Break-out group
Regional armed forces and security policy
Saturday 8 December 2007, 3.30 pm
CHAIRMAN
General the Lord Guthrie of Craigiebank
Former Chief of the Defence Staff, United Kingdom
OPENING REMARKS
Major-General Issa Al Mazrouie
Director of Military Intelligence, Armed Forces, United Arab Emirates
Mark T. Kimmitt
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Middle East, United States
Lieutenant-General Sheikh Dr Mohammad Bin Abdullah Al Khalifa
Minister of State for Defence Affairs, Bahrain
General Babakir Baderkhan Zibari
Chief of Staff, Iraqi Joint Forces, Iraq
Remarks made in break-out groups may not be attributed to the individuals who made them. This rule is designed to encourage free discussion.
The group heard that military establishments in the Gulf region exercised a wide variety of roles, reflecting the diversity of security challenges faced by the region’s states.
At the domestic level, risks were posed to Gulf societies by rapid population growth, including the risk of the attraction of unemployed youth to religious fundamentalism. At the same time, many Gulf states remained highly dependent on expatriate labour, and while foreign workforces had contributed to economic growth, they also carried political and security implications. National institutions remained weak and needed to perform better if they were to provide the improved governance that was so vital to development, and some speakers highlighted democratisation as a key part of the development process. The hydrocarbon sector remained the Gulf’s economic basis and had enabled ‘leaps in development’, but governments still needed to diversify national economies in order to provide employment for growing indigenous populations.
At the regional level, since 1981, the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) had been bringing member states closer together, and there were plans for a common market, improved intra-regional transport links, and even a common currency. Yet the Gulf was also the scene of territorial disputes involving Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Levels of national development measured by per capita GDP varied widely within the region. On the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen’s relative poverty was striking, but the Gulf states were providing substantial funds to support that country’s development in the interest of the region as a whole.
At the same time, the Gulf was part of a wider Middle East in which the Israel–Palestine conflict continued to be a major source of insecurity, ‘at the heart of our security problems’, as one delegate put it. The more immediate region, embracing the Gulf, Iraq and Iran, had suffered three major wars over the past 30 years, and Gulf states still had good reason to fear threats from their vicinity. There were challenges from major regional powers, most importantly Iran. Tehran’s nuclear programme and overall strategic stance were of major concern to other Gulf states. Iran continued to occupy three islands claimed by the UAE, ‘in violation of international law’, according to one speaker. Speakers pointed to the danger of radioactive contamination from Iran affecting the Gulf states in the event of conflict. They also highlighted Iran’s ‘export of revolution’ and its ‘direct interference’ in Iraq.
The Gulf states also faced a serious terrorist threat within the region, posed in particular to the infrastructure that is so vital to their role as oil exporters. States viewed the conflict in Iraq as a dangerous magnet for jihadi terrorists, including some citizens of GCC states, and were concerned over Iraq’s emergence as a major point of origin for arms-smuggling.
There was broad agreement, though, that counter-terrorism was not essentially a military task. Rather, terrorism could only be defeated through an ‘ideological’ struggle. Nevertheless, governments often saw their armed forces not only as deterrents to external threats to national sovereignty, but also as the ultimate guarantors of state authority. Participants noted a renewed domestic focus on the part of regional states’ armed forces, which might in future find their role challenged by ‘unhappy’ populations.
Iraq’s armed forces faced particularly acute challenges in reconstituting a national-defence capability while simultaneously taking a greater share of the burden of fighting a multi-faceted insurgency that still seriously threatened national cohesion. Insurgents were using equipment looted from the ousted Ba’athist regime’s forces, as well as suicide bombs and improvised explosive devices, against government and coalition forces, not to mention Iraqi civilians.
The group heard that Iraq’s government intended that the new national armed forces should represent all sectors of Iraqi society, and that they should be apolitical and respectful of human rights. While the army was still a largely infantry-based force, it now deployed more than 100 battalions (many now at full strength) and included mechanised and Special Forces units, and was backed up by a volunteer reserve. Many of its units were combat-tested. The embryonic air force was equipped mainly with helicopters and transport aircraft, while the small navy deployed 15 patrol boats. Training institutions included a military academy for officer training, a national-defence university, an institute of strategic studies and an institute of languages, as well as 15 training schools. The government was re-
creating a national-defence industry to support the military. The aim was that Iraq’s forces should possess the ‘best and most modern’ equipment possible, and there was particular emphasis on improving command and communications equipment.
Speakers projected optimistic views of the progress made by the Iraqi Joint Forces, noting their growing ‘confidence, competence and capability’, the growing respect of the civilian population for them, their improved cooperation with coalition forces, and their successes in decommissioning insurgents’ weapons and integrating militias into mainstream security forces.
One key emerging task for security forces in the Gulf region was the protection of key infrastructure such as oil refineries, power stations and desalination plants. In early 2007, the government of the UAE had established a dedicated force for the protection of vital installations. Similar forces existed in Iraq, where insurgents had frequently attacked infrastructure such as the electricity grid. There was some discussion in the group of what constituted ‘critical’ infrastructure, and whether the definition should be expanded to include financial systems, the Internet and iconic buildings.
One participant asked whether private security and military companies had a legitimate role to play in the Gulf. It was argued that governments’ internal security forces could not expand quickly enough to take on the new roles that had emerged in recent years. Another participant, though, asserted that security should remain a state responsibility.
Delegates noted that governments in the region had increased their defence spending, and major equipment procurement programmes were under way. States in the region were ‘competing to strike a balance’, but a mutually satisfactory military equilibrium remained elusive. The group heard that some Gulf countries were concerned about the ‘arms race’ in the region, which absorbed 40% of global arms exports. Gulf states’ defence budgets as proportions of government spending and of GDP remained among the world’s highest, with opportunity costs for sectors such as health and education. Iran was developing comprehensive defence-industrial capabilities. There were arguments in favour of a comprehensive agreement to rid the Gulf of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
The strategic importance of the Gulf’s hydrocarbon fuel exports and reserves meant that the region’s security was of global significance. Powers with vital interests in the Gulf were playing significant security roles there. The United States’ security presence, aimed at protecting Washington’s vital interests in terms of the free flow of oil exports and the maintenance of regional stability, was particularly prominent. The US role in Iraq was, it was argued, key to regional security. Joint exercises with US forces enhanced regional states’ military deterrents to external aggression, and the US also provided extensive support for Gulf states’ efforts against terrorism and narcotics-smuggling. Missile defence was an area where existing cooperation with Gulf armed forces might be further strengthened in the future, with the US sharing early-warning data with GCC states to create a ‘defensive umbrella’ for the region. However, the US was still reluctant to provide formal, binding security guarantees to Gulf states, though this remained a possibility for the future and could prove a powerful deterrent to WMD threats to the region.
The broader West also contributed to Gulf security, through NATO’s ‘Istanbul Initiative’ and bilateral British and French understandings with states in the region. The United States favoured a broad maritime coalition that included Western, Gulf and Asian nations – effectively an expansion of the existing Proliferation Security Initiative, aimed primarily at countering maritime terrorism and smuggling.
Asia was ‘both present and absent’ in relation to the region’s security. Rapidly growing Asian economies – notably China, India and Korea – relied increasingly, as did Japan, on energy supplies from the region, and were more concerned than ever about the security of these supplies. So far, though, Asian states had contributed relatively little to the region’s security, leading one speaker from the Gulf to express hope that they would play more important security-related roles in future.
Greater cooperation on defence and security matters, both among Gulf states (whose individual national strategies could only be limited in their impact), and between these states and non-regional powers with vital interests in the region, was crucial to maintaining regional stability. It was argued that, in order to build trust and confidence among regional states, a high-level conference of defence and foreign-affairs ministers was needed. Such a conference could establish ‘diplomatic preventive measures’ aimed at forestalling conflict. There was particular concern over the prospect of conflict between Iran and the United States. To avoid such conflicts, the region also needed a ‘strategic forum’ involving Gulf states and international players. The IISS Manama Dialogue was, it was said, already beginning to play this role.
Multinational military cooperation was an essential component of efforts to improve security, and the presence of US and coalition forces in Iraq and the region as a whole would remain a key factor in assuring the prosperity and ‘self-determination’ of Gulf states. One speaker asserted that the United States would ‘stand by its allies’ and remain committed to the region despite the drawdown of its forces in Iraq. This commitment would manifest itself economically, politically and militarily. In the military sphere, US armed forces were heavily engaged alongside their Iraqi and coalition counterparts, while the US Navy’s 5th Fleet was based at Bahrain. US armed forces were assisting the development of Gulf states’ armed forces, for example by training UAE personnel to operate their newly established air and space operations centre.
At the same time, it was clear that more could be done to improve cooperation between GCC forces. Developing and strengthening the GCC’s ‘Peninsula Shield’ force would help to synergise national-defence efforts and create a regional deterrent to outside interference. An announcement on the future structure and training of the force was expected within weeks. Establishing a regional counter-terrorism centre could also contribute to the Gulf’s security. However, the existence of sometimes divergent national threat perceptions remained an obstacle to closer defence cooperation among GCC members.
