad to positions about 12 miles 

from the Kuwaiti border.238 The United States, as noted 

earlier, responded to the crisis by rushing troops to the 

area to serve as a deterrent against Iraqi aggression. 

Another crisis occurred in February 1998, when U.S. 

troop strength in Kuwait was increased in preparation 

to any Iraqi counterstrike after the beginning of 

Operation DESERT FOX. The U.S. decision to punish 

Saddam for his noncooperation with UN weapons 

inspectors also carried the risk that he would lash out 

at pro-American states such as Kuwait. In both cases, 

Iraq prudently chose not to strike at Kuwait, apparently 

understanding that it would not benefit from a process 

of military escalation with the United States. 

Due to their hatred and fear of Saddam, the 

Kuwaitis were the most supportive of any Arab 

country in backing the planned invasion of Iraq in 

2003. In the preparation phase for the coming war, 

Kuwaiti bases hosting U.S. and other coalition troops 

occupied over one-quarter of the country by providing 

space for military encampments, training facilities, and 

artillery ranges.239 Kuwait also supplied U.S. military 

forces entering into Iraq with fuel for their vehicles 

and equipment at no cost. Later, the Kuwaitis sought 

nominal payment for fuel supplied to U.S. forces 

remaining in Iraq after Saddam’s ouster.240 Kuwaitis 

still refer to the 2003 invasion as the “liberation of 

Iraq,” terminology almost never found elsewhere 

in the Arab World. Nor were they hesitant about 

asserting the importance of this phrase in March 2003 

when the UAE-based pan Arab television station, al 

Arabiya, described the conflict only as the “third gulf 

war.” Angry that the conflict was not referred to as 

“the liberation of Iraq,” Kuwaiti backers of the station 

pulled a quarter of its funding.241
67

Despite their enthusiasm for Operation IRAQI 

FREEDOM, many Kuwaitis are deeply uncertain about 

the future of Iraq and how still unfolding events there 

ultimately will affect them. While virtually all Kuwaitis 

were delighted to see Saddam removed from power, 

they also recognize that problems with Iraq could continue to grow and develop in the aftermath of Saddam’s 

ouster. While Kuwait strongly and openly supported 

the U.S. decision to oust Saddam, some Kuwaitis are 

angry with what they see as a botched occupation 

that was based on minimal planning and coordination 

with allies in the region.242 They also worry about the 

possibility of another Iraqi strongman emerging from 

a divided and unstable Iraq. Two Iraqi heads of state 

prior to Saddam (King Ghazi and Brigadier Abdul 

Karim Qassim) claimed that Kuwait was a part of Iraq 

which needed to be restored to the homeland.243 King 

Ghazi, who ruled Iraq as a restless British client in the 

late 1930s, demanded Kuwait’s annexation in public 

statements and attempted to incite Kuwaitis against 

their local leaders while the country was still a British 

protectorate.244 Even more seriously, Brigadier Qassim 

publicly threatened to invade Kuwait and restore it to 

the Iraqi homeland by military force after the British 

granted the country independence in 1961. Qassim’s 

threats prompted British and later Arab League forces 

to be stationed in Kuwait to deter an Iraqi invasion.245

The belief that Iraqi designs on Kuwait will not end 

with Saddam is therefore not surprising and may well 

be correct. 

In the past, Kuwait at times has viewed a rough 

balance of power between Iraq and Iran as having 

some positive aspects, although this view changed in 

1991. Iraq invaded Kuwait at a time when Iran had 

been weakened severely by the Iran-Iraq war and was 
68

not in a position to respond to the crisis. A weakened 

Iran thus helped to empower a strong and aggressive 

Iraq. Nevertheless, when Iraq received an unexpectedly 

strong response from the United States, Baghdad 

quickly renegotiated its relationship with Iran, making 

a variety of territorial and other concessions to Tehran 

in order to redeploy its troops to face potential combat 

against the United States and its allies. The 1991 war left 

Saddam severely crippled, but he was still considered 

Kuwait’s deadliest enemy until his ouster in 2003. 

In the aftermath of Saddam’s ouster, Iran has 

emerged as the strongest of the Gulf regional powers. 

Unfortunately, the political leadership in Tehran has 

become more extreme over the last few years with 

the marginalization of the Iranian reform movement 

and the elevation of additional hardliners such as 

Iranian President Amadinejad. Additionally, Kuwait 

has a troubling history with Iran that was set aside 

in recent years due to the more serious threat of 

Saddam Hussein. During the Iran-Iraq war, Kuwait 

was threatened repeatedly by the Tehran government 

for its support of Iraq, and Iranian-supported terrorist 

activities in Kuwait emerged as a serious problem. 

On one occasion, the Kuwaiti emir was targeted in an 

unsuccessful assassination attempt that the Kuwaitis 

believe was Iranian supported.246 In some instances, 

the Iranian Air Force “mistakenly” bombed targets in 

Kuwait.247 Kuwaiti problems with Iraq, therefore, have 

not made them comfortable with a resurgent Iran, and 

this concern provides additional support for the policy 

of U.S. troops remaining with the country. 

The U.S. military currently maintains troops 

scattered throughout around 10 bases in Kuwait, the 

most important of which are Camp Buehring and 

Camp Arifjan. Previously the centerpiece of the U.S. 
69

presence in Kuwait was Camp Doha, but this facility 

had been closed almost completely by early 2006, with 

the Camp Doha operations transferred to other bases in 

Kuwait that are farther away from civilian population 

centers.248 Camp Doha was never envisioned to be a 

permanent base, and the movement to Camp Arifjan 

constitutes an effort to further lower the profile of U.S. 

troops in Kuwait. Some Kuwaitis have previously 

expressed concern that the U.S. military presence 

is exceptionally visible to the local citizenry, unlike 

during the early 1960s when British troops in Kuwait 

appeared virtually invisible. Both the U.S. and Kuwaiti 

governments seek to limit the U.S. public profile in the 

country as a way of minimizing any strengthening of 

the political opposition to their presence.

On the domestic front, Kuwait is a stable country 

which handled a contentious succession crisis in 2006 

with dignity and consensus.249 Varying degrees of 

political freedom also have existed throughout Kuwaiti 

post-independence history. The Kuwaiti parliament 

was created by the 1962 Constitution, and the Parliament 

operated sporadically from 1963 to 1990 and almost 

continuously from 1992 on. Kuwait also has a strong 

reformist movement which is well-represented in the 

Parliament. Upon occasion, the Parliament can be quite 

assertive in confronting the monarchy.250 Kuwait also 

has an ongoing reform movement and granted women 

the right to vote in 2005.

The Kuwaiti population is about 25-30 percent 

Shi’ite, and this group traditionally has been outside 

of the governmental power structure. In recent years, 

Kuwaiti Shi’ites have suffered discrimination and 

remain outside of the inner circles of power, but the 

Kuwaiti government also has taken a number of steps 

to integrate them more fully into the political life of the 
70

state and to give them a stake in the future of the Kuwaiti 

political entity.251 Kuwaiti policies toward their Shi’ites 

often appear particularly enlightened when compared 

to those of Saudi Arabia and, to some extent, Bahrain.252

A key moment of Shi’ite choice was the aftermath of 

the 1990 Iraqi invasion when Kuwaiti Shi’ites formed 

an important part of the underground resistance to the 

Iraqi occupation, establishing themselves among the 

foremost Kuwaiti nationalists.253

A small number of Kuwaitis and noncitizen 

residents of Kuwait disapprove of that country’s role 

as a springboard for the 2003 invasion and object to the 

continuing presence of 25,000 U.S. troops in Kuwait.254

Most of these oppositionists appear to be Islamists, and 

there is a fringe of violent radicals. Al Qa’ida has a few 

Kuwaitis, and a former al Qa’ida spokesman, Suleiman 

Abu al Ghaith, was a Kuwaiti who lost his citizenship 

in 2001.255 Other members of al Qa’ida appear to have 

grown up in Kuwait as the children of foreign workers, 

including the operational mastermind of the 9/11 

attacks, Khaled Sheikh Mohammad, and his nephew, 

Ramzi Yousef, one of the planners of the first World 

Trade Center attack in 1993.256 Both of these individuals 

are Pakistani citizens. There also have been shoot-outs 

between the police and the armed Islamic extremists 

within Kuwait.257 One of the most important of these 

confrontations was the “Peninsula Lions” incident of 

January 2005. This episode involved a 3-day gun battle 

between Kuwaiti police and antigovernment radicals, 

often identified as associates of al-Qa’ida. Four 

policemen and two civilian bystanders were killed 

in this battle, along with eight of the terrorists. Ten 

policemen also were wounded in the clash which was 

unprecedented in Kuwaiti history. Six of the terrorists 

captured in this attack were sentenced to death by 
71

hanging in December 2005. Twenty-two others were 

given prison sentences ranging from 4 months to 15 

years.258 Thus while terrorist problems within Kuwait 

currently are manageable, the Kuwaiti government 

also clearly needs continuing U.S. counterterrorism 

support. 

Bahrain.

Bahrain is a small nation composed of a 36-island 

archipelago, with around 700,000 citizens and residents. The four main islands are joined by causeways, 

and include about 95 percent of Bahrain’s total land 

area. Like a variety of other Gulf Arab states, Bahrain 

did not become independent from Great Britain until 

1971. The Khalifa ruling family which assumed power 

upon the departure of British forces has been in place 

as Bahrain’s national leadership for 2 centuries.259

Although the ruling family is Sunni Muslim, around 70 

percent of the citizens of Bahrain are Shi’ites. There are 

around 235,000 foreign workers, many of whom come 

from South Asia. Bahrain is not a wealthy state, and 

most of its oil reserves already have been depleted.

While none of the Gulf Arab states have a serious 

capacity for self-defense, Bahrain is the smallest of the 

GCC countries and almost certainly the most helpless. 

Manama’s limited financial resources also make largescale military purchases impossible, and the Bahraini 

government may have concerns about expanding 

the military in ways which significantly increase the 

representation of Shi’ites in the army. Currently, the 

army includes a number of foreign nationals including 

Pakistanis, Jordanians, Syrians, and Yemenis.260 This 

situation seems to leave foreign alliances as the only 

serious way of approaching external defense. Thus, as 
72

Bahrain began to loosen its relationship with London, 

the need for friendly relations with the United States 

became increasingly important. 

The U.S. Naval presence in Bahrain has existed 

continuously since 1949 and thus pre-dates Bahraini 

independence.261 On October 27, 1991, the U.S.-

Bahraini relationship was strengthened and given 

greater depth with the signing of a new military 

cooperation agreement providing for port facilities and 

joint military exercises.262 Bahrain is the headquarters 

for the U.S. Fifth Fleet (also known as the Naval 

Support Activity, Bahrain) and NAVCENT, the naval 

component of the U.S. Central Command. Bahrain 

provided major basing and support facilities on a 

number of occasions, including the “tanker war” with 

Iran in the late 1980s, the 1991 Gulf War, and the 2003 

invasion of Iraq.263 Bahrain also sent a small symbolic 

force to participate in Operation DESERT SHIELD and 

Operation DESERT STORM in 1990-91.264 Dredging 

is taking place in Manama Harbor to allow it to more 

easily accommodate warships. On March 25, 2002, 

President Bush designated Bahrain as a “major nonNATO U.S. ally.”265

Bahrain is within 8 minutes flying time from Iran, 

and concerns about Iran are central to Manama’s 

assessments of possible dangers to its independence 

and security. Iran, under the rule of the last shah, raised 

claims to sovereignty over Bahrain as the UK moved 

increasingly close to granting its independence.266 The 

shah eventually recognized Bahrain’s forthcoming 

independence in 1970, but considerable residual fear 

existed that Tehran would reassert itself if it could 

do so without a substantial regional or international 

uproar.267 Bahrain was an Iranian possession between 

1602 and 1783.
73

The overthrow of Iran’s last shah in 1979 did not lead 

to better Bahraini-Iranian relations, and instead caused 

Manama’s relations with Tehran to fall to a new low 

due to the assertiveness of the Iranian revolutionaries. 

In the exuberance of the young revolution, leading 

spokesmen of the Islamic Republic briefly reasserted 

claim to Bahrain, although these claims received little 

rhetorical follow-up and seemed to fade relatively 

quickly.268 More seriously, in December 1981, 73 

Bahrainis were arrested and accused of planning a 

coup against the Bahraini government. They also 

were charged with being members of the Tehranbased Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain and 

coordinating their subversive actions with Tehran.269

Iran vehemently denied involvement in the effort to 

overthrow the government.270 While Iran and Bahrain 

were later able to normalize their relations, this is a 

troubling history.

Some journalistic reports suggest that Iran directed 

strong pressure at Bahrain to oppose publicly the 2003 

U.S. intervention in Iraq.271 Thus, it is hardly surprising 

that in August 2002, the king of Bahrain issued a 

joint statement with Iran’s leadership opposing any 

“unilateral” military strike against Iraq.272 While Tehran 

had little use for the Saddam Hussein regime, its leaders 

were concerned that the United States, by defeating 

Saddam, could encircle Iran with pro-American 

regimes from Afghanistan to Iraq, thus threatening the 

Islamic Republic. Bahraini leaders apparently felt the 

need to show at least cosmetic solidarity with Iran over 

this issue. In a related effort, Manama subsequently 

made a last-minute asylum offer to Saddam Hussein in 

what it presented as an effort to avoid war while also 

ending the Saddam regime. This offer may not have 

been particularly serious and was only made after 
74

Saddam has stated unequivocally that he would rather 

die than go into exile.273 While the Bahrainis remain 

willing to make these sorts of gestures, they almost 

certainly would never trust Iran to the extent of failing 

to maintain strong security ties with the United States 

or another outside power.

The caution noted above can be seen in at least one 

of Bahrain’s other regional relationships, the one with 

Saudi Arabia. Bahrain, unlike Qatar, does not have the 

luxury of asserting a great deal of independence from 

Saudi Arabia, when the larger nation wishes to assert 

its regional clout. Despite their geographical proximity, 

Bahrain and Qatar have overwhelming differences in 

their political and economic situations. While Qatar is 

a wealthy country that is getting wealthier, Bahrain, 

as noted, has much more limited resources. Moreover, 

Bahrain’s economic problems have made it somewhat 

dependent upon Saudi Arabia, which provides 

support to Manama in several important ways. One 

of these involves the King Fahd causeway (opened in 

1986) which connects Bahrain to Saudi Arabia and is 

used for over 2,300,000 car trips per year.274 A variety 

of Saudi tourists come to Bahrain via the causeway, 

and they often spend significant amounts of money 

there. Additionally, Saudi Arabia has granted Bahrain 

the right to exploit the Abu Safa offshore oil field. 

Previously the two countries shared the revenues of 

this resource.275 While Bahrain clearly is grateful for 

Saudi support, a relationship with the United States is a 

valuable counterweight to complete Saudi domination 

of its much smaller neighbor.

Bahrain is a moderately stable nation which, at 

times, displays some pluralistic tendencies, although 

substantial problems exist over issues such as Shi’ite 

representation in parliament. Reform also is an up 
75

and down process in Bahrain, with some observers 

suggesting Manama is unable to make more than 

cosmetic efforts to more fully enfranchise Shi’ites.276

Bahrain, unlike the other small Gulf Arab states, has 

a substantial Shi’ite majority (around 70 percent of the 

population), and granting them true equality could 

lead to a divided government with a Sunni monarchy 

and Shi’ite-controlled parliament. Such a prospect also 

is of concern to Bahrain’s privileged Sunni Arabs, most 

of whom have grown comfortable with a system that 

allows them to dominate the majority Shi’ites. The 

government further is concerned about deepening 

sectarian violence in Iraq aggravating sectarian 

problems in Bahrain. During the 1990s, there was 

considerable sectarian strife in Bahrain after Shi’ites 

began a protest campaign for greater political rights 

in late 1994. This campaign led to disturbances and a 

tough government crackdown.277 By 1999, the cycle of 

anti-regime unrest and massive government repression 

seemed to have concluded, and some hopes existed for 

the peaceful expansion of Shi’ite rights. 

Bahrain’s political culture also allows demonstrations which are usually small and sometimes at odds 

with each other. Anti-Israeli demonstrations occur that 

occasionally involve speeches and slogans opposing 

the continued U.S. military presence in Bahrain.278 This 

is probably an effort to express anger over various 

Israeli actions rather than a serious call to change the 

U.S.-Bahraini relationship in any fundamental way. 

Bahraini officials have urged people to limit their 

criticism and not to burn the U.S. flag during protests 

because they fear that such actions would harm their 

relations with the United States.279 Some Bahraini 

protestors even have considered waving the U.S. flag 

at their demonstrations as part of a call for democracy, 
76

but they ultimately rejected doing so because this 

appeared to invite foreign intervention in a domestic 

dispute.280 Additionally, since Bahrain is not a rich 

country, issues of the equitable sharing of U.S. rental 

fees for the use of Bahraini port and basing facilities is 

an ongoing political issue. 

Bahrain’s political turmoil has on occasion affected 

U.S. military operations there. In July 2004, the U.S. 

Department of Defense approved the temporary 

relocation of family members and nonemergency 

personnel from Bahrain.281 This decision was made 

because of concerns about Sunni Muslim terrorists 

rather than Shi’ite unrest. The 2004 decision to 

evacuate U.S. dependents nevertheless mortified the 

Bahraini leadership. Bahraini Defense Minister Bin 

Hamad, after careful consultation with U.S. officials, 

stated that the withdrawal was limited to families 

and purely a “precautionary measure” in response 

to al Qa’ida threats. He maintained that “Bahrain is 

safe. We are not lax and will not be lax with terror. 

Our forces are capable of deterring every danger.”282

In October 2005 outgoing Fifth Fleet commander Rear 

Admiral David Nichols stated that Bahrain would 

remain a permanent home for the Fifth Fleet, and that 

reports it would be moved to Qatar were baseless.283

The nonviolent Bahraini opposition usually does not 

raise the basing issue as a point of disagreement with 

the government, and the presence of U.S. military 

forces also may help the two sides remain peaceful 

in their disagreement, since unrest and bloodshed 

could provoke another temporary relocation order or, 

in extreme circumstances, could cause NAVCENT to 

consider relocating its headquarters.
77

Oman.

Oman maintains a highly strategic position in the 

Gulf region. The country has a long history of cooperation with the United States and United Kingdom, 

although it seeks to maintain these ties in an 

inconspicuous way. Additionally, Oman, with a territory the size of Kansas and around 3 million residents, 

is somewhat larger than some of the other Gulf states. 

Around 600,000 of its residents are noncitizen foreign 

nationals. 284 Oman produces limited amounts of oil, 

but it also is one of the less prosperous members of the 

GCC. Oman also has a bit more military muscle than 

most of the Arab Gulf states (at least regarding size), 

with 41,000 active duty personal in its armed forces, 

including 25,000 in the army. 

Oman is a moderate Arab country with long 

history of concern about revolutionary Iran. Muscat 

previously had maintained extremely close relations 

with the Shah of Iran, who provided some military 

forces to assist the Omanis in putting down a long and 

difficult rebellion in their province of Dhofar.285 This 

rebellion began in 1962 and ended in 1975 after years 

of difficult fighting. In the aftermath of the Iranian 

revolution, the Iranian and Omani navies shadowed 

each other, and the Iranians violated Omani territorial 

waters.286 Oman has been discretely supportive of the 

Arab-Israeli peace process and was one of the few Arab 

nations to support Egyptian President Sadat’s 1977 trip 

to Jerusalem to address the Israeli Knesset. 

In 2000, Oman renewed its 10-year defense 

agreement with the United States, which it initially 

accepted in 1979. This agreement allows the U.S. military to base aircraft at three Omani air bases, Seeb, 

Masirah Island, and Thumrait. The agreement also 
78

allows the United States to preposition military 

equipment.287 In 2003 the U.S. presence in Oman fell 

to around 3,750 from about 4,300 during Operation 

ENDURING FREEDOM in 2002. By 2006, there were 

only around 26 U.S. personnel stationed in Oman, 

indicating that Omani facilities are no longer being 

used to support operations in Afghanistan or Iraq. 

Most of the U.S. military personnel stationed in Oman 

were members of the Air Force.288 U.S. aircraft stationed 

there during the high point of hostilities included B-1 

bombers and C-130 transport aircraft. There has been 

little apparent public opposition to the U.S. presence in 

Oman during 2002-03 when military operations from 

that country were at their high point. 

The United States has continued to maintain 

extensive prepositioning facilities on the Omani island 

of Masirah.289 Oman also appears stable, and the 

current sultan has been in power since 1970. There is no 

designated successor to the sultan in Oman, although 

Sultan Qaboos has written his preference in a letter to 

be opened after his death if the sultanate’s notables 

cannot agree on a successor.

CONCLUSIONS

Relations between the United States and the Arab 

World were at a particularly low level at the time this 

report was written due to ongoing differences over the 

Iraq war, the war on terrorism, the Israeli/Palestinian 

conflict, and the aftermath of a crisis in Lebanon. 

Yet, the United States has highly significant interests 

and important allies in the region which cannot be 

neglected. The challenge for the United States remains 

to support its allies and its national interests without 

adding to its already serious difficulties in the region 
79

through actions which inadvertently support the 

growth of radicalism in the area. The following policy 

recommendations are offered with these concerns in 

mind.

1. The United States should treat basing rights 

and democratization as issues that must be balanced 

and rationalized. This will not be easy in all cases. 

Sometimes incomplete and distorted democracy may 

have to be acknowledged as better than instability and 

violence. New and more virulent forms of repressive 

regimes sometimes result from the overthrow of 

paternalist monarchies. There is no way for the United 

States to maintain bases in the Arab world while totally 

insulating itself from the political dynamics of the 

region. Moreover, the United States does itself and its 

allies no favors by allowing the issue of basing rights 

to silence it on human rights and democratization. 

2. The United States should not seek long-term 

military facilities in Iraq, unless strongly implored 

by a wide spectrum of the Iraqi leadership to do so. 

The United States should conduct future strategic 

planning on the assumption that U.S. bases in Iraq 

will be turned over to the Iraqis in the mediumterm future. Large and important Arab states seeking 

prestige and political leadership in the Arab World find 

these bases to be a political burden. The United States 

should seek military cooperation with any future Iraqi 

government that is stable, inclusive of its citizenry, 

and friendly in ways that do not involve permanent 

bases. Nor is it clear what tactical advantage they 

would provide, given the large number of other Gulf 

states willing to allow U.S. basing rights currently. The 

Egyptian, Jordanian, and now Saudi Arabian examples 

of close security cooperation with the United States 

without permanent basing rights could be particularly 
80

useful to draw upon should Iraq emerge as a U.S. 

security partner. Additionally, in either a worst or 

best case scenario, U.S. forces will have to evacuate 

Iraqi bases. In a best case scenario, a self-confident 

and united Iraq is expected to emerge, but this type 

of nation will almost certainly return to its historic 

patterns of seeking Arab leadership and displaying 

independence from all foreign states. In a worst case 

scenario, civil unrest in Iraq will spin out of control, 

leaving an environment in which the United States 

can no longer contain unrestrained Iraqi violence and 

will almost certainly choose to withdraw. In a case of 

low level civil unrest or ongoing insurgency, the Iraqis 

would have difficulty explaining a semi-permanent 

U.S. presence to their public or the wider Arab World 

unless the alternative was seen as anarchy.

3. The United States must make a serious effort 

to heal the rift between itself and the Arab World by 

privately and publicly treating friendly Arab states 

as our security partners and not our clients. That will 

involve consulting them on a wide array of military 

and nonmilitary issues throughout the region. There 

also is a need to treat states with respect and courtesy, 

which is important in the Arab World. U.S. officials 

traveling to Iraq, for example, could help U.S.-Kuwaiti 

relations if they used Kuwait as something more than 

a site to refuel their aircraft. Stopping even for a few 

hours to consult with Kuwaiti allies could avoid the 

stigma of a great power that refuses to take smaller 

nations seriously.

4. The United States now has what amounts to 

a special relationship with Qatar that needs to be 

continuously nurtured despite differences over 

Al Jazeera satellite television. Qatar was willing to 

expand its military relationship with the United States 
81

at a point when doing so was and remains enormously 

unpopular in the wider Arab World. It also has relatively friendly relations with Israel, and this situation, 

at least, suggests that it will be circumspect about 

allowing the Israeli-Palestinian problem to overwhelm 

other interests. Moreover, the Qatari emphasis on 

addressing Palestinian problems through engagement 

with Israel ultimately may help the Peace Process and 

the Palestinians. The factors that unite the United States 

and Qatar therefore seem fundamental, and the issues 

dividing them seem weak. The military value each 

side has to the other is enormous. Differences over al 

Jazeera can continue to be discussed usefully but must 

not be allowed to poison the relationship.

5. The leadership of the United States must make 

a strong effort to understand how its actions may be 

placed into the context of Middle Eastern history. 

The nations of the Arab World can not be dealt with 

effectively without understanding the long history 

of interaction between the Arab World and the West, 

including periods of substantial Western domination. 

This means that our good intentions will not always be 

taken for granted, and any sign of Western hypocrisy 

will be identified rapidly. The United States must take 

differences between itself and the Arab World over 

policy as serious matters for discussion. It must not 

view policy differences as emerging as a result of a 

failure of public relations. The United States needs to 

remain aware that Gulf politics cannot be isolated from 

the politics of the larger Arab World and Middle East.

6. To the extent that both parties desire it, the 

United States needs to strengthen its military and 

counterterrorism relations with friendly Arab 

governments. Terrorism will become either an 

increasing or decreasing problem, depending on a 
82

variety of factors including what might happen in Iraq, 

and every effort must be made to defeat the terrorists. 

However flawed our current allies are, they are hugely 

better than terrorists such as Kuwait’s Peninsula Lions 

or al Qa’ida of the Arabian Peninsula. Everything 

possible to help them in their struggles is worth 

consideration, and we must do nothing that impedes 

their efforts or suggests that we may be equivocating 

in our support for them in the face of enemies such as 

those noted above. 

7. The United States, and especially the U.S. 

military, needs to reduce and remove bureaucratic 

obstacles to bringing allied Arab officers to the United 

States to receive military training and education.

This is particularly the case with officers from highly 

strategic countries and countries that can fund the 

overseas education and training of their nationals. 

Anything that can be done to reduce the difficulty of 

Gulf officers coming to the United States for education 

and training is well worth consideration. 

8. The United States must recognize that small 

Gulf powers have good reasons to seek U.S. bases 

on their soil, but these states will also be reluctant 

to antagonize regional powers such as Iran. While 

small, weak, and rich countries will never want to be 

left to the tender mercies of their larger Gulf neighbors, 

neither do they wish to antagonize them unnecessarily. 

Refusal to confront powerful neighbors in an open 

and public way is second nature to small and weak 

states and should not be viewed as a sign of waning 

commitment to a defense relationship with the United 

States. Rather, it is an effort not to insult a highly 

sensitive and dangerous neighbor. However pleasant 

such niceties appear, the leaderships of the Gulf Arab 

states do not trust Iran.
83

9. The United States needs to avoid mistreating 

its allies needlessly as occurred as a result of the 

cancellation of the Dubai Ports World agreement 

with the United Arab Emirates. A staggering amount 

of utterly inaccurate information was put forth 

during this controversy to a public that was almost 

completely unaware of the existence of the UAE, let 

alone the value of its friendship to the United States. 

White House efforts to address public concerns and 

explain the relationship were useful but ultimately 

were unsuccessful due to widespread lack of public 

understanding about both the value of the relationship 

with the UAE and the nonthreatening nature of the 

agreement with Dubai Ports World. Good allies must 

not be treated as expendable, since the United States 

might need their help at some future point. Continuing 

efforts to educate the public on these matters remain 

important. The efforts and courage of the U.S. 

administration in this matter should be lauded by those 

experts who understand this situation, even if they do 

not agree with the administration on other matters. 

10. The United States should continue to work 

with the Bahraini government to ensure a continued 

U.S. presence in that country. The United States 

also should continue to encourage ongoing Bahraini 

efforts at reform and a government that is inclusive 

of Shi’ites. Should serious sectarian violence continue 

to escalate in Iraq, it might strongly affect the political 

situation in Bahrain. Yet, any U.S. withdrawal from 

Bahrain at a time of limited and containable civil unrest 

could be interpreted as a lack of confidence in the 

monarchy’s ability to survive. U.S. friendship therefore 

could be viewed as fickle and only as valuable as the 

umbrella that works perfectly, except when it rains. 

Force protection analysts therefore must find creative 
84

ways to protect U.S. service personnel in Bahrain, 

using approaches that do not undercut our allies, if 

this is possible. A full civil war in Bahrain, of course, 

would be a different situation, but one hopes that the 

Bahrainis would be wise enough to pull back from this 

alternative. 

ENDNOTES

1. Mohamed Heikal, Cutting the Lion’s Tail: Suez Through 

Egyptian Eyes, New York: Arbor House, 1987, p. 52. Note that 

Heikal was a close friend of Egyptian President Nasser (1918-70) 

and is often considered the most well-known journalist in the 

Arab World.

2. “‘Gulf’ between Arabia, Persia gets ever wider,” Kuwait 

Times, May 4, 2006, p. 1. 

3. As cited in Greg Jaffe, “Desert Maneuvers: Pentagon Boosts 

U.S. Military Presence in the Gulf,” Wall Street Journal, June 24, 

2002, p. 1.

4. John Lewis Gaddis, Strategies of Containment, Oxford and 

New York: Oxford University Press, 1982, especially chapters 3 

and 5.

5. Ibid., p. 31.

6. See Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public 

Affairs), “Global Posture: Testimony as Prepared for Delivery by 

Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld to the Senate Armed 

Service Committee,” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of 

Defense, September 23, 2004, DefenseLink; on the U.S. departure 

from some European bases such as the Rhein-Main Air Force 

Base in Germany, see Mark Landler, “After 60 years, the Yanks 

Fly Out, Leaving Just the Ghosts,” New York Times, October 21, 

2005, internet; James Kitfield, “Army Anxiety,” National Journal, 

September 18, 2004, internet.

7. Andrew Koch, “U.S. Overseas Basing Moves Face Budget 

Crunch,” Jane’s Defence Weekly, May 18, 2005, internet; and “U.S. 

Troops to Remain in Europe,” BBC News, February 23, 2005, 

internet.

8. “U.S. Troops to Remain in Europe.” On the costs of overseas 

basing, see Report of the Commission of Overseas Military Facility 
85

Structure of the United States, Arlington VA: Overseas Basing 

Commission, May 9, 2005, available at obc.gov, pp. 26-30. Some 

authors use the term lily pad, suggesting that well-provisioned 

bases having a limited number of permanent forces would be 

like a number of lily pads strung across a pond. Some might be 

useful for expeditionary forces in a conflict, while others might 

be ignored. The concept is supposed to increase flexibility and, in 

some instances, decrease predictability, at least at the operational 

level. 

9. The Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936 and the Anglo-Iraqi 

Treaty of 1930 are good examples of such a legal instrument. See 

Peter Mansfield, The British in Egypt, New York: Holt, Rinehart, 

and Winston, 1971, pp. 271-289.

10. Daniel Yergin, The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & 

Power, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991, p. 340. 

11. Mansfield, pp. 275-276.

12. Yergin, pp. 371-372.

13. Phebe Marr, The Modern History of Iraq, Boulder, CO: 

Westview Press, 2004, p. 50.

14. For a critical but not dismissive analysis of the suspicions 

of murder, see Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the 

Revolutionary Movements of Iraq, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University 

Press, 1978, pp. 342-344.

15. Said K. Aburish, A Brutal Friendship: The West and the Arab 

Elite, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997, p. 114.

16. On this episode, see Reeva Spector Simon, Iraq Between 

the Two World Wars: The Militarist Origins of Tyranny, New York: 

Columbia University Press, 2004, chapter 6.

17. James Lunt, The Arab Legion, 1923-1957, London: Constable, 

1999, chapter 9.

18. See Cyrus Ghani, Iran and the Rise of Reza Shah, London and 

New York: I. B. Tauris, 2000, pp. 406-407.

19. Peter L. Hahn, The United States, Great Britain and Egypt, 

1945-1956, Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina 

Press, 1991, pp. 11-12.

20. Anthony Nutting, Nasser, New York: E. P. Dutton & 

Company, Inc, 1972, pp. 18-19.
86

21. Said K. Aburish, Nasser, the Last Arab: A Biography, New 

York: Saint Martin’s Press, 2004, p. 19.

22. Anthony H. Cordesman, The Gulf and the Search for Strategic 

Stability, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1984, p. 96.

23. Helen Chapin Metz, Libya: A Country Study, Washington 

DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, 1989, p. 38.

24. Townsend Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles, Boston: 

Atlantic, Little, Brown and Company, 1973, pp. 315-317.

25. Minxin Pei, “The Paradoxes of American Nationalism,” 

Foreign Policy, May-June 2003, p. 36.

26. For a book length study of the coup that makes excellent use 

of recently (2000) de-classified CIA material, see Stephen Kinzer, 

All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East 

Terror, Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2003. 

27. Salim Yaqub, Containing Arab Nationalism, The Eisenhower 

Doctrine and the Middle East, Chapel Hill and London: University 

of North Carolina Press, 2004, chapter 7.

28. Yaqub, chapter 7.

29. Note that President Nasser felt compelled to discard 

nonalignment on a practical level following the massive Egyptian/

Arab defeat by the Israelis in June 1967. At this point, he became 

much closer to the Soviet Union in an effort to obtain massive 

military assistance. See Mohamed Heikal, The Sphinx and the 

Commissar, New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1978, especially 

chapter 11.

30. This agreement was negotiated in July 1954 and signed by 

Nasser and Anthony Nutting, representing the British government, 

on October 19, 1954. See Joel Gordon, Nasser’s Blessed Movement: 

Egypt’s Free Officers and the July Revolution, New York and Oxford: 

Oxford University Press, 1992, pp. 165-168. 

31. As quoted in Aburish, Nasser The Last Arab, p. 78.

32. Aburish, pp. 80, 88.

33. Bernard Lewis, The Shaping of the Modern Middle East, 

Oxford University Press: New York and Oxford, 1994, p. 153.

34. Adeed Dawisha, Arab Nationalism in the Twentieth Century: 

From Triumph to Despair, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton 

University Press, 2003, pp. 160-165.
87

35. James Lunt, Hussein of Jordan Searching for a Just and Lasting 

Peace, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1989, pp. 

21-23; Hussein of Jordan, Uneasy Lies the Head: The Autobiography 

of His Majesty King Hussein I, New York: Bernard Geis Associates, 

1962, p. 101.

36. Alexei Vassiliev, A History of Saudi Arabia, New York: New 

York University Press, 2000, p. 356.

37. Mohamed Heikal, Secret Channels: The Inside Story of ArabIsraeli Peace Negotiations, New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 

1996, p. 106.

38. For one of the best and most comprehensive books on the 

1956 War, see Kennett Love, Suez: The Twice Fought War, New 

York: McGraw-Hill, 1969. Also see Donald Neff, Warriors at Suez, 

Brattleboro, VT: Amana Books, 1988.

39. Neff, Warriors at Suez, pp. 407-408.

40. Uriel Dann, Iraq Under Qassem, A Political History, 1958-

1963, New York: Praeger, 1969, p. 31.

41. Dann, p. 31.

42. Marion Farouk-Sluglett and Peter Sluglett, Iraq Since 1958: 

From Revolution to Dictatorship, London: I. B. Tauris Publishers, 

2003, p. 49.

43. Malcolm H. Kerr, The Arab Cold War: Gamal ‘Abd al Nasir 

and his Rivals, London: Oxford University Press, 1971, pp. 17-21. 

Qassim was later overthrown and executed in February 1963.

44. Rachel Bronson, Thicker than Oil, America’s Uneasy 

Partnership with Saudi Arabia, Oxford and New York: Oxford 

University Press, 2006, p. 79.

45. Michael B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of 

the Modern Middle East, Oxford and New York: Oxford University 

Press, 2002, p. 263.

46. Mohamed Heikal, The Road to Ramadan, New York: 

Ballantine Books, 1975, chapter 5.

47. Metz, Libya: A Country Study, p. 46.

48. John D. Glassman, Arms for the Arabs: The Soviet Union and 

War in the Middle East, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins 

University Press, 1975, p. 75.

49. Lieutenant General Saad el Shazly, The Crossing of the Suez, 

San Francisco, CA: American Mideast Research, 2003, pp. 159-

167.
88

50. Paul Dresch, A History of Modern Yemen, Cambridge, UK: 

Cambridge University Press, 2000, pp. 118-119.

51. Bob Woodward, Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981-1987, 

New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987, p. 31. 

52. Graham E. Fuller, The Center of the Universe, The Geopolitics 

of Iran, Boulder: Westview Press, 1991, especially chapter 5.

53. Bob Woodward, The Commanders, New York: Simon & 

Schuster, 1991, p. 230.

54. As cited in Michael A. Palmer, Guardians of the Gulf: A 

History of America’s Expanding Role in the Persian Gulf, 1833-1992, 

New York: The Free Press, 1992, p. 106.

55. Andrew Bacevich, The New American Militarism: How 

Americans are Seduced by War, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 

2005, p. 102.

56. For a critique of many of the early problems associated 

with the RDJTF, see Jeffrey Record, The Rapid Deployment Force 

and U.S. Military Intervention in the Persian Gulf, Cambridge, MA, 

and Washington DC: Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, Inc, 

1981, especially chapter 5. 

57. Palmer, Guardians of the Gulf, pp. 106-111.

58. Jane’s Sentinel Security Assessments, “Oman,” July 13, 2006, 

internet.

59. “Bright Star,” Federation of American Scientists, and “The 

Host with the Most,” Economist, June 6, 1981.

60. F. Gregory Gause III, Oil Monarchies: Domestic and Security 

Challenges in the Arab Gulf States, New York: Council on Foreign 

Relations Press, 1994, p. 122.

61. Jane’s Sentinel Security Assessments, “Oman.”

62. For a deeper examination of this role in the 1980s, see W. 

Andrew Terrill, “Jordan and the Defense of the Gulf,” Middle East 

Insight, Vol. 4, No. 1, March-April 1984, pp. 3-14.

63. See J. B. Kelly, Arabia, The Gulf and the West, New York: 

Basic Books, 1980, pp. 174, for a disapproving account of Kuwaiti 

policies during this time frame.

64. Richard A. Mobley, “Deterring Iraq: The UK Experience,” 

Intelligence and National Security, Summer 2001, p. 57.

65. Woodward, The Commanders, pp. 267-268.
89

66. Lawrence Freedman and Efraim Karsh, The Gulf Conflict 

1990-1991: Diplomacy and War in the New World Order, p. 92.

67. Woodward, The Commanders, p. 248.

68. For Saudi concerns about this danger, see His Royal Highness General Khalid bin Sultan (with Patrick Seale), Desert Warrior: 

A Personal View of the Gulf War by the Joint Forces Commander, New 

York: Harper Collins, 1995, pp. 185-186.

69. Egypt officially was assigned the liberation of Kuwait City, 

but in practice only entered the capital city after U.S. Marines had 

cleared it of Iraqi forces. See Gordon and Trainor, Cobra II, p. 108.

70. George H. W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World 

Transformed, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998, p. 342.

71. For a discussion of the nature and outcome of the internal 

debate within the PLO over whether or not to support Saddam, 

see W. Andrew Terrill, “Saddam’s Failed Counterstrike: Terrorism 

and the Gulf War,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, July-September 

1993, pp. 225-226. Note that while Arafat supported Saddam 

politically, no military operations were conducted on his behalf.

72. Jerry M. Long, Saddam’s War of Words, Politics, Religion, and 

the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait, Austin: University of Texas Press, 2004, 

p. 25; Geoff Simons, Libya: The Struggle for Survival, New York: St. 

Martin’s Press, 1993, p. 18.

73. Said K. Aburish, Saddam Hussein: The Politics of Revenge, 

New York: Bloomsbury, 2000, p. 291.

74. George H. W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World 

Transformed, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998, p. 472. Also see 

Scowcroft interview with ABC News as quoted in Dilip Hiro, Iraq: 

In the Eye of the Storm, New York: Nation Books, 2002, p. 42; and 

recollections of Vice President Dick Cheney as quoted by Michael 

R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor, Cobra II: The Inside Story of the 

Invasion and Occupation of Iraq, New York: Pantheon Books, 2006, 

p. 39.

75. Lawrence Freedman and Efraim Karsh, The Gulf Conflict, 

1990-1991: Diplomacy and War in the New World Order, Princeton, 

NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993, p. 415.

76. Phebe Marr, A History of Iraq, p. 246.

77. George Packer, The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq, New 

York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005, p. 36.

78. Bronson, p. 201.
90

79. Saudi Arabian bases were used to support air patrols but 

not bombing attacks. Gordon and Trainor, p. 41. 

80. Denis J. Halliday, “The Impact of UN Sanctions on the 

People of Iraq,” Journal of Palestine Studies, Winter 1999, pp. 29-37. 

On the no fly zones, see Mark Thompson, “The Forgotten War,” 

Time, September 23, 2002, pp. 43-44.

81. Anthony Shadid, Night Draws Near: Iraq’s People in the 

Shadow of America’s War, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 

2005, p. 37.

82. Tareq Y. Ismael and Jacqueline S. Ismael, The Iraq Predicament, London and Sterling, VA: Pluto Press, 2004, p. 142.

83. Heikal, The Road to Ramadan, p. 139.

84. Steve Coll, Ghost Wars, New York: Penguin Press, 2004, pp. 

65, 72.

85. General Tommy Franks, American Soldier, New York: Regan 

Books, 2004, p. 286. 

86. Robin Wright and Ann Scott Tyson, “U.S. Evicted from Air 

Base in Uzbekistan,” Washington Post, July 30, 2005, p. 1.

87. Alexander Cooley, “Base Politics,” Foreign Affairs, November/December 2005, p. 88.

88. Robin Wright, “Kyrgyzstan Agrees to Continuing U.S. 

Military Presence at Key Air Base,” Washington Post, October 12, 

2005, p. 10. 

89. “Bakiyev Retreats on Rent Rise for U.S. Base,” London 

Financial Times, June 2, 2006, internet.

90. Wright and Tyson, “U.S. Evicted from Air Base in 

Uzbekistan.” 

91. Thom Shanker, “Afghan Leader to Propose Strategic Ties 

with the U.S.,” New York Times, April 14, 2005, internet; Robert 

Burns, “Karzai to Ask Bush for Security Deal,” Associated Press, 

April 13, 2005, internet.

92. Paul Watson, “U.S. Troops May Have Fired at Kabul 

Crowd,” Los Angeles Times, June 1, 2006, internet; Carlotta Gall, 

“After Riots End, Kabul’s Residents Begin to Point Fingers,” New 

York Times, May 31, 2006, internet. 

93. Franks, American Soldier, pp. 204-205.

94. Cordesman and Obaid, p. 140.
91

95. Amberin Zaman, “Turkey OKs Expanded U.S. Use of Key 

Air Base,” Los Angeles Times, May 3, 2005, internet.

96. Gordon and Trainor, p. 115.

97. James E. Kapsis, “From Desert Storm to Metal Storm: 

How Iraq has Spoiled U.S.-Turkish Relations,” Current History, 

November 2005, p. 385.

98. Philip Smucker, “As U.S. Talks Up Iraq Threat, Gulf States 

Stifle a Yawn,” Christian Science Monitor, September 20, 2002, p. 

7.

99. Heba Saleh, “Saudis’ Unease Over U.S. Ties,” BBC News, 

World Edition, March 8, 2003, internet.

100. Bradley Graham, “Over Iraq, Pilots Fly into Action When 

Troops Call for Help,” Washington Post, December 19, 2004, p. 31.

101. Anthony H. Cordesman and Nawaf Obaid, National 

Security in Saudi Arabia: Threats, Responses and Challenges, Westport, 

CT, and London: Praeger, 2005, p. 140. 

102. See Associated Press, “Hussein’s Popularity Waning in 

Arab World,” Baltimore Sun, December 29, 2002, internet.

103. David Lamb, “A Big Blow to the Arab Psyche,” Los Angeles 

Times, April 10, 2003, internet.

104. For a critical analysis of these issues, see Bracevich, p. 85. 

Also see Bronson, pp. 236-237.

105. Michael Jansen, “Saddam’s phony crisis,” Middle East 

International, October 21, 1994, pp. 4-5.

106. Shadid, p. 8. 

107. Shadid, pp. 387-389.

108. Tom Lasseter, “To U.S. Chagrin, Sadr Winning Heats,” 

Philadelphia Inquirer, June 10, 2004, internet. Also see International 

Crisis Group, Iraq’s Muqtada al-Sadr: Spoiler of Stabiliser? Brussels, 

Belgium: International Crisis Group, July 11, 2006, p. 12.

109. Edward Wong and Dexter Filkins, “In an About Face, 

Sunnis Want U.S. to Remain in Iraq,” New York Times, July 17, 

2006, p. 1.

110. “U.S. Image up Slightly, but still Negative,” Pew Global 

Attitudes Project, June 23, 2005, internet.
92

111. Howard Kurtz, “Newsweek Apologizes,” Washington 

Post, May 16, 2005, p. 1; and Evan Thomas and Michael Isikoff, 

“The Qur’an Question,” Newsweek, May 30, 2005, p. 36.

112. Agence France Presse (AFP), “Six Bahrainis To Be 

Released from Guantanamo,” Daily Star (Beirut), November 1, 

2005, internet.

113. “Al Jazirah Interview: Bahraini Ex-Guantanamo Prisoner 

on Hardships, Interrogations,” Al Jazirah, December 2, 2005, 

as cited by Open Source Center (formerly Foreign Broadcast 

Information Service [FBIS]) December 2, 2005, internet.

114. See “Euro MPs Urge Guantanamo Closure,” BBC News: 

International Version, June 13, 2006, internet; “The U.S. Wants ‘To 

End Guantanamo’,” BBC News, International Version, June 21, 2006, 

internet.

115. “U.S. Rejects Guantanamo Criticism,” BBC News, January 

10, 2006, internet.

116. “New Claims of Guantanamo Torture,” BBC News, January 

11, 2006, internet.

117. Eric Schmitt, “3 in 82nd Airborne Say Beating Iraqi 

Prisoners Was Routine,” New York Times, September 24, 2005, p. 

1.

118. Mark Mazzetti, “Released Detainees Join Fight,” Los 

Angeles Times, October 22, 2004, internet; John J. Lumpkin, “7 Exdetainees Return to Fighting; Guantanamo Release Process Called 

Imperfect,” Associated Press, October 18, 2004, internet.

119. “France and Immigration: After the Riots,” Economist, 

December 17, 2005, pp. 47-48.

120. Glenn Kessler, “Turks Challenge Hughes on Iraq,” 

Washington Post, September 29, 2005, p. 16.

121. On Talibani’s comments, see Robert F. Worth, “Leader 

Says Other Arabs are Insensitive to Iraq’s Plight,” New York Times, 

September 6, 2005, internet. On Arab diplomats being attacked, 

kidnapped, or killed, see “Emirates Diplomat Freed in Iraq,” 

BBC News, May 30, 2006, internet; James Glanz, “In Web Posting, 

Terrorist Group says Algerian Diplomats were Slain,” New York 

Times, July 28, 2005, p. A-8; John F. Burns and Hassan M. Fattah, 

“Rebels Kill Egyptian Diplomat, Adding Pressure on Others in 

Iraq,” New York Times, July 8, 2005, p. A-1.
93

122. Dexter Filkins and Robert F. Worth, “11 Die in Baghdad 

as Car Bomb Hits Jordan’s Embassy,” New York Times, August 8, 

2003, internet.

123. Tarek al-Issawi, “Report: Iran Appoints Ambassador to 

Iraq,” Associated Press, May 10, 2006, internet.

124. “Bush Pushes For Reform in Mideast,” Jordan Times, July 

1, 2004, internet.

125. International Crisis Group, France and Its Muslims: Riots, 

Jihadism and Depoliticisation, Brussels, Belgium: International 

Crisis Group, March 2006.

126. “U.S. Pulls Out of Saudi Arabia,” BBC News: World Edition, 

April 29, 2003, internet.

127. Thomas W. Lippman, Inside the Mirage: America’s Fragile 

Partnership with Saudi Arabia, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004, 

p. 343.

128. Bronson, pp. 252-254.

129. “Riyadh Denies Advising Saddam to Step Down, Will Not 

Join War,” Jordan Times, December 26, 2002, internet.

130. On the outbreak and nature of anti-government violence 

and its nature, see Sherifa Zuhur, Saudi Arabia: Islamic Threat, 

Political Reform, and the Global War on Terror, Carlisle Barracks, PA: 

Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, March 2005, 

pp. 32-38.

131. Mahmoud Khaleel, “Al Qa’ida Plans Attacks in the Gulf,” 

Arab News, May 14, 2003, internet.

132. Cordesman and Obaid, pp. 268-283.

133. David B. Ottoway and Robert G. Kaiser, “Saudis May 

Seek U.S. Exit,” Washington Post, January 18, 2002, p. 1; and Roger 

Hardy, “Questions Over U.S. Troops’ Saudi Future,” BBC World 

Edition, February 10, 2003, internet.

134. For a useful discussion of U.S.-Saudi disagreements on 

how to manage Iraq, see Bronson, p. 220.

135. Hugh Miles, Al Jazeera: The Inside Story of the Arab News 

Channel that is Challenging the West, New York: Grove Press, 2005, 

pp. 21, 196-197. 

136. Thom Shanker and Eric Schmitt, “Pentagon Expects LongTerm Access to Four Key Bases in Iraq,” New York Times, April 20, 

2003, p. 1. Also, for a valuable critique of the advocates of such 
94

policies, see Jeffrey Record, Dark Victory: America’s Second War 

Against Iraq, Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2004, p. 131.

137. David R. Francis, “U.S. Bases in Iraq: Sticky Politics, Hard 

Math,” Christian Science Monitor, September 30, 2004, internet; 

and U.S. Department of Defense, “News Transcript: Secretary 

Rumsfeld Interview with the Associated Press,” April 24, 2003, 

defenselink.mil.

138. “Envoy: U.S. Exit to Forgo Bases,” Washington Times, 

March 12, 2006, internet.

139. Mowaffak al-Rubaie, “The Way out of Iraq: A Road Map,” 

Washington Post, June 20, 2006, p. 17. 

140. Matthew Clark, “Iraq PM Urges Quick Pullout of U.S. 

Forces,” Christian Science Monitor, July 27, 2005, internet.

141. See Anthony Shadid, “Tens of Thousands of Iraqis Demand U.S. Withdrawal,” Washington Post, April 10, 2005, p. 25.

142. Ed Blanche, “The Empire Digs In,” The Middle East, May 

2006, pp. 14-15. 

143. Fred Kaplan, “Hunkering Down: A Guide to the U.S. 

Military’s Future in Iraq,” Atlantic Monthly, June 2006, pp. 34-37.

144. Kaplan, p. 37.

145. Mohamed Kadry Said, “Potential Egyptian Contribution 

to a Security Framework in the Gulf,” Middle East Policy, Fall 2004, 

p. 66.

146. Husayn Abd al Raziq, “An American Penetration in the 

Name of Democracy,” al Wafd (Cairo), March 25, 2005, pp. 7, 14, as 

cited by Open Source Center, March 25, 2005, internet.

147. Agence France-Presse, “Bright Star Joint War Games 

Begin in Egypt,” Defense News, September 6, 2005, internet; 

“Mideast Nations to Join U.S. in War Exercises,” Washington Post, 

September 7, 2005, p. 8.

148. Gordon and Trainor, p. 111.

149. Ron Suskind, The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside 

America’s Pursuit of its Enemies Since 9/11, New York: Simon and 

Schuster, 2006, p. 76.

150. L. Paul Bremer III, My Year in Iraq: The Struggle to Build a 

Future of Hope, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006, p. 76.

151. Gordon and Trainor, p. 110.
95

152. Anthony Shadid, “Jordan to Allow Limited Stationing 

of U.S. Troops,” Washington Post, January 30, 2003, A-1; and E. 

A. Torriero, “Jordanians Conflicted Over Growing U.S. Troop 

Presence,” Chicago Tribune, March 11, 2003, internet.

153. Thom Shanker, “Officers Being Trained at Base in Jordan 

to Lead New Iraqi Army,” New York Times, February 25, 2004, 

internet.

154. Bremer, p. 157.

155. “Abizaid: Development of Iraqi Police Forces Hindered 

by Infiltration,” Inside the Army, March 20, 2006, p. 1; Ed Blanche, 

“Divided Loyalties,” The Middle East, July 2006, pp. 22-24; Jonathan 

Finer and Ellen Knickmeyer, “Shiite Militias Control Prisons, 

Official Says,” Washington Post, June 16, 2006, A-1; Michael 

Hastings, “The Death-Squad War,” Newsweek, February 27, 2006, 

p. 44.

156. Cordesman and Obaid, p. xxii.

157. Cordesman and Obaid, p. 137.

158. Zinni, p. 196.

159. Jonathan Randal, Osama, The Making of a Terrorist, New 

York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004, p. 212.

160. Zinni, p. 196.

161. “‘Gulf’ between Arabia, Persia Gets Ever Wider,” Kuwait 

Times, May 4, 2006, p. 1.

162. Riad Kahwaji, “GCC States Fear Iranian Nuke, Regional 

War,” Defense News.Com, April 24, 2006, internet; Jonathan Wright, 

“Many Arabs Favor Nuclear Iraq, Even with Weapons,” Defense 

News, April 18, 2006, internet.

163. Amira Howeidy, “Taking Measures in Hand: Interview 

with Ali Larijani,” Al Ahram Weekly, April 20, 2006, internet.

164. Miriam Joyce, Kuwait, 1945-1996: An Anglo-American 

Perspective, London: Frank Cass, 1998, pp. 161-162.

165. U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, (CIA), World Factbook, 

August 8, 2006, internet.

166. “Green Energy Gambit,” The Pearl (Magazine of the State of 

Qatar), March 2005, p. 4.

167. Michael R. Gordon and Lieutenant General Bernard E. 

Trainor, The General’s War: The Inside Story of the Conflict in the 

Gulf, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1995, pp. 281-282.
96

168. David J. Morris, Storm on the Horizon: Khafji, The Battle that 

Changed the Course of the Gulf War, New York: Ballantine Books, 

2005, especially pp. 251-252, 263-265.

169. Gordon and Trainor, The Generals’ War, p. 286.

170. Greg Jaffe, “Desert Maneuvers: Pentagon Boosts U.S. 

Military Presence in the Gulf,” Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2002, 

p. 1.

171. In April 2006, the author of this report met with 

Ambassador Ali Yahya of Israel in Doha. Ambassador Yahya 

was then serving as the head of the Israeli trade mission in Qatar. 

The title Ambassador is a personal title in this instance because 

of his previous service at that rank in Finland, rather than a 

reflection of his status in Qatar. Also see “Qatar gives $50 million 

to Palestinians,” BBC News, April 17, 2006, internet.

172. Yaroslav Trofimov, “Some Arabs Back U.S. on Iraq, Citing 

Benefits of Hussein Ouster,” Wall Street Journal, December 3, 2002, 

internet.

173. Franks, American Soldier, p. 404.

174. Paul Adams, “U.S. Plans ‘Exercise’ in the Gulf,” BBC News 

World Edition, internet.

175. Preston Mede Hall, “ A U.S. Perch in the Persian Gulf,” 

MSNBC.com, October 19, 2005, internet.

176. Gordon and Trainor, Cobra II, p. 40.

177. Bradley Graham, “Dangers on the Ground in Iraq Lead 

to Increased Use of Airlifts,” Washington Post, December 12, 2004, 

p. 28.

178. “Bush in Qatar After Key Talks,” BBC News: World Edition, 

June 4, 2003, internet. 

179. Robert F. Worth, “Leaser Says Other Arabs Are Insensitive 

to Iraq’s Plight,” New York Times, September 6, 2005, internet.

180. For detail on the 1995 coup, see Mary Ann Tetreault, “Gulf 

Winds: Inclement Weather in the Arabian Peninsula,” Current 

History, June 1996, pp. 24-25.

181. “Country Profile: Qatar,” BBC News, March 23, 2006, 

internet.

182. Miles, p. 29. 
97

183. Tehran IRNA, “Qatari Emir: Iran Ties Beneficial to 

Regional Peace,” July 18, 2000, as cited in Open Source Center, 

July 18, 2000, internet.

184. Miles, pp. 50-55, 63-65.

185. “Gulf Neighbours Hope to Heal Rift,” BBC News: World 

Edition, June 11, 2004, internet.

186. “Gulf Neighbours.”

187. The author spoke to a number of Qatari military officers 

about this approach in 2006. Also see “Kuwait Joins List of Saudi 

Malcontents,” Jane’s Foreign Report, April 19, 2006, internet.

188. “Qatar: Soft Target,” Middle East International, April 1, 

2005, p. 20-21.

189. “Qatar Bombing ‘Unlawful Killing’,” BBC News: World 

Edition, June 22, 2005, internet.

190. “Protest Rally Over Qatar Bombing,” BBC News: World 

Edition, March 21, 2005, internet; and “Qatari Citizens Rally 

Against Terror,” Jordan Times, March 22, 2005, internet.

191. “U.S. General Lauds Qatar for Checking Extremism,” The 

Peninsula, September 10, 2005, internet.

192. Miles, al Jazeera, p. 348.

193. Michael Jansen, “Shaykh Zayed--An Obituary,” Middle 

East International, November 19, 2004, p. 24.

194. Frank Gardner, “Dubai Defied the Pessimists,” BBC News, 

December 17, 2005, internet.

195. “Abu Dhabi Music Festival Makes a Name for Itself,” 

Daily Star, April 29, 2006, internet; Julia Wheeler, “Dubai Race 

Attracts Rich and Famous,” BBC News: World Edition, March 

27, 2005, internet; “Dettori Wins Dubai World Cup,” BBC News: 

World Edition, March 30, 2003, internet; “Els Keeps Dubai on 2005 

Schedule,” BBC Sport: Golf, December 24, 2004, internet; Agence 

France Presse, “Industry Experts Say Dubai Has Made Itself the 

Region’s Advertising Capital,” Daily Star, June 19, 2006, internet.

196. For some historical background on the islands issue as 

a key problem between Iran and the UAE, see Dan Caldwell, 

“Flashpoints in the Gulf: Abu Musa and the Tunb Islands,” Middle 

East Policy, March 1996, pp. 50-57.

197. Jane’s Sentinel Security Assessments, United Arab Emirates, 

August 3, 2006, internet; and Sami G. Hajjar, U.S. Military Presence 
98

in the Gulf: Challenges and Prospects, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2002, p. 20.

198. “U.S. Pushes Middle East Arms Sales,” BBC News: World 

Edition, September 6, 2002, internet.

199. “Getting Smart: Gulf States Go for U.S. ‘Wonder 

Weapons’,” The Middle East, October 2002, p. 24.

200. Anthony H. Cordesman, The Military Balance in the Middle 

East, Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004, pp. 347-348. 

201. Interviews conducted with U.S. and Emirati officials in 

the UAE, May 2006.

202. “Spy Chief Calls Threat from Port Deal Low,” CNN.Com, 

February 28, 2006, internet.

203. Ahmed Rashid, Taliban, Militant Islam, Oil & Fundamentalism 

in Central Asia, New Haven, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 58.

204. “UAE Cuts Ties with Taliban,” BBC News, September 22, 

2001, internet.

205. “Iran Ends Huge Border Exercises,” BBC News, November 

2, 1998, internet.

206. “UAE Freezes ‘Terrorist Assets’,” BBC News, November 

8, 2001, internet.

207. “Karzai Reopens UAE Embassy,” BBC News, February 11, 

2002, internet.

208. Nora Boustany, “World Shows Its Generosity in Storm’s 

Wake,” Washington Post, September 7, 2005, A-21.

209. “Rumsfeld Launches Gulf Tour,” BBC News: World Edition, 

April 27, 2003, internet.

210. The White House, “Fact Sheet: DP World: Myth Vs. Fact,” 

February 2006, whitehouse.gov, internet.

211. David S. Cloud, “U.S. Sees Emirates as Both Ally and, 

Since 9/11, a Foe,” New York Times, February 23, 2006, internet.

212. Michael Sirak, “Interview: U.S. Air Force Lieutenant 

General Walter Buchanan,” Jane’s Defense Weekly, September 29, 

2004, internet.

213. “U.S. Spy Plane Crash in Gulf State, BBC News: International 

Version, June 23, 2005, internet.

214. White House, “Fact Sheet: The United States-UAE Bilateral 

Relationship,” February 2006, whitehouse.com. internet.
99

215. Daren Fonda, “The Dubai Deal You Don’t Know About,” 

Time.com, March 9, 2006, internet.

216. The author of this report has viewed a U.S. attack carrier 

at Jebel Ali.

217. White House, “Fact Sheet: The United States-UAE Bilateral 

Relationship.”

218. “‘Threat’ Shuts U.S. Embassy in UAE,” BBC News: World 

Edition, March 24, 2004, internet.

219. “Extremists Threatened Dubai Over Ties to West,” 

Associated Press, March 17, 2006, internet.

220. Josh Martin, “Arabs Wage War on Money Laundering,” 

The Middle East, July 2006, p. 9. This article also notes the efforts of 

a variety of other Arab states to reform banking and finance.

221. Ron Suskind, The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America’s 

Pursuit of its Enemies Since 9/11, New York: Simon and Schuster, 

2006, pp. 157-159.

222. Nicholas D. Kristof, “The Arabs are Coming!” New York 

Times, February 26, 2006, internet.

223. David Brooks, “Kicking Arabs in the Teeth,” New York 

Times, February 23, 2006, internet.

224. Paul Blustein and Eric Rich, “Security Programs, Unions 

Would Stay at Ports,” Washington Post, February 22, 2006, D1.

225. See, for example, Brooks, “Kicking Arabs in the Teeth,”

internet. 

226. Paul Blustein, “Bush Again Defends Deal on U.S. 

Seaports,” Washington Post, March 1, 2006, p. 4.

227. This letter is included as a PDF file on “Israeli Shipper 

Endorses DP World,” CNN.Com, March 3, 2006, internet.

228. Ted Bridis, “DP World Outlines Its Plan to Sell Rights to 

U.S. Operations,” U.S.A. Today, March 16, 2006, p. 10. 

229. “Bush Okays Dubai Purchase of British Defence Supplier,” 

Kuwait Times, April 29, 2006.

230. “Bush: I’m Worried By Message Sent by Failed Port Deal,” 

CNN.com, March 10, 2006, internet.

231. Gerald Butt, “The Damascus Declaration: Eight Pairs of 

Eyes on Iraq,” Middle East International, March 22, 1991, pp. 9-10.
100

232. Charles Aldinger, “U.S. Honors Kuwait as Major NonNATO Ally,” Reuters, April 1, 2004, internet; N. Janardhan, 

“Kuwaiti Radical Islam is Partly the Government’s Doing,” Daily 

Star, February 16, 2005, internet.

233. Boustany, p. A-21.

234. Anthony H. Cordesman, Kuwait: Recovery and Security 

After the War, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997, p. 10. 

235. Helen Chapin Metz, ed., Persian Gulf States: A Country 

Study, Washington, DC: Federal Research Division, Library of 

Congress, 1994, p. 327.

236. Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor, The General’s 

War, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1995, p. 280.

237. Cordesman, The Military Balance in the Middle East, pp. 

341-342.

238. Anthony Cordesman and Ahmad Hashim, Iraq: Sanctions 

and Beyond, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997, pp. 187-188.

239. Philip Dine, “Training ‘Ramps Up’ in Kuwait,” Saint Louis 

Post Dispatch, November 20, 2002, internet.

240. This is an issue of U.S.-Kuwaiti disagreement that the 

author became aware of during his May 2006 visit to Kuwait. Also 

see Agence France Presse, “Kuwait and U.S. Locked in Dispute 

Over Fuel Payment,” Arab News, March 17, 2005, internet.

241. Miles, p. 241.

242. This view was made clear to the author during his travel 

to Kuwait in 2006 and was particularly well-represented in 

discussions with students and faculty at Kuwait University and 

the American University in Kuwait.

243. Majid Khadduri, Republican Iraq: A Study in Iraqi Politics 

Since the Revolution of 1958, London: Oxford University Press, 

1969, p. 167. Also note that in early 1958, one other Iraqi leader, 

Prime Minister Nuri al-Said, invited Kuwait to join Iraq and 

Jordan in a union of the three countries. Kuwait, still under British 

protection, was not interested, and the union between Jordan and 

Iraq quickly failed as a result of the 1958 Iraqi revolution. 

244. Khadduri, p. 167.

245. Hussein A. Hassouna, The League of Arab States and Regional 

Disputes: A Study of Middle East Conflicts, New York: Oceana 

Publications, 1975, chapter 6.
101

246. Cordesman, Kuwait, p. 9; and “Kuwait: In the Shia 

Shadow,” The Economist, April 18, 1987, p. 39.

247. Cordesman, Kuwait, p. 9; and Edgar O’Ballance, The Gulf 

War, London, Brassey’s Defence Publishers, 1988, pp. 71, 155.

248. Sandra Jontz, “Army Preparing to Close Camp Doha, Shift 

Operations to Other Kuwaiti Bases,” Mideast Stars and Stripes, 

April 11, 2005, internet.

249. “Ailing Kuwait Ruler Ousted by MPs,” BBC News, January 

24, 2006, internet; “Sabah Family Backs Ailing Emir’s Removal,” 

Daily Star, January 24, 2006, internet.

250. Agence France Press, “Kuwaiti Reformists Dig in Their 

Heels Over Electoral Changes,” The Daily Star, May 17, 2006, 

internet.

251. Yitzhak Nakash, Reaching for Power: The Shi’a in the Modern 

Arab World, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 

2006, pp. 42-44. 

252. On the problems faced by Saudi Shi’ites, see Nakash, 

chapter 2; and Toby Jones, “The Iraq Effect in Saudi Arabia,” 

Middle East Report, Winter 2005, pp. 20-25.

253. Nakash, p. 42.

254.“ Kuwait: A State On Alert,” The Middle East, October 

2005, p. 17. Also see Nicholas Blanford, “Kuwaitis Question U.S. 

Ambitions,” Christian Science Monitor, December 19, 2002, p. 6.

255. N. Janardhan, “Kuwaiti Radical Islam Is Partly the 

Government’s Doing,” Daily Star, February 16, 2005, internet; and 

Diana Eliias, “Kuwait Interrogates al Qaida Member,” Associated 

Press, November 18, 2002, internet; “Al Qa’ida’s Kuwaiti 

Spokesman Resurfaces to Make New Threats,” Jordan Times, 

December 9, 2002, internet.

256. Randal, p. 219.

257. “Kuwait: Tension Bursts,” Middle East International, 

February 18, 2005, pp. 24-25.

258. Agence France Presse, “Death Sentence for Six Qaeda 

Militants in Kuwait,” Bahrain Tribune, December 27, 2005, internet. 

Also see Anthony Skinner, “Kuwait: A State on Alert,” The Middle 

East, October 2005, pp. 16-17.

259. Hamad Bin Isa al Khalifa, First Light: Modern Bahrain and 

Its Heritage, London and New York: Kegan Paul International, 

1994, chapter 2. 
102

260. International Crisis Group, Bahrain’s Sectarian Challenge, 

Brussels, Belgium: International Crisis Group, May 2005, p. 2.

261. Fred H. Lawson, Bahrain: The Modernization of Autocracy, 

Boulder, San Francisco and London: Westview Press, 1989, p. 

119.

262. Nadim Jaber, “Conflicting Visions,” Middle East International, November 22, 1991, p. 13.

263. Cordesman, The Military Balance in the Middle East, p. 339.

264. Metz, Persian Gulf States: A Country Study, p. 144.

265. “Getting Smart: Gulf States Go for U.S. Wonder Weapons,” 

The Middle East, October 2002, p. 24.

266. J. B. Kelly, Arabia, The Gulf and the West, New York: Basic 

Books, 1980, pp. 54-55.

267. Anthony H. Cordesman, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, and the 

UAE, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996, p. 36.

268. See Lawson, p. 123; and Cordesman, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, 

and the UAE, p. 41.

269. “Timeline: Bahrain,” BBC News: World Edition, August 25, 

2005, internet. 

270. R. K. Ramazani, “Iran’s Islamic Revolution and the Persian 

Gulf,” Current History, January 1985, p. 7.

271. S. Rob Sobhani, “Qatar Politics,” Weekly Standard, 

September 16, 2002, internet.

272. “Iran and Bahrain Oppose Iraq Attack,” BBC News: World 

Edition, August 18, 2002, internet.

273. “Bahrain Offers Asylum to Saddam,” BBC News: World 

Edition, March 19, 2003, internet.

274. The Saudi Arabian Information Resource, internet, figures 

cited are from 2001. A trip from one country to the other and then 

back is counted as two trips (coming and going).

275. Nakash, p. 56.

276. “Moving Backwards in Bahrain,” Middle East International, 

July 8, 2005, pp. 26-27.

277. “Bahrainis Demand Trial of Police ‘Torturer’,” BBC News: 

World Edition, November 24, 2002, internet.
103

278. Adnan Malik, “Police Break up Anti-U.S. Protest in 

Bahrain,” Washington Post, April 11, 2002, p. 19.

279. “Don’t Burn U.S. Flags, Bahrainis Told,” BBC News: World 

Edition, December 2, 2002, internet.

280. International Crisis Group, Bahrain’s Sectarian Challenge, 

Brussels Belgium: ICG, 2005, p. 19. 

281. “U.S. Evacuates Staff from Bahrain,” BBC News: World 

Edition, July 3, 2004, internet.

282. “Interview with Bahraini Defense Minister Staff General 

Shaykh Khaifah Bin Hamad Al Khalifah,” al Hayah, London, 

January 27, 2005 p. 2, as cited by Open Source Center, January 27, 

2005, internet.

283. “U.S. Families on Their Way Back: Iraq Pullout in 2006 

Says U.S. Admiral,” Bahrain Tribune, October 27, 2005, internet.

284. CIA, World Factbook, “Oman” September 7, 2006, internet. 

285. Calvin Allen, Jr., and W. Lynn Rigsbee II, Oman Under 

Qaboos: From Coup to Constitution, 1970-1996, London: Frank Cass, 

1996, pp. 70-71.

286. Allen and Rigsbee, p. 184.

287. Ed Blanche, “Regional Briefing--Gulf States: Winds of 

Change,” Janes’ Defense Weekly, February 9, 2005, internet.

288. Greg Jaffe, “Turkey’s Prime Minster Seeks to Allow U.S. 

Troops in Nation,” Wall Street Journal, February 6, 2003, internet.

289. Cordesman, The Military Balance in the Middle East, p. 343.