Among the Gulf states, Bahrain is a small transparent existence.
As an island country, the land area is very small, only 750 square kilometers, not as large as Chongming Island, and it is the smallest among the Gulf countries. In terms of national wealth, compared with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, it belongs to the existence of the younger brother, and the economy is only better than Oman. In international politics, there is no Saudi big brother status, and there is no UAE that will do things, it can only go with the wind, and invite more than 5,000 American soldiers to protect themselves...
Bahrain, which has a very low sense of existence, its biggest title in the private sector may be - the "Saudi back garden".
If you want to say where the Saudis like to go, then Bahrain must be on the list, if you want to ask where the most common tourists in Bahrain come from, it is undoubtedly Saudi Arabia.
So how did Bahrain become a Saudi back garden step by step? There are historical reasons for this, as well as political and economic reasons.
"Poor" achievement "back garden"
Although Bahrain is a small country, its historical foundation is not thin. First of all, Bahrain was the first of the Gulf states to discover oil (1931) and the first Gulf countries to enter the oil industry. On the other hand, the early British proxies were stationed in Bahrain and played an important role in the formation of a modern state in Bahrain. Bahrain has the first post office in the Gulf region, the first girls' school, and in the early 20th century, Bahrain was much more modern than the Uae and other countries at that time.
In fact, when the UAE was about to establish a state, it also called Bahrain (and Qatar), but Bahrain was the most advanced country in the Gulf at that time, how could it bend its knees to other small emirates, and simply become independent on its own.
However, although the country is advanced, it cannot resist the lack of resources. Although Bahrain is the first country in the Gulf to extract oil, it is also the fastest to finish. In 1985, Bahrain's proven oil reserves were 21.32 million tons, which seemed like a lot, but neighbor Saudi Arabia had reserves of 37.8 billion tons, more than 1,700 times that of Bahrain.
Today Bahrain's first oil well has become a sight
If Bahrain continued to harvest in this way, its oil would dry up and then return to poverty in less than 10 years. That's when Bahrain had to make the decision to transform. On the one hand, reduce oil exploitation and exports, on the other hand, give full play to their own geographical advantages.
First of all, Bahrain is an island, which makes it unique in port resources, which has led to a vigorous development of trade and transshipment business.
Secondly, although I have no oil, but the neighbor Saudi Arabia has a lot of oil, I can't produce oil, help the neighbor refine and store oil is always OK. As a result, Bahrain gradually transformed from an oil-producing country to a link in the oil industry chain, and cooperated with Saudi Arabia as a downstream of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia even directly built the pipeline to Bahrain so that Bahrain could help it refine oil. This also makes Bahrain one of the very few countries in the Middle East with more refining capacity than oil production capacity, which further optimizes the country's economic structure.
Moreover, Bahrain advocates a liberal economic policy, which has won the favor of capital. In the 1970s, Bahrain began to vigorously develop offshore financial centers, and gradually replaced Lebanon as the financial center of the entire Middle East. To this day, Bahrain, the traditional financial leader of the Gulf, still has the most developed banking system in the Arab region, as well as an Islamic financial center and a Persian Gulf banking center.
The prosperity of the diversified economy has also brought a growing number of foreign workers, and Bahrain has given residents and tourists enough freedom to the extremely conservative Saudi Arabia. Women can wear no headscarves, drink alcohol in hotels and even eat pork, and Bahrain's tourism industry has naturally developed. In 2004, Bahrain also built the world-renowned Bahrain F1 circuit.
Even under the epidemic in 2021, Bahrain still attracted about 4 million overseas tourists, of which 89% were Saudi tourists, and the visual sense of "back garden" has come to the fore.
The capital of the "Garden Route" and the "Wave"
Bahrain can become Saudi Arabia's "back garden", and there is a "garden road" that is indispensable, that is, the King Fahd Causeway, which was completed in 1986. With a total length of 25 kilometers, the bridge is the sixth largest bridge in the world, connecting Bahrain and Saudi Arabia with the sea route.
Previously, it took 2 hours for Saudis to go to Bahrain Wave for a boat ride, but because of this bridge, it only takes 20 minutes to travel across the country. This also makes Bahrain a top leisure holiday destination for Saudis. The King Fahd Bridge has 5 million passengers a year, and Bahrain's population is 1.5 million, which is enough to see how much Saudis love to go to Bahrain. Because there are so many Saudi tourists, bahraini currency and Saudi currency can be used in Bahrain.
Although religion gives people a constraint on entertainment, people can never escape their own desires.
Conservative Saudi Arabia and open Bahrain can be described as a perfect complement, on the one hand, there is money but no land to spend, on the other hand, it is delicious and fun but lack of money, and every crazy Saudi has the idea of playing in Bahrain in the past. Unlike other Arab countries, in addition to traditional entertainment, Bahrain's pornography industry is also very developed, and it is reported that there are more than 10,000 sex workers (basically foreigners) in Bahrain, accounting for about 1% of Bahrain's total population, which makes people jaw-dropping. Of course, pornography is also illegal in Bahrain, but the state has chosen to turn a blind eye.
Net map, taken in a hotel in Bahrain
However, Bahrain's Red Light District is not a product of modernization, but has a long history, as early as the First World War, and is a well-known sex tourism destination in the Arab world. Therefore, this Saudi "back garden" can also be understood as the "harem" of Saudi Arabia
Special reasons became the old iron of Saudi Arabia
In fact, Bahrain and Qatar were once the same country, ruled by the Al-Khalifa family, and later the Khalifa family put the center of their rule on the island of Bahrain, and another family on Qatar Island eventually became independent and divided into two countries under the mediation of the British. So the flags of the two countries look almost the same, but the length and width ratio and color are a little different.
This pair of historical enemies still have territorial disputes, naturally do not deal with each other, and there is only a Saudi big man next to them to rely on, Bahrain naturally threw itself into the arms of Saudi Arabia.
In addition, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia are not only geographical allies, but also deeply bound politically. Because Bahrain was ruled by the Persian Empire for a long time in the early days, the majority of the "Shia" people, but the Rulers of Bahrain, the Khalifa family, believed in "Sunnis", making Bahrain a rare country with a minority Of Sunnis (30%) ruling the majority Of Shiites (70%).
The yellower it is Sunni and the redder it is Shia, and it can be seen that bahrain is particularly red
Generally speaking, the Shiite bigwigs in the Middle East are Iran, and the Sunni bigwigs are Saudi Arabia. In order to maintain their dominance, the Khalifa family in Bahrain paid welfare to their citizens to prevent trouble, and on the other hand, they turned to Saudi support. Saudi Arabia, which has not been able to deal with Iran, understands the reason for the coldness of the lips and teeth, and naturally has an obligation to give Bahrain all kinds of support.
Saudi Arabia has always contributed greatly to Bahrain's economy, which has long had Saudi funding in the fields of housing, education, engineering, water supply and power supply. Even when the Arab Spring burned in Bahrain in 2011, Bahrain directly invited Saudi Arabia to send troops to maintain stability, which solved the urgent needs of the Khalifa family, which shows how iron the relationship between the two countries is.
It can be said that the stability and prosperity of Bahrain today are inseparable from the support of Saudi Arabia, and this small Gulf country has completely become the little brother of Saudi Arabia and the "back garden" of the Middle East tycoon today.