User:Leefeni de Karik/sandbox/2

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Background[edit]

In the 17th century, the Ya'rubid Imam Sultan bin Saif drove the Portuguese out of the Persian Gulf, inaugurating the Omani Empire, which claimed authority over the Musandam Peninsula. Later, the Busaid took over and became the dominant power in the western Indian Ocean, extending their control to territories on both sides of the Gulf, and as far as Gwadur and Zanzibar.[1]

In 1820, the British Empire politically divorced the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman from the dominant sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf coast through a series of treaties. This loose unity formed the Trucial States, which would experience prosperity booms after the discovery of oil. The division of Shihuh land in the Musandam Peninsula provoked high regional inequality and land disputes.[2] Even before the discovery of oil, however, Musandam was of high interest for the British, due both to its strategic position for telecommunications and its deep anchorage.[3]

In 1930, the Council of Ministers of Muscat and Oman approved a mission by the HMS Ormonde to the peninsula. Aware that the British planned to plant a flag, the sheikhs of [...] demonstrated resistance. George Stewart Symes [...].[3]

Upon entering office in June 1970, the Conservative Prime Minister Edward Heath immediately set about trying to reverse Harold Wilson's policy of diminishing the United Kingdom's military presence East of Suez.[4] Conversely, foreign policy was focused on maintaining control of global oil supply routes, causing the expulsion of the Chagossians simultaneously to Operation Intradon.[5]

[GERADO =]

Officials were focused on maintaining control of global oil supply routes. This led to the displacement of the Chagossians and the handover of land to a pro-Western dictator. Operation Intradon was carried out in Musandam, a mountainous peninsula that overlooks the Strait of Hormuz. The Shihuh, Musandam's main tribe, resented outside interference and effectively regarded themselves as independent despite living at a crossroads of the global economy as important as the Suez or Panama canals.

Any foreign authority over the peninsula had lapsed by November 1970, and Whitehall feared it may become the base for a “potential insurrection”. The then Conservative foreign secretary, Alec Douglas-Home, believed that some 70 communist guerrillas from elsewhere in the Gulf were hiding in Musandam and using its relative isolation to hatch plots against British interests in the region.

These dissidents were believed to be part of the National Democratic Front for the Liberation of Oman and the Arabian Gulf (NDFLOAG), a left-wing Arab nationalist movement run by Omanis with cells across the region. Their goal was to expel foreign powers from the Gulf. Files found at the UK National Archives show the chief of the defence staff fretted that these dissidents could unleash “an anti-British campaign of terror”.

  1. ^ Hoffman, Valerie J. (2016-01-11), "Muscat and Zanzibar, Sultanate of", The Encyclopedia of Empire, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, pp. 1–7, doi:10.1002/9781118455074.wbeoe342, ISBN 9781118455074
  2. ^ "The Oman Question: The Background to the Political Geography of South-East Arabia". The Geographical Journal. 137 (3): 361–371. 1971. doi:10.2307/1797273. {{cite journal}}: |first= missing |last= (help); Unknown parameter |late= ignored (help)
  3. ^ a b https://www.qdl.qa/en/british-power-al-bu-said-sultanate-and-musandam-peninsula-1800-1932
  4. ^ Chandler, David; Beckett, Ian, eds. (1994). The Oxford Illustrated History of the British Army (1 ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 362. ISBN 0198691785.
  5. ^ Miller, Phil (22 October 2021). "Stealing a nation – the secret SAS mission to capture the Middle East's oil artery". Declassified UK.
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