BANDARGATE. I strongly doubt that many Tapped readers follow Bahrani politics closely. But they may be forced to do so soon, if this story blows up. The island kingdom of Bahrain is tiny, with less than 700,000 people (including non-nationals) living in an area only 665 square kilometers in size. That's about four times the size of Washington, D.C. Though nobody can say for sure, up to 70 percent of the Muslims there are thought to be Shi'a; they are an absolute majority in any case. The Sunni Al-Khalifa family rules the country in a liberalizing autocratic fashion; in other words, economic reform has proceeded fairly well while democratic political change has lagged. Shi'a are grossly under-represented in the circles of power, and complain of a variety of official and unofficial discrimination. The country is important, if not vital, to U.S. security because it contains the headquarters of the U.S. Navy's Central Command and the Fifth Fleet. The U.S. has been there since 1948, so this is not a new relationship. But since the late 1970s, when the United States began playing more of a direct military role in the Middle East, activity there has picked up. U.S.-Bahraini ties are close and getting closer, especially now that the country is a critical logistics hub for Iraq, because it has made tangible economic progress with American encouragement, and because its Sunni ruling family fears growing Iranian influence in the region. Which is why this 216-page report, put out (in Arabic) by a former strategic planning consultant to Bahrain's Ministry of Cabinet Affairs and Information, has to be so unsettling for the Pentagon. It details, with names and receipts, a secret plot to deny the majority Shi'a a fair chance in the upcoming parliamentary elections in November. The author, a British citizen of Sudanese origin named Saleh Al-Bandar, was deported on September 13th and has been accused of being a British spy, breaking into a government database, and stirring up sectarian tensions. The government has strongly denied his charges, but he is sticking to them. It is inconceivable that Al-Bandar is acting on behalf of the British government, which has no interest in stirring up sectarian trouble. English-speaking Bahrainis have been quick to label the scandal "Bandargate." As you can imagine, Al-Bandar's allegations, if true, are explosive, and could destabilize that country. The Bush administration may then be forced to chose between an undemocratic, pro-American Sunni royal family, and an angry, populist Shi'ite street movement that has cultural ties to Iran and Iraq, and whose position on U.S. basing rights is likely to be hostile. Hassan Fattah of the New York Times is the first major reporter to write about "Bandargate," but expect to see more stories if Bahrain's Shi'a take to the streets in anger. For more background about the dangerous sectarian divide in Bahrain, see this excellent report by the International Crisis Group (ICG) from May of 2005. As the ICG details, Shi'ite discontent with the current unfair system dates back to before the Iraq War, but the rise of Shi'ite power there and elsewhere in the region has emboldened the community's calls for reform.
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Blake Hounshell
