King Abd al-Aziz's Changing Relationship with the Gulf States During the 1930s

Many of the dominant geopolitical characteristics of the Gulf region today emerged during the formative decade of the 1930s. On the one hand, its three major countries – Iraq, Iran and Saudi Arabia – were in the process of consolidating their respective positions, both internally and externally. On the other, the smaller Gulf states – Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and the Trucial States – then, as today, came to be the meeting place for the various competing forces of these three countries, the most dominant being those created by Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd al-Rahman ibn Faisal Al Saud. This paper will attempt to examine how the Saudi relationship with the Gulf states came to dominate all others; it will also describe the changing attitude of Abd al-Aziz to these states during the 1930s.