In 1958, Pakistan paid Oman three million pounds for a small fishing town called Gwadar. For two centuries it had been an Omani possession. Sixty-eight years later, both sides of that old transaction are being tested by the same war, and the results should trouble anyone in Islamabad who thinks seriously about the country’s economic future.

Last week the International Monetary Fund published its regional outlook for the Middle East. The numbers are brutal. The six Gulf Cooperation Council economies are expected to shrink by 4.8 per cent this year. Kuwait’s economy is forecast to contract by 16.7 per cent, Qatar’s by 15.6 per cent, and Bahrain’s by 11.3 per cent. These are not slowdowns. They are the kind of collapses normally associated with financial crises or civil wars.

Yet one Gulf economy is growing. Oman is expected to expand by 4.1 per cent, and the IMF has actually raised its forecast since April. Oman is a modest oil producer, so oil does not explain it. Geography and preparation do.

This war has taught every Gulf capital that concentrating its economy behind a single narrow strait is a strategic liability.

This war has taught every Gulf capital that concentrating its economy behind a single narrow strait is a strategic liability.

Oman’s three major ports, Sohar, Duqm and Salalah, sit on the Arabian Sea, outside the Strait of Hormuz and outside the Red Sea danger zone. When the strait was shut this spring, cargo meant for Dubai, Doha and Kuwait still had to land somewhere. Much of it landed in Oman. Sohar handled 52 million tonnes of cargo in the first half of this year, up 52 per cent, with almost half of it moving through ship-to-ship transfers. Qatar formally designated Omani ports as alternatives to........

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