270 L.-C. SIM
of the key domestic policy challenges—the shortfall in energy requirements to power its twenty-first-century economic development. The
interaction between landscape and regime level considerations is discussed
in a later section.
What of the geostrategic motivation, in particular that civilian nuclear
energy was a hedge against another landscape-level development, namely,
Iran’s bellicosity and alleged ambition to acquire nuclear weapons? 26
Competition over regional hegemony between Iran and the Gulf has
intensified since 1979, manifested through sectarian, ethnic, strategic,
and territorial rivalries. These tensions were underlined by the continuing Iranian occupation of three UAE-claimed islands, formation of the
GCC, by the latter’s financial support for Iraq during its eight-year war
with Iran, by proxy wars fuelled by Arab fears of an ascendant Iran-led
Shia crescent in Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, 27 and by suspected Iranianbacked attacks on civil infrastructure in the Gulf. The UAE’s ambassador
to the US argued in 2010 that ‘the UAE is most vulnerable to Iran. Our
military wake up, dream, breathe, eat, sleep the Iranian threat. It’s the
only conventional military threat our military plans for, trains for, equips
for…it’s very much in our interest that Iran does not gain nuclear technology’. 28 Some scholars have also asserted the existence of a robust link
between national security considerations, nuclear weapons, and civilian
nuclear energy programmes. 29
For the UAE, however, while Iran’s nuclear programme was certainly a
huge source of concern, it was not the driving force behind Barakah. The
UAE’s adoption of the ‘gold standard’ of non-proliferation eliminated
any possibility of a domestic capacity for advanced uranium enrichment
required for a weapons programme. Although the UAE’s bilateral agreement with the US—Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954—
contains a provision that should the US negotiate a more favourable 123
agreement with another country in the Middle East, the ‘gold standard’
can be renegotiated, the UAE is highly unlikely to do so. The global
goodwill, respect, prestige, and ‘soft power’ earned through its management of the nuclear programme is invaluable; the UAE leadership would
be loath to give this up. This is not to say there was no political calculation about symbolically pushing back against Iran’s nuclear hegemony,
only that it was not a driving force. As reiterated by its Minister of Foreign
Affairs, the country’s nuclear programme was also an ‘opportunity to
drive positive change at the international level’ in terms of widely-shared
of the key domestic policy challenges—the shortfall in energy requirements to power its twenty-first-century economic development. The
interaction between landscape and regime level considerations is discussed
in a later section.
What of the geostrategic motivation, in particular that civilian nuclear
energy was a hedge against another landscape-level development, namely,
Iran’s bellicosity and alleged ambition to acquire nuclear weapons? 26
Competition over regional hegemony between Iran and the Gulf has
intensified since 1979, manifested through sectarian, ethnic, strategic,
and territorial rivalries. These tensions were underlined by the continuing Iranian occupation of three UAE-claimed islands, formation of the
GCC, by the latter’s financial support for Iraq during its eight-year war
with Iran, by proxy wars fuelled by Arab fears of an ascendant Iran-led
Shia crescent in Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, 27 and by suspected Iranianbacked attacks on civil infrastructure in the Gulf. The UAE’s ambassador
to the US argued in 2010 that ‘the UAE is most vulnerable to Iran. Our
military wake up, dream, breathe, eat, sleep the Iranian threat. It’s the
only conventional military threat our military plans for, trains for, equips
for…it’s very much in our interest that Iran does not gain nuclear technology’. 28 Some scholars have also asserted the existence of a robust link
between national security considerations, nuclear weapons, and civilian
nuclear energy programmes. 29
For the UAE, however, while Iran’s nuclear programme was certainly a
huge source of concern, it was not the driving force behind Barakah. The
UAE’s adoption of the ‘gold standard’ of non-proliferation eliminated
any possibility of a domestic capacity for advanced uranium enrichment
required for a weapons programme. Although the UAE’s bilateral agreement with the US—Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954—
contains a provision that should the US negotiate a more favourable 123
agreement with another country in the Middle East, the ‘gold standard’
can be renegotiated, the UAE is highly unlikely to do so. The global
goodwill, respect, prestige, and ‘soft power’ earned through its management of the nuclear programme is invaluable; the UAE leadership would
be loath to give this up. This is not to say there was no political calculation about symbolically pushing back against Iran’s nuclear hegemony,
only that it was not a driving force. As reiterated by its Minister of Foreign
Affairs, the country’s nuclear programme was also an ‘opportunity to
drive positive change at the international level’ in terms of widely-shared