Oman: Quiet, Startegic Jewel of the Persian Gulf

"Driving along a rocky red cliff," Sharon Otterman wrote in The Times back in March, "with deep canyons yawning below, one could be forgiven for mistaking this rugged place for Utah. But this is the Musandam Peninsula of Oman, an Arabian land of pristine seas, jagged peaks and, for the moment, few tourists."

Writing in the same paper three years earlier, Seth Sherwood described this jewel of the Persian Gulf this way: "For travelers, the main attractions of this nation of 2.3 million are its unspoiled natural beauty - vast deserts, craggy hills and dramatic coastlines, well-preserved fortresses and tolerant, friendly citizens. The physical contrast to Dubai is clear as soon as you step off the one-hour flight to Muscat, Oman's capital. You depart an enormous airport framed by ugly construction cranes and arrive at a small airfield surrounded by picturesque jagged bluffs.

"In Muscat, no sports cars fill the roads, and no glass palaces of commerce spoil the skyline. Crossing the city by taxi, you glide through deep ravines where white houses cling like teeth to the perilous inclines. Along the coast, spiny moon-rock formations descend to the water and push into the sea, creating sublime outcroppings."

It wasn't so long ago that Oman was one of the most repressive places on the planet--a Taliban-like outpost before the Taliban made its existence known. Under Sultan Said ibn Taimur, and until 1970, it was illegal to wear glasses, ride bicycles or own radios or televisions (just as it would be under the Taliban in 1990s Afghanistan). Western clothes, smoking and dancing were forbidden. Those who broke the law were publicly flogged. Omani women and girls could not attend school. Foreigners were not welcome. The wooden gates of the capital city, Muscat, were shut promptly each evening, with dusk.

In 1970 the Sultan's son, the authoritarian yet genial Kaboos ibn Said, returned from Britain;s military academy at Sandhurst and changed everything. As David Lamb wrote in The Arabs, "He had discovered the world. His new passion was light opera, and he would lie on the bedroom floor for hours listening to Gilbert and Sullivan. His affinity for western culture so infuriated the Sultan that he smashed Kaboos's favorite album, The Pirates of Penzance, over his knees. Kaboos protested and was placed under house arrest for three years."

Lamb doesn't make an allowance for the possibility that anyone in his right mind would be entirely justified to smash The Pirates of Penzance soundtrack over his knees, or anyone's knee. That aside, it seems the smashing was, for Kaboos, the last straw. He never served out his three years. He rebelled in the traditional way of Arab monarchs: he overthrew his father, and Oman has never been the same since.

Here's my new profile of Oman.