The foreign policy of the United Arab Emirates offers a curious
case study for scholars of international relations: a small state with a tiny
population and historically little presence on the world stage, but with
outsized – and seemingly ever-expanding – ambitions. Over the past decade,
while consolidating its status as a regional financial center and international
business hub, the UAE has quietly become a rising military power in the Middle
East.
Abu Dhabi Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander of the United
Arab Emirates (UAE) Armed Forces Mohammed bin Zayed (center) attends the Arab
Islamic American Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia May 21, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan
Ernst
Since the watershed of the Arab Spring, the UAE has pursued an
increasingly assertive and interventionist foreign policy, the effects of which
are most evident in the Red Sea basin and Horn of Africa. Here, the UAE has
sought to become a major political actor, maintaining a formidable military
presence, handing out lavish economic aid and taking on the role of kingmaker
and peace broker. The rigorous efforts of the UAE in the Red Sea basin and the
Horn of Africa region included establishing military bases; constructing,
refurbishing and running ports; providing maritime services; and building
police stations, health clinics, schools and sewage infrastructure for the
indigenous populations. Today, the UAE operates ports in four of the seven
countries bordering the Red Sea (Egypt, Somalia, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia), and
military bases in Yemen, Eritrea and Somaliland. The UAE’s presence in the
region also includes the establishment of a modern military base in Berbera
(the center of trade traffic in East Africa and the largest port in Somalialand),
an airfield, deep-water port facilities and logistics support area in
Eritrea’s Assab, a formidable naval presence in two islands in Bab el-Mandab
Strait and a plan to set
up a base for military training in the Yemeni Island of Socotra,
located in the Arabian Sea south of the Yemeni mainland.
The UAE has been ratcheting up its economic activities in the Red Sea
basin as well. In 2000, Dubai government-owned, Dubai-based port operator DP
World won a
20-year concession to operate the Port of Djibouti. Its efforts in Egypt began
around a decade ago when it took over the operation, development and management
of Ain Sokhna Port, crucial for being the closest port to the Egyptian capital,
Cairo. Last year, it signed an
agreement with the Suez Canal Authority to establish a company that would
develop an area of 95 kilometers in the Ain Sokhna area. In Saudi Arabia, DP
World operates the South Container Terminal at the Jeddah Islamic Port, and in
2017 it won a
contract to develop the entire port, in support of Saudi Vision 2030 and the
$500 billion NEOM mega project.
A shipment of grain is unloaded at Hodeidah, Yemen August 5, 2018.
Emirati troops are waging an amphibious assault on the Yemeni Red Sea port.
REUTERS/Abduljabbar Zeyad
These port deals were won through negotiation, but elsewhere the
UAE has employed more forceful measures. The UAE has used its heavy involvement
in the Yemen conflict (as part of the Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi
rebels) to expand its geopolitical power in the region. In 2015, UAE-backed
forces seized the
port of Aden – once the British Empire’s busiest port – from the Houthis. In
2016, the UAE captured the ports of Mukalla and Ash-Shihr, about
300 and 375 miles east of Aden, respectively, as well as two
strategically-located islands in the Bab el-Mandab Strait. Emirati troops secured
the Red Sea port of Mokha in 2017, and are now engaged
in an amphibious assault on Hodeidah, the only major Yemeni port not yet under
Emirati control.
But why has the UAE shifted from being a buyer of security to a
supplier of it? It could be argued that the UAE’s foray into East Africa is due
to the importance of the Red Sea as a vital artery for the transportation of
the country’s hydrocarbon exports. Through its two narrow chokepoints – the
Suez Canal in the north and the Bab el-Mandab Strait in the south – around 3.9
and 4.8 million oil barrels, respectively, flowed every
day in 2016. Control of seaports, moreover, helps in opening markets,
generating economic opportunities and, in times of conflict, projecting
military power.
The Emirati leadership’s obsession with the threat of Islamism
certainly plays a role. Not only does the ruling elite (particularly Mohammed
bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and the UAE’s de facto ruler) harbor a
deep sense of enmity toward militant Islamists, it perceives them as an
existential threat to its domestic authority. The UAE has likely been propelled
to adopt a policy of direct intervention because a number of militant Islamist
groups are currently active in East Africa, including the Bosaso-based
Al-Ittihad al-Islami group, the Eritrean Islamic Jihad Movement, the Justice
and Equality Movement and Al-Takfir wal-Hijra group in Sudan, and Al-Shabab in
Somalia.
Yet, there’s more to it than that. The passing on of leadership in
2004 from Sheikh Zayed, the founder of the state, to his heirs, Khalifa and
Mohammed, seems to be the real dynamic behind policy change. While Zayed
favored dialogue, quiet diplomacy and non-entanglement in the quarrels of other
states, his successors are more proactive and daring. Their actions are
sometimes tainted with an element of recklessness. Awash with cash and
ambition, they have sought to turn the country into a regional power with outstanding
military might, a little Sparta on the Persian Gulf.
Several regional developments have emboldened the Emiratis. These
include the vacuum created by the debilitation of the Arab world’s
heavyweights; the formation of a crescent of instability in Libya, Sudan, South
Sudan, and Yemen; the ossification of the Gulf Cooperation Council; the shift
in American geostrategic priorities; the UAE’s entanglement in the Yemeni
conflict; and the rivalry with Iran. Still, in the oil-rich Gulf states,
decision-making processes are highly personalized, leaders replace
institutions, and ego-centered dynamics shape much of the political output. So
without the change at the helm of the UAE, old perceptions and policies would
have probably remained unchanged. Bent on punching above its weight, the UAE
has under the new bold leadership become, as one researcher pointed
out, “a small state with a big ego.” Its long arms have not only
reached into the poorer states of East Africa, but also into Syria, Libya,
Egypt and other Middle Eastern states.
Arab politics is undergoing massive changes. After decades of
fixating on big states, researchers of the international relations of the
Middle East ought to keep a close eye on small states, such as Qatar and the
UAE, who are no longer young, vulnerable and inward-looking. While the big Arab
states are becoming slow to think and act, these smaller states are dynamic,
agile and highly influential. The UAE’s security policies in particular will
continue to have a huge impact on developments in nearly all of the region’s
hot spots, including Yemen, Libya, the Arab-Israeli conflict and the
Saudi-Iranian rivalry. Its success last month in effecting a rapprochement
between Ethiopia and Eritrea, who had been
engaged in hot and cold war for two decades, is the latest proof of that
influence.
As the grounds are cracking, and a new regional order is rising, it
is all too crucial to pay high attention to the new agents of power.
Nael Shama
* This essay appeared in Reuters Opinion on August 27, 2018 under the title “Ambitious
UAE Flexes Military Muscle”
* Photo: Reuters .
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