You made a mistake in the estimate of the Gulf States population (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman), because you have included the the expatriate population. If you consider citizens only, its more like 28-30 million. The citizen component of their militaries varies; in Saudi Arabia, its about 90% citizen, in Qatar, its 40%. Its not unusual for units to be entirely mercernary. In Bahrain and Qatar, without foreigners, their armed forces basically don't exist. Why so many foreigners? Demographics, ie not enough people. Poor image; soldiering is not seen as a good job in these countries. Loyalty; frankly, the rulers don't trust their own people. In Bahrain, for instance, internal security forces are almost entirely Jordanian. When the UAE deployed troops to Yemen, basically no one from Dubai or Abu Dhabi went; nearly all the combat troops were Colombians. The Gulf states don't want to contribute troops not because they have any particular concern for them, but because they don't really have anything, and what they have is really not all that. The 3 F15es shot down in Kuwait. Not due to errant groundfire, as first reported, but by a single Kuwaiti F18, who made not one mistake, not two mistakes but three mistakes. https://www.twz.com/news-features/kuwaiti-f-a-18-hornet-responsible-for-shooting-down-three-usaf-f-15e-strike-eagles-report The deal for American bases in the Gulf is that the Americans protect the Arabs. Nothing more than that. Its not a grand formal alliance, of sharing the burden. This is what Khalaf Al Habtoor meant, in his rebuke of Graham. America gets to put troops in the Gulf, to protect America. The Arabs give them huge sacks of cash in the form of arms sales, for arms that they are never going to use, in return, a bit of that protection is extended to the Arabs. Gulf Arabs don't really have the same sense of nationhood as, say Europeans, or Asians like the Japanese or Koreans.
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