Articles From Our Experts

An Italian bombing raid brought Bahrain into the Second World War’s ‘zone of operations’, sparking fear amongst Bahrainis and concerns amongst the British over the safety of the islands’ strategic oil installations.

Faced with the rise of a new power on land and an increase in attacks at sea, the British response at the start of the nineteenth century would lead to a new era of political and military intervention.

In 1920, a gift from Ibn Saud in the form of a female oryx was the first ever to have survived the difficult journey from Arabia to London.

In the late 1940s an American Mission Hospital was in development in Doha. The response of British officials seems to have been motivated more by the demands of the nascent oil industry and concerns over loss of influence than intrinsic concern for the health of the people of Qatar.

By offering military protection to Qatar, the British tried to ensure access to Qatari oil in the run-up to the Second World War. But why did Qatar need weapons and armoured cars in 1935?

Musandam’s majestic sea cliffs, inlets, and strategic location have always attracted the attention of external powers. British support in enforcing the writ of the Sultan of Muscat on the Peninsula has been vitally important since the mid-nineteenth century.

Lewis Pelly, Political Resident in the Persian Gulf 1862–72, witnessed rapid expansion in the value of trade in the region as well as political upheaval and crisis caused by famine.

It’s hard to imagine a natural resource as important to the history of the development of the Gulf States as oil. But in the early days of oil exploration, nothing was more important than water.

A small selection of memoirs by retired political officers provides a unique insight into one generation’s experiences of living and working in the Gulf.

Beyond Sykes and Picot, the India Office Records reveal the complex historical and political junctures that shaped the map of today's Middle East.

A minor incident at Basaidu in the 1930s led to the Royal Navy launching its First Destroyer Flotilla on a tour of the Gulf, in a very public display of its naval dominance over the region.

From its earliest years the RAF played a vital role in maintaining and strengthening British power in the Gulf.

In spite of legally abolishing slavery in its Empire in 1833, the British Government struggled to eradicate the practice in its protectorates in the Gulf.

The life and times of Shaikh Khaz’al bin Jābir bin Mirdāw al-Ka‘bī (1861-1936), the Emir of Mohammerah and chief of the Banu Ka’b tribe.

Who were the Bania, and how are they depicted in the India Office Records?

Over several centuries, the close relationship between individual explorers of the Arabian Peninsula and the British Empire was made clear in often unpublished journals and accounts held in the India Office Records.

During WWII, secret instructions for the interception of post passing through the Gulf were circulated to Political Agents in Bahrain, Kuwait and Muscat.

Over 800 manumission statements, collected by numerous British administrators in the Gulf over the course of three decades, offer invaluable insights into the lives and labours of the enslaved peoples of the Gulf region.

Only by mapping and surveying Aden fully were the British able to plan for its reconstruction and fortification, thereby facilitating trade and other shipping to and from India and beyond.

How geophysicists working in the Gulf were able to contribute in the 1930s to the scientific community’s understanding of the earth’s magnetic field.

Keen to maintain peace and wary of inflaming relations with the Trucial Shaikhs, in 1910 the Government of India censured those responsible for a bloody bombardment of Dubai and its aftermath.

Bahrain’s Order in Council gave the Political Agent the power to, on one hand, issue birth certificates, and on the other, to rule on capital punishment for convicted criminals.

While much of the world was experiencing the effects of global war in the first half of the 1940s, the Gulf by contrast was an oasis of calm.

The 1948 visit of Shaikh Khalīfa bin Mohammed Āl Khalīfa to Britain on a training trip arranged by the British Council provides an early example of cooperation between Britain and Bahrain in matters related to policing and security.

Looking to strengthen Persia as a potential buffer for the defence of India, Britain provided military assistance to the Crown Prince of Persia in his struggle against Russian expansion into the Caucasus.