Since the outbreak of the Arab Spring revolutions at the end of 2010, Saudi Arabia has changed its diplomatic approach, from being quiet to being a little aggressive in speaking out, which has reached the point where it has challenged American policy on some regional issues, notably its stand on the January 25 revolution in Egypt.
The Arab Spring revolutions created threats for Saudi Arabia on two levels.
First, the revolutions targeted the regimes. Saudi Arabia has old sensitivities with the concept of a revolution, inherited from the days of Arab nationalism, when Riyadh saw many thrones fall. The Egyptian revolution/coup “infection” of July 23, 1952 passed over Jordan in 1957 and was then transmitted to Iraq in 1958 and to Yemen in 1962.
However, Saudi Arabia’s abhorrence for any kind of uprising is due to the Iranian revolution of 1979, which opened two gates of hell, nationalism and sectarianism for Saudi Arabia and the rest of the region.
Despite the fact that Saudi Arabia mobilised after the success of the Tunisian revolution, and responded by hosting the ousted president, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, it only sensed danger when the revolution moved to Cairo.
During Hosni Mubarak’s rule, especially since the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Egypt has been the most important regional ally of Saudi Arabia. The revolution in Cairo was enough to take all issues back to the days of the Arab cold war and the conflict with Egypt at the time of Gamal Abdel Nasser. This happened when Saudi Arabia was busy with its existential conflict with Iran. So Saudi Arabia decided to support Mubarak and his regime till the end.
The second issue, which causes concern to Saudi Arabia in the same degree as the Arab revolutions, is the alternatives to the regimes, which are mostly Islamic political parties, with the Muslim Brotherhood leading the way.
Egyptian Muslims and Saudi Arabia have a strong bond that began in the 1950s because of their opposition to Nasser’s regime, but this relationship turned sour when the Muslim Brotherhood backed Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
However, this wasn’t the only thing that made Riyadh decide to work with Mubarak’s regime to bring down the Muslim Brotherhood’s rule in Cairo and block their ambition to lead the Arab Spring countries; the Muslim Brotherhood also posed a challenge to the Saudi interpretation of Islam and Islamic leadership.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s rise empowers the successful Islamic models in the region. Turkey has a charismatic leadership embodied in Recep Tayyip Erdogan and it is the leader of the Islamic trend in the region — a position the Arab Spring helped it gain.
This became clear from the visit of Erdogan to Arab Spring countries in 2012, especially to Egypt, although his recommendation for a secular state wasn’t welcomed by most Muslim Brotherhood leaders.
In this way, the Arab Spring posed an ideological challenge to Saudi Arabia, represented by the Muslim Brotherhood leading an important country like Egypt that could compete with it for leadership of the entire Muslim world.
It also posed a geopolitical challenge in the sense that from an ally Egypt could become a rival, or even an enemy — something that would empower Turkey regionally. This was at a time when Iran was doing all it could to defend its influence in the Fertile Crescent, as it tried to tighten the noose on Saudi Arabia. Since it was under threat, Riyadh took action bearing in mind that it had to win this battle. But the question is how?
War against all
Saudi Arabia followed a strategy that is a bit strange, since it aims to defeat all its opponents at once. At a time when it was facing the forces of the Iranian camp in the north and south of the Arabian Peninsula — the regimes of Nouri Al Maliki, Bashar Al Assad, the militias of Hezbollah, the Houthis, and many others — Saudi Arabia entered into a conflict with the Turkish and Muslim Brotherhood camps across the region.
Fighting on two fronts at the same time was fraught with serious risks, especially since Riyadh’s trust in Washington was at its lowest after the Americans readily dumped their ally Mubarak and wanted to reach a deal with Iran, their old enemy whom they show respect these days.
However, the war waged by Saudi Arabia against the Muslim Brotherhood contributed to reducing Turkish influence after the coup in Egypt in July 2013, and ultimately benefited Iran.
The blow received by the Brotherhood branch represented by Yemen’s Al Islah party ended with the Houthis taking control of Sana’a, and as a result Iranian influence in the south of the Arabian Peninsula was strengthened.
Saudi Arabia did a lot to win Egyptian support in its regional conflict with Iran and Turkey. But though Riyadh was relieved by the end of the Muslim Brotherhood’s rule, Yemen’s fall awakened it to the limited capacity of Egypt to act as a counterweight to Iranian influence across the Arab region, especially after the fall of Syria and Iraq.
In its battle against the Muslim Brotherhood Saudi Arabia missed the truth about Egypt — that it has become a weak country. This fact made Saudi Arabia realise later that it had paid more than it could expect to get in return from Egypt.
It also missed the fact that Egypt may become a burden in any alliance, especially in a fierce battle against Iran.
Saudi Arabia began to realise these facts when the final stage of Iran’s nuclear talks approached. The Obama administration is using its war against IS as a tool to achieve a nuclear agreement, which will enable Iran to rehabilitate itself on the international arena; then Iran will be given the role of the policeman of the region.
Egypt’s capacity to face Iran
As a priority, Saudi Arabia should focus on preventing Egypt from coming under the influence of Iran through Russia, and not rely on Egypt to hold off this influence. According to the equations of the dominant powers in the region, a confrontation with Iran requires capabilities that Egypt lacks at present.
Considering Egypt strong due to its large population is a mistake. Egypt’s big population is a burden, not an advantage. Based on current data, Egypt’s potential for leading the region is almost non-existent.
To see how weak Egypt has become, we need to compare the Egyptian and Iranian experiences over the past 35 years.
After the Iranian revolution of 1979, Iran became isolated. In the same year Egypt signed a peace treaty with Israel and it began receiving $2.2bn in annual aid from America.
When it started to reap the fruits of peace, Egypt was expected to get off its shoulders the burden of the conflict with Israel. On the other hand, Iran had started its eight-year-long war with Iraq, which cost it hundreds of millions of dollars, besides human casualties estimated to exceed one million dead and disabled.
While the policy of containment used against Iran thwarted its industrial and economic development, Egypt received international and Gulf assistance worth billions of dollars as gifts for its stand against the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and for making a contribution to peace by putting pressure on the Palestinians to accept Israeli demands. This was apart from its commitment to implementing the Camp David Accords.
So what are the results of 35 years of peace in Egypt and isolation in Iran?
The result is that Egypt, with a population of 90 million, has a national income of $272bn. According to the International Monetary Fund, Egypt was ranked 41st in the world in 2014, after the Philippines, Chile and Nigeria.
We must keep in mind that Egypt’s ranking is close to that of Greece, which is smaller and has a population a tenth in size. Egypt still suffers from serious economic problems, has high rates of illiteracy, unemployment and poverty, and its military dominates the economy.
In addition, Egyptian influence is on its last legs in the region and in Africa, where Ethiopia has ignored Cairo’s concerns on the issue of building dams on the Nile.
On the other hand, the national income of Iran, which had 80 million people according to the 2013 census, has reached $350bn, putting it in the 32nd rank globally despite its isolation and confrontation with the West.
Iran has managed to build influence over most of the region, from Afghanistan in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west and Yemen and the Horn of Africa in the south.
Iran is negotiating with world powers over its nuclear programme. In addition, it is close to getting the know-how for making a nuclear weapon.
Speaking of scientific research, Iranian universities are considered very good in teaching diverse branches of knowledge.
All this will make it very hard for Egypt to act as a counterweight to Iran. Egypt will more likely become a big burden for its allies before it comes under other regional and international influences.
Turkey’s capacity to face Iran
As a result, Turkey looks like the only regional power that can confront Iran.
Turkey’s population is about 70 million, its national income is over $830bn and it ranks 17th in the world.
For years Turkey has seen annual growth rates of 5-6 percent, and even 8 percent sometimes.
The country has a stable political system, a developed industrial base and an educated workforce. The Turkish government has an ambitious plan to make the country the 10th-ranked economy by 2023, when the country will celebrate the centennial of the Turkish republic, which means that Turkey will be competing with the likes of South Korea, Mexico, Spain, Australia and even Canada.
The Turkish economy is double the size of Iran’s economy, three times that of the Egyptian economy and bigger than the combined economies of those two countries. Turkey has the most developed industrial base in the region and the entire Muslim world.
The Turkish military is the second biggest in Nato after that of the US. Geopolitically, Turkey is located between Europe, the Middle East and Russia, which enables it to control the shortest land and sea routes between these three regions.
Turkey’s weak point is lack of energy resources, but this can be overcome if the political alliances in the region are changed, especially those that link it with the Syrian conflict, and if it is liberated from blackmail by Russia and Iran, who provide it oil and gas.
As for the war against IS, Turkey is the only regional power that can confront IS and contain its influence geographically, ideologically, militarily and politically.
Turkey is a Sunni power ruled by an Islamic government that provides a successful administrative and economic model. It has a military that can fight IS. In any battle with IS, Turkey will surely win. All the factors mentioned above make clear why Saudi Arabia should forge a strong alliance with Turkey, even if that ends its alliance with Egypt.
The author is a columnist and academic researcher
