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Saudi Arabia
Collective Security under the Gulf Cooperation Council
The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) was formed by the six Persian
Gulf states of the Arabian Peninsula--Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar,
Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates--in 1981 to confront
their security challenges collectively. The immediate objective
was to protect themselves from the threat posed by the Iran-Iraq
War and Iranian-inspired activist Islamism (also seen as fundamentalism).
In a series of meetings, chiefs of staff and defense ministers
of the gulf states developed plans for mutual defense and launched
efforts to form a joint command and a joint defense network.
Ground and air units of the six member states carried out several
multilateral exercises between 1983 and 1987 under the code name
of Peninsula Shield. Military assistance, funded mainly by Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait, was extended to Bahrain for up-to- date fighter
aircraft and a modern air base, and to Oman to improve its defensive
capability at the Strait of Hormuz. The GCC planned to integrate
naval and ground radar systems and to create a combined air control
and warning system based on Saudi AWACS aircraft. Problems of
compatibility with different communication and electronic systems,
however, delayed the introduction of these programs. In 1984 the
GCC defense ministers agreed on the creation of a two-brigade
(10,000-man) Peninsula Shield Force. This joint intervention force
was based in Saudi Arabia near King Khalid Military City at Hafar
al Batin under the command of a Saudi officer . In addition to
a headquarters staff, the force consisted of one infantry brigade
of about 5,000 men with elements from all GCC states in 1992,
according to The Military Balance. Its mission, however,
had not been publicly defined. It was not clear, for example,
whether the joint force would have authority to intervene in a
domestic emergency. The force could be enlarged at a time of threat;
it was apparently reinforced prior to the Persian Gulf War in
1991 but did not take part in the war as a distinct unit.
In March 1991, after the conclusion of the Persian Gulf War,
the six members of the GCC, together with Egypt and Syria, declared
their intention to establish a deterrent force to protect Kuwait,
with Egypt and Syria to provide the bulk of the troops and the
GCC states to provide the financing. The plan subsequently encountered
a series of setbacks. At year's end, there appeared little chance
that the Arab deterrent force would be installed. In the meantime,
Kuwait had succeeded in obtaining security commitments from the
United States and Britain and arranged for the prepositioning
of United States military equipment.
Data as of December 1992
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