Middle East stability : Saudi muscles, Oman diplomacy

By Nima Khorrami Assl

While U.S. and international attention is mainly focused on Libya and Yemen, it seems that the violent crackdown against protestors in Bahrain poses a bigger threat to the entire regional stability. This is so because instability in Bahrain is reviving long simmering tensions and rivalries between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and thus the situation in Bahrain carries the danger of triggering the next regional catastrophe.

Although the 'ideological Cold War' between Iran and Saudi Arabia has been raging, and occasionally encouraged by external powers, since the Islamic revolution in Iran, recent Arab uprisings, especially the ongoing instability in Bahrain, have sharply intensified the hegemonic rivalry between the two nations as leaders in both countries work to take advantage of the political turmoil sweeping the Middle East.

Debka files reveal that King Hamad has allowed his realm to "become the de facto 14th province of Saudi Arabia" handing over to Riyadh "control of Bahrain's defence, external, and domestic security affairs" and that Saudi Arabia would soon start building a "naval base on the Island opposite the Iranian coastline". In the meantime, GCC governments have successfully orchestrated a show of unity epitomised in their foreign ministers' statement in which they criticised Iran for its "flagrant interference and meddling" in Bahraini affairs and the wider Arab world.

For its part, Iran has responded swiftly calling the GCC move an "occupation". President Ahmadinejad has called the GCC statement "invalid" and his Foreign Minister has warned the Saudi government of the "consequences" of its involvement in Bahrain. Most interestingly though, and in an indirect response to Saudi plan for building a naval base in Manama, Roohollah Hoseinian, head of Islamic Revolution Committee in Majlis, has asked the government to keep the armed forces on alert so to avoid any possible expansion of Saudi borders closer to the Iranian coastlines.

Saudi Arabia and Iran are divided by long-standing structural tensions. Whereas Tehran regards Riyadh as America's proxy and a buffer against Iran's rightful primacy in the Gulf, Saudi Arabia worries about Iran's asymmetric power and regional ambitions, its ability to challenge the legitimacy of the al-Saud by upstaging them on pan-Arab issues, its expanding influence in Iraq and Levant, and its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Energy differences are also a source of tension. In contrast to Iran, Saudi Arabia can afford to take a long-term view of the global oil market and has incentives to moderate prices. Iran, on the other hand, is compelled to focus on high prices in the short term due to its smaller oil reserves and larger population. Added to this are sectarian differences between the two states which have had an "echo effect" on the region mainly because it is a rivalry to determine the religious legitimacy of one over the other to lead the Muslim world. Nevertheless, these differences are not the principal determinants in the policy outlook of each regime, and instead, the more fundamental disagreement seems to be over regional hierarchy and the role the United States.

Since 2003, the fundamental driver of the relationship is a struggle to shape the regional balance of power with each state seeing the expansion of regional influence by the other through a zero-sum lens. And in this game of geopolitics, much of the anxieties that Arab states have are underpinned by the fear of Iran's imperial past. This stands in sharp contrast to Iran's enmity toward Saudi Arabia which has more immediate strategic reasoning such as Saudi cooperation with western intelligence services to retard Iran's nuclear programme or its financial support for certain oppositional groups.

In addition, Iran's influence in the Council and its relations with less hostile countries like Oman and Qatar has already caused rifts inside the Council.

Oman sees in Iran an important political and economic ally that is too powerful to ignore, let alone antagonise, and thus maintains that its security is closely related to security of Iran regardless of who governs Tehran. "For us, this is the expression of being realistic because Iran is a big neighbour, and it is there to stay", claims Salim al-Mahruqi, a former Omani diplomat.

For its part, border conflicts with Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have encouraged Qatar to pursue an independent foreign policy since the late 1980s. For instance, Qatar was the first GCC country to adopt a conciliatory stance towards both Iran and Iraq in the immediate aftermath of the Gulf crisis of 1990-1991. Iran and Qatar have been relatively successful in maintaining constructive relations not only because they share the large North Field/South Pars natural gas deposit but also because there are well-established commercial and family ties between Qataris and Iranian Arabs.

There are then intra-GCC rivalries which have continued to persist in despite of efforts to unify the Council in recent years. Putting aside Riyadh and Doha armed clash along the Saudi-Qatari border in 1992, Saudi-Qatari relations in recent years have been cordial but marked by periodic indications of continuing tension. Controversy over Dolphin undersea natural gas pipeline project in July 2006 is a case in point. Similarly, UAE has its own border problems with Saudi Arabia and it has reservations with regard to Saudi influence in Sharjah. Oman, on the other hand, considers Saudi's efforts to spread Wahhabism in the Gulf as a serious threat to its stability provided that 75 percent of the population in Oman is affiliated with Ibadism.

The notion of an impermeable bloc of Gulf Arab states opposing Iran, as advocated by some Arab commentators, is therefore unrealistic. Bilateral dialogues between the smaller individual Gulf States and Iran implicitly favour Tehran, and even Saudi Arabia itself has shown the tendency to accommodate and engage Iran in the Gulf when it perceives ambiguity and confusion in U.S. policy.

It follows then that establishment of a more cooperative regional organisation with broader aims than the ones limited to the six members' partnership presents the best prospect for de-escalation of crisis in the sub-region of Gulf; that is, a Gulf Neighbourhood Policy containing two categories of states: 'strategic partners' consisting of Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, and 'distant actors' including US, EU, China, and Russia.

This, in turn, requires the West, particularly the United States, to find a suitable interlocutor for engagement with Iran. U.S.-Saudi interests are aligned against Iran in numerous ways and this alignment has in fact disabled Saudi leadership to meaningfully engage with the Iranian government. Oman, on the other hand, can prove a more capable enabler for a number of reasons.

To understand Oman's current foreign policy is to understand how skilled diplomacy works. While other nations in the Middle East have been driven by ideology and short-term gains, the Sultanate of Oman has pursued a pragmatics foreign policy, holding to the belief that peaceful negotiation is essential to the overall, long-term goals of Omani security and prosperity. This is evident in Oman's neutrality in the Iran-Iraq War or Qaboos calls for direct Israeli-Palestinian talks at a time when all the other GCC leaders were against such move. What is more, Oman has no sizable Shiite community with which Iran could meddle in so the fear of Iranian interference is less pronounced. There are also residual positive sentiments pre-dating Iran's Islamic revolution.

Needless to say, this proposed structure is not without its drawbacks not least because of smaller GCC states preference for bilateral ties with the United States due to their fears of Saudi and Iranian dominance. Nevertheless, a new paradigm that does not focus on a specific threat – i.e. Iran –, but rather provides an open-ended security forum in which regional states can discuss and address a range of challenges, stands a better chance than a more traditional balancing approach.

More interestingly, though, the Bahrain crisis is also showing the limits of U.S. influence and power in a region vital to western interests. The Obama Administration's calls to speed up political reforms have undermined US image as a trustworthy ally in the eyes of Saudi leadership. Consequently, Saudi government has started looking eastward for help from Pakistan. Prince Bandar, former ambassador in Washington, reportedly visited Islamabad late March to ask the Pakistani government for troops to help ensure internal stability in the Kingdom and the Gulf States if needed.

Therefore, whichever power that can convince regional actors to institutionalise their rivalries, will gain the upper hand in the regional affairs for the years to come. And China stands a good chance of taking the lead on this because of her strict adherence to the principles of national sovereignty and non-intervention in her foreign policy conduct. What is clear thus is that US influence in the region is diminishing rapidly and that the geopolitical landscape of the region is undergoing significant changes. What is unclear though is whether or not China will opt for assuming a greater role in the Persian Gulf.