The UK's Integrated Review and the Gulf States

Introduction

The UK periodically undertakes a range of reviews, of which the Integrated Review and the Defence Command Paper of March 2021 are but the latest iteration. These kinds of projects and publications are designed to, in broad terms, articulate the ends (strategic goals), the means (the capabilities), and the ways (the strategy) that government aspires to use the means to achieve the ends. The Integrated Review, in particular, is comparatively more detailed and far-reaching in its aims compared to the 1998 Strategic Defence Review and the 2010 and 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) and National Security Strategy (NSS).

The Integrated Review contained a few high-profile policy shifts, including the reneging on the 0.7% government spending on international aid, the surprising increase on the UK’s cap on nuclear weapons, and the merging of the Department for International Development and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Arguably

The Atlanticist link is reinforced, Europe is far from eschewed, various presences and links to Africa (mainly East Africa) are discussed, working up Arctic-orientated capabilities and warship tours is noted, and, above all else, the paper introduces an upcoming ‘tilt’ to the Indo-Pacific region. Indeed, this last element is the signature development of the Integrated Review. Couched in response to a rising China, via the Review, the UK government signalled its orientation and aspiration to go forth and engage, challenge, and deter. The dispatching of the UK’s aircraft carrier to the Indo-Pacific region is the leading symbol of this venture.

At the same time as the UK’s aspirations are rising and broadening, its capabilities and forces are, at least in the short term, decreasing in number. For example, the army’s strength will drop to numbers not seen since 1714, and tank numbers will dwindle to only 148. By way of a broad comparison, Russia, a state according to the Integrated Review that remains ‘the most acute threat to our security,’ has 13,000 tanks. The UK hopes to leverage newer technologies to bridge this (and many other similar) gaps. In the defence space, this is about using smart technologies (drones, AI-linked systems, etc.) to overcome mass. However, the Integrated Review is far from focused on defence and security concerns alone, hence the entire concept of integrating different parts of government work under one overarching strategic plan. Indeed, there is considerable focus on forging a role for the UK in a broader innovation and technology space, where the focus will be on ‘collective action and cocreation with our allies and partners.’

Competition for the Gulf States?: An Eastwards Tilt

Arguably at least, secondary to this underlying modus operandi is the desire to better acquaint the UK with critical partners in the Indo-Pacific region in the broader contest against the rising might of China. This tilt and the squeezing of resources deployed to carry out this strategic reorientation are of particular relevance to the states comprising the Gulf Cooperation Council, Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Indeed, there does appear to be a comparative shift away from the Middle East. The long-term focus on Iraq is lessening considerably, and the focus on upstream prevention of terrorism and extremism is more limited. Meanwhile, the focus on the GCC states is also dialled down. The previous strategic guidance, the 2015 National Security Strategy and the aligned Strategic Defence and Security Review (NSS, SDSR), placed considerably more emphasis on the UK’s pre-existing interaction and role in the Gulf region and the Middle East. A bespoke ‘Gulf Strategy Unit’ was created and hosted in the Cabinet Office, while a ‘Gulf Strategy’ was promised though nothing came of it.

However, the Gulf focus in the 2021 documents is comparatively demure. A keyword search provides a basic but telling metric. Mentions of the Middle East went down considerably from 27 to 15, moving from the 2015 SDSR to the 2021 reviews, while the Indo-Pacific region only entered the vernacular in the 2021 reviews. Similarly, reference to the Gulf region dropped from 10 to 6, and, somewhat surprisingly, Qatar did not even merit a mention in the Integrated Review.

Table 1: Keyword Search of Strategy Documents

This fits with the broader strategic narrative that the UK government is pursuing, shifting its focus, like the US under the Obama Administration (or, arguably, even beforehand), further eastwards.

In the Integrated 2021 Review alone, ‘China’ and the ‘Indo-Pacific’ are collectively mentioned 63 times (34 + 29), while the Gulf countries, as a group and in name, are mentioned a mere 16 times.

Whither Gulf Relations?

Nevertheless, conclusions must carefully parse these documents, thinking about the realities of UK-Gulf engagement today versus the aspirational – or, for some, plainly unrealistic – tone of the Integrated Review. Moreover, in the Defence Command Paper, the importance of the Gulf states remains clear. Qatar is mentioned three times. The unusually close UK-Qatari relationship is rooted primarily in the Royal Air Force and its regular Voyager deployments to Qatar, and the joint standing up of a Hawk training squadron and a Typhoon squadron, which is the first time since World War Two that the RAF has formed a joint squadron. Similarly, Oman’s importance shines through thanks to the instantiation of a new Naval Base at Duqm and allied expanded training facilities. Perplexingly, neither Bahrain nor the UAE merits a mention in the Defence Command Paper. This is bizarre given the demonstrable importance of the making permanent of a long-established base in Bahrain at HMS Juffair for four counter-mine ships, a Type-23 frigate, an auxiliary support ship, and 1200 sailors. Similarly, the RAF extensively uses the Al Minhad airbase in the UAE and still bases its 906 Expeditionary Air Wing there.

More generally, the GCC states remain a hugely important trading partner for the UK, not least as the fourth largest export destination after the US, China, and the EU states, amounting to around £45billion ($62.6 billion) a year. Former Secretary of State for International Trade and current Conservative Party MP, Liam Fox, sees tangible opportunities for the Gulf States and the UK to work together and use the GCC “as a gateway for exporting goods and services to the European continent and Central Asia”. There is plenty of room for country-to-country cooperation between the UK and the Gulf states. For example, the UAE has a trade figure of £17 Billion with the UK, which the British Government hopes to increase to £25 billion in 2021. Another meaningful index of the solid partnership between the two countries is the signature in March 2021 of an agreement between the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala, and the UK. According to this agreement, Mubadala will invest £1bn in the UK life sciences’s industry to combat the aftereffects of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this way, these kinds of investments mirror the Integrated Review’s focus on niche, future-orientated industries and technologies where the UK can leverage its experience alongside allies.

So What’s New?

In many ways, the Gulf states have seen this movie play out before. As noted, for over a decade, the monarchies have been hearing about the US vaunted Pivot to Asia. Some in the region fretted that this was the beginning of the inevitable decline of the US in the region, with the US switching attention to the Far East, leaving the Gulf states alone to deal with Iran. In stark contrast, the reality for the Gulf states is nearly the complete inverse: there has been no significant US pivot from the Gulf to Asia. Certainly, the drawdown from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has lowered US troop numbers. This led to a commensurate drop in, for example, transit via the various US bases in the region. However, the Qatari al Udeid air force base remains the home of US Central Command, 10000 US troops, multiple air wings, and is still in the process of renovation and expansion, if some elements are moving to Jordan. The Al Dhafra airbase in the UAE remains vital. Meanwhile, over a decade after leaving Saudi Arabia, US forces are back once again at Prince Sultan Air Base. There is little sign of the US army forward base in Kuwait slimming down, and the 5th Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain is also growing. The point is that the Gulf monarchies have carved and institutionalised a critical place for themselves in the US and UK foreign policy and security furniture that no rhetoric will easily shift, at least not in the near term.

Moreover, from this distinctly solid basing, UK-Gulf relations are prospering across the board.

Still, there is a sense that this was something of a missed opportunity. While UK relations certainly fluctuate in the Gulf, the overarching expanding foothold augers for a sustained period of closer relations. Given that the region is frequently touted as a locus for considerable Chinese energy-rooted interest, leveraging pre-existing ties would seem like a natural, if not a simple, thing to do. Though esconced on a solid base, the UK’s relations with the Gulf states certainly ebb and flow, and it remains opaque how a substantial UK-Gulf-China policy of mutual benefit could be fashioned. For any progress to be made, all sides would have to strive to compartmentalise their relations to limit inevitable disagreements in discrete spheres from spilling over and scuppering wider progress, something that would require a tricky shift in the contemporary modus operandi. But the reality remains that the UK and the Gulf states and the Gulf states and China remain deeply interested in fostering closer relations from an already high baseline. As the fulcrum of a putative trilateral engagement, the Gulf states are in a position to leverage both sides, and states like the UAE, Qatar and increasingly Saudi Arabia have considerable experience in driving innovative policy gambits, fashioning competitive new sectors, and working with diverse partners to mediate regional conflicts. In the end, both Global Britain and the US need to play their ‘engage, challenge, and deter’ cards vis-à-vis China right. If this were to be the case, the GCC, with its cultural significance, unusually close relations with pivotal East Asian states, and strategic geopolitical location, can be a significant factor in maintaining peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond.

Dr David B. Roberts is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Security Studies at King’s College London where he is the School theme-lead for Regional Security and Development. Dr Roberts is also Adjunct Faculty at Science Po’s Paris School of International Affairs, and a Non-Resident Fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute Washington. Prior to moving to King’s, Dr Roberts was the Director of the Gulf office of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (RUSI Qatar).

Sara Ghazi Almahri is enrolled on the Ph.D. Program of Kings College London's War Studies Department (School of Security Studies). She has an MA in Diplomacy and International Strategy from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Her research interests include foreign policy, diplomacy, small states and soft power, education, and women's empowerment.

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