THE Arab Gulf states are in a bind. They argue that they are neutral and don’t support the US- Israel war on Iran. Tehran, on the other hand, sees the presence of American bases on their territories as compromising their status as neutral powers.

One way to look at it is to innovate — for the purpose of this crisis — a distinction between the political neutrality of the Gulf states and their legal neutrality. Legal neutrality, or the absence thereof, is to be ascertained from the texts of defence pacts and the quasi status of agreements that the Gulf states have executed with the US for the last 40-plus years. Most can be accessed on the website of the UN and US treaty series. My team accessed a few agreements and their analysis shows that they were intended for training, upkeep, immunity, parking aircraft, docking ships, etc, during peacetime — and not meant to extend support to the US during an armed conflict. To the governments or sovereigns of the Gulf states, these agreements provided the comfort of knowing that a superpower was present in their backyard, although the agreements retrieved do not seem to provide any guarantee of protection during aggression.

However, even if the agreements are read as providing legal evidence of compromised neutrality, the present position of the Gulf states has been the opposite — they have vehemently opposed attacks on Iran, a demonstration of ‘political neutrality’. In other words, none of the Gulf states wanted the war against Iran. None showed any belligerent intention towards it. Political differences with Iran on regional issues such as support to non-state actors apart, the Gulf states have never raised armed forces and made preparations to attack Iran.........

© Dawn