Going Local: SAS and Former Insurgents for Tribal Engagement in Dhofar, Oman

BLUF:

• The firqat were not a cheap option, and were not always trustworthy or effective: on some days they were outstanding, and on others refused to obey orders. Nevertheless, the war would not have been won without them, and their success is a great tribute to the professionalism and patience of the SAS.

Two Constants in Attempting to “Go Local”:

• The CSAF [Commander. Sultan’s Armed Forces, Brigadier John Graham] and the Commander, Dhofar Brigade met the idea with some skepticism….
• … members no longer wished to serve in a multi-tribal organization.

Dhofar is sharply different from the rest of Oman….  The people are also different. They are more volatile, darker and finer featured than Northern Omanis, and speak their own languages. Although now an ethnic mix, the mountain people, the Jebalis, are descended mainly from the aboriginal inhabitants. Like the Mussandam Shihuh, and unlike the people in central Oman, they survived the migration of Arabian tribes into Eastern Arabia nearly 2,000 years ago.

In territorial terms, a tiny force in a country as big as Great Britain was suddenly faced with rebellion in a province, previously unvisited, the size of Wales. The local Dhofar Force, which had been founded in the 1950s by a British officer, Major St. John Armitage, had degenerated after his departure into an ineffective static guard....

The UK started to withdraw from bases in East Aden Protectorate in August and in short order withdrew from Aden itself by the end of November 1967. The Socialist Revolution followed, and the committed Marxist-Leninists in Aden began to supply bases, equipment, training and direction for the Dhofar rebellion.....

A major military effort was now needed. The time for concessions had, for the moment, gone. The DLF was becoming increasingly politicised. Aid from Communist regimes was pouring in through the PDRY. China provided arms, ammunition and military advisers, and trained 30 members of the DLF as military leaders and political commissars at the Anti-Imperialist School in Peking....

The CO of 22 SAS Regiment, Lieutenant Colonel John Watts, was sent incognito to report. “I was horrified.  The road was cut and the only resupply was by air or sometimes by sea ... There were no Dhofaris in SAF, which was virtually an army of occupation. Everybody on the jebel was with the enemy, some convinced, some out of boredom, some intimidated: SAF had only a few Jebali guides. It was crazy – we were on a hiding to nothing fighting a people. There were signs of counterrevolution, with Muslim-Communist arguments. The latter were better armed and organised and ruthless, absorbing some Dhofaris and shooting others. A clash was coming and therefore the Government had a chance of getting some Dhofaris on their side. The idea must be to pick up the Muslim rebellion, but to do this a national aim was needed….”

Watts hesitated, for the only way to win was to take advantage of the divisions and encourage virtually civil war. His strategy for SAS employment covered five fronts: intelligence, an information team to give facts to the Jebalis, a medical officer supported by SAS medical assistants,a veterinary officer, and the raising of Dhofari soldiers to fight for the Sultan. The military front was deliberately last: civil development was more important, and using an appeal aimed as much at the heart as the head Colonel Watts enlisted the support of British diplomatists in Bahrain, who had earlier been chary of a “British Vietnam”....

The first British unit, appropriately, was an army medical team. By the end of August, after an RAF field surgical team replaced the small army detachment, 600 people a day were being treated at Salalah.

SAS Medic

An SAS advance party arrived in September, following acceptance of Colonel Watts’s paper now the political situation had so dramatically changed. The first group of 20 SAS began to implement the five front plan: the troop soon had small civil action teams at Taqa and Mirbat, treating medical and veterinary problems? an intelligence team was collating information? Radio Dhofar, a small transmitter in an old shack, was broadcasting to the jebelis, supplemented by leaflets and noticeboards? military development, apart from selfdefence by the formidable small SAS teams, awaited larger numbers. RAF Regiment radar teams and Royal Artillery officers and signallers were provided to help ensure the security of RAF Salalah. A tiny Dhofar HQ was established under Colonel Harvey, now back as area commander. The SAS began to train groups of SEPs.

Jeapes has described raising, equipping and training the firqat and taking them into battle: it was a difficult, demanding, frustrating task. understandably, there was suspicion from SAF members who saw recent enemy well equipped and better paid than SAF. The firqat were not a cheap option, and were not always trustworthy or effective: on some days they were outstanding, and on others refused to obey orders. Nevertheless, the war would not have been won without them, and their success is a great tribute to the professionalism and patience of the SAS. It was also important that there was an organisation to keep SEPs employed and paid. Eventually, there were over 3,000 members of firqat – most of the fighting strength of the Front.

John McKeown, BRITAIN AND OMAN:THE DHOFAR WAR AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE, 1981

The first firqat was a multi- tribal organization. A leader of a small tribe, Salim bin Mubarack, approached the SAS with the idea of recruiting former members of the adoo [translates in Arabic to “enemy”] to fight for the Sultan against the communists. The CSAF [Commander. Sultan’s Armed Forces, Brigadier John Graham] and the Commander, Dhofar Brigade met the idea with some skepticism, but allowed the raising of the first firqat, Firqat Salahadin.

After the raising of the Firqat Salahadin, the Sultan authorized the raising of five other firqt. The next four firqat were all tribally-aligned organizations with a tribal leader serving as the senior firqat commander. In addition to providing jobs and salaries to the firqat, the Sultan also provided veterinary care for the firqat’s livestock, medical care for families, and wells for water. The wells especially drew a number of people to the firqat locations, and at times. The BAAT [British Advisory Training Team] had concerned that the firqat and their families would overwhelm the infrastructure in the area.

On 5 March 1971, only thirty days after the raising of the Firqat Salahadin, Salim bin Mubarack died of an apparent heart attack. A month later, the Firqat Salahadin self-disbanded as the firqat members no longer wished to serve in a multi-tribal organization. Most of the members joined their tribally aligned firqat and continued fighting the adoo. The firqat program continued throughout the war, but all were tribally based.

Eric Hunter Haas. Operations at the Border: Efforts to Disrupt Insurgent Safe-Havens, Dhofar,Oman, Insurgency, Counterinsurgency, 2015.

From Amazon:

While the Americans were fighting in Vietnam, a struggle of even greater strategic significance was taking place in the Middle East: the Sultanate of Oman guards the entrance to the Arabian Gulf, and thus controls the movement of oil from that region. In the 1960s and 70s, the Communists tried to seize this artery and, had they succeeded, the consequences for the West and for the Middle East would have been disastrous - and yet, few people have ever heard of this geo-political drama at the height of the Cold War.

In the Service of the Sultan tells, first-hand, the largely unknown story of a small number of British officers who led Muslim soldiers in this hard-fought anti-insurgency war which has shaped today’s Gulf. After outlining the historical, geographical and political background, the book describes military action in a stark and mountainous environment, including operations with irregular forces and the SAS as well as action in the air and at sea. The book gives a gripping, moving, funny account of all these and paints a powerful and illuminating picture of the realities of war.

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