The arguments rocking the Arab world over what to do about the complete collapse of Syria, and the impending debate over any possible intervention in Iran, has given the Gulf states a much greater role than they have been used to in the past, which has taken them almost beyond what they are able to deliver well. The vacuum of leadership in the Arab world has brought the Arab Gulf states into unusual regional prominence. The collapse of traditional Arab leaders like Egypt, Iraq and Syria has meant that countries like Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been able to play a much more significant role in the region than they have done historically.
However, the Gulf states do not have large populations and have a limited capacity to extend their reach on the ground. Their small armed forces mean that the Gulf states are not able to take the lead in any military operation to impose calm, but they are frequently welcomed as brokers. This is the role that Qatar is playing in hosting successive conferences of Friends of Syria and in allowing the Taliban to open a representative office in Doha to facilitate talks about finding peace in Afghanistan.
This latest burst of activity builds on more than a decade of such work as the Gulf states have tried to mediate in many regional clashes to seek a peaceful outcome. Saudi Arabia tried most successfully with the warring faction in Lebanon in 1979 and succeeded, but then failed to bring Hamas and Fatah together despite several efforts. Prior to the fall of Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen, Qatar tried repeatedly to bring the secessionist forces back into talks with the government to no great effect and during 2011 and 2012 it also tried to help remove Saleh from office, which eventually needed Saudi intervention.
The most prominent of the recent Gulf interventions outside the Gulf was by the UAE and Qatar, which backed and contributed to the Nato effort to support the opposition in Libya. In addition, the UAE has also been a long-standing member of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, where its armed forces have been fighting alongside all the other allies.
Soft power
All this direct political activity is relatively new for the Gulf states. They are much more experienced at projecting soft power through using their large financial resources to support infrastructure projects, education, health care in some of the most rundown and poor parts of the world, as well as in countries they would like to see more stable and working better.
One example of this kind of commitment is last week’s opening of the Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Road in Pakistan’s Waziristan area, shortening the connection between Karachi and Kabul by a significant 400 km. This project was part of the wider work of the Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Humanitarian Foundation, which has spent more than $60 million (Dh220.68 million) on roads and bridges in Pakistan, including a bridge over the Swat River.
The UAE Red Crescent has become well-known in disaster zones for providing excellent refugee camps. More than 25,000 Syrian refugees, who have fled to Jordan in desperation, have found dignity and clean housing, with medical facilities, food and schools. They are experiencing the UAE at work, as did thousands of Kosovars in 1999, the Somalis who were able to recover in UAE-run camps in the early days of that country’s sad disintegration, and the Afghan refugees who fled the fighting when the US-led troops invaded in 2001. This work leaves lasting goodwill, long after the people return to more normal lives.
Keep the home fires burning
But all this activity abroad has to be subordinate to the vital task of nation-building at home. Both the more recent direct political interventions and the more established soft initiatives are secondary to the Gulf states’ primary task of developing their countries’ infrastructure and human capacity.
It is very easy to forget how far the UAE and other Gulf states have come in a very short time and how far they have still to go in deepening their skills base and national human resources. The world-class buildings in the cities, which are symbols of a modern UAE, overshadow the work still to be done — giving 65 per cent of the population, which is under 25 years, the skills and education needed to meet their aspirations and take the country forward.
The scale of achievement to date is huge: When the newly-independent UAE started 42 years ago, there were only a few hundred kilometres of tarred roads in the country. The leadership was looking for between 500 to 2,000 graduates to take on the necessary jobs to make the government work, but the entire UAE population had only 45 graduates.
To move from 45 graduates to today’s world of tens of thousands of graduates, as well as compulsory primary and secondary education, has been the UAE’s most important achievement and remains the country’s primary task. So, as turmoil swirls in the region, civil strife breaks out and various governments compete for regional dominance, it is important that the UAE and other Gulf states do not forget that their hope for a successful future lies with their young people.
