The use of UAE air infrastructure has also proved to be a key area of co-operation with the US military, as after 9/11 Dubai International Airport’s Terminal 2 became one of the busiest airports involved in invasion of Afghanistan. For some years since it was one of the few airports in the world that had regular flights to Baghdad and Kabul, with a high proportion of seats being reserved for American military personnel or for employees of big US contractors such as Halliburton. Also important have been the airport’s military freight facilities, with many commercial companies using it to ship US military goods and even armoured vehicles. Shrouded in secrecy for many years Abu Dhabi has also been making available its airbase in Al-Dhafrah to the US Air Force and to the CIA, with RQ-4 Global Hawk unmanned reconnaissance aircraft being stationed there and with KC-10 tanker aircraft having used the base to support operations in Afghanistan. Most embarrassingly for the UAE authorities, in the summer of 2005 it was revealed that US drones and U2 aircraft were also being serviced in Al-Dhafrah, following the crash landing of an unmanned spy plane on its return to Abu Dhabi from a mission in Afghanistan. The incident prompted the US Air Force to confirm that its 380th Air Expeditionary Wing had been based there since 2002[686] and at the time it was thought that there were over 100 US military personnel stationed in Al-Dhafrah.[687] The UAE has also been secretly making available an airbase in Pakistan to the US military. Following a leaked US diplomatic cable and a Reuters report describing the base as a ‘mystery wrapped in a riddle’, it emerged that the Al-Shamsi base in Baluchistan had been leased by the Pakistani government to the UAE since 1992, but had then been sub-leased more recently by the UAE to the US, presumably to facilitate the latter’s operations in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. According to the cable ‘the UAE government desired to keep details of the UAE co-operation with the US military in Afghanistan and Pakistan confidential, because the government is concerned that public acknowledgement of this assistance could pose risks to the UAE security within the UAE and in Pakistan’.[688]
Despite pleas and offers of financial aid from certain Gulf rulers to keep British servicemen based in the region after their independence,[689] Britain’s military role in the Gulf monarchies has been greatly reduced since 1971. Nonetheless the Royal Air Force continues to deploy an expeditionary air wing at Qatar’s Al-Udeid base, and has its own desert air base at Thumrait in Oman.[690] Moreover, other Western powers have recently been establishing bases in the region — sometimes openly, and sometimes covertly. Most prominent has been the aforementioned French base in Abu Dhabi, opened at Dhafrah in 2009. Although Abu Dhabi’s former ruler, Zayed bin Sultan Al-Nahyan, had long forbidden the overt presence of Western servicemen in Abu Dhabi, sensing the risk it would carry, it seems that his successors have been much less cautious. If anything, the French base — dubbed the ‘Peace Camp’—was inaugurated with considerable fanfare, with even the French president being in attendance.[691] It was followed up by announcements that the French Navy would begin using facilities at Abu Dhabi’s Port Zayed, and that UAE diplomats could begin using French embassies in countries where there was no UAE presence.[692] Moreover, writing in a high profile opinion editorial for one of the UAE’s state-backed newspapers, the French president openly stated his case, claiming that ‘We have been strategic partners for fifteen years, linked by the defence accord we signed in 1995. With this permanent base, our commitment alongside you becomes even stronger. This base proves that our country is prepared to commit itself fully, together with you, to the security of the region’. Later in his article he also claimed that the base ‘…proves that France is prepared to take every risk for its friends. The message is clear: we will stand by you under all circumstances, even the most difficult’ before concluding that ‘…it is in adversity that one recognises one’s friends. You should know that you can always count on us if the security of the region were ever to be threatened’.[693]
Canada has also been operating military bases in the Gulf monarchies, with a little-known military camp — dubbed ‘Mirage’—located outside Dubai and used as a rest and supply station for Canadian and Australian troops fighting in Afghanistan. Following a dispute over air landing rights for UAE airlines in Canada in 2010—likely the combined result of Canadian protectionism for Air Canada[694] and the UAE’s alleged lobbying against Canada’s bid for a UN Security Council seat[695]—existence of the camp finally became public knowledge when it was closed down by the UAE authorities in an apparent tit-for-tat retaliation. When the dust settles, however, it is likely that the camp will quietly re-open and Canadian access resume.
The Western military presence in Gulf monarchies will accelerate following an announcement by the US CENTCOM commander[696] that at least four Gulf states were due to receive the latest US antimissile systems — new versions of the Patriot anti-missile batteries — presumably in an effort to assuage fears of Iranian missile attacks. Tellingly, the general was unable to reveal exactly which states had agreed to deploy the US weapons, with one media report explaining that ‘many countries in the Gulf region are hesitant to be publicly identified as accepting American military aid and the troops that come with it. The names of countries where the antimissile systems are deployed are classified, but many of them are an open secret’. Nevertheless it is widely understood that the unnamed states are Kuwait, the UAE, Qatar, and Bahrain, and that the US will now also keep Aegis cruisers equipped with early warning radar on patrol in the Persian Gulf at all times.[697]
Equally, if not more, problematic than hosting so many foreign military bases, has been the Gulf monarchies’ ever-rising spending on Western armaments. With most of the arms being sourced from the US, Britain, and France, it seems this has become another price that these states must pay for their external security guarantees. Indeed, even if the purchased equipment is never used, is inappropriate for defensive capabilities, or is seemingly superfluous to the requirements of the Gulf monarchies’ described peacekeeping operations, it has long been regarded as a necessary part of the overall cost of their protection, much like the aforementioned sovereign wealth investments and the soft power strategies employed in the West. In recent years there have been many signs that this spending has been getting out of hand, with the Gulf monarchies now being by far the biggest arms purchasers in the world — at least as a proportion of their GDP. This even includes the poorer Gulf monarchies, which, as discussed, are now grappling with declining resources and serious socio-economic pressures. With more and more information on their purchases appearing in the public domain, it will become much harder for governments and ruling families to justify these massive and usually opaque transactions to increasingly beleaguered national populations.
689
32. For a full discussion see Davidson, Christopher M.,