Standard Disclaimer: All resources contained herein are approved for public release and/or in the public domain. Wherever possible and/or appropriate, links to both local copies and original sources have been provided.

The Dhofar War

In late 2010, I arrived in Kuwait, and assumed responsibility for the security of a DoD maintenance activity operating across several Gulf states. One of these states happened to be the Sultanate of Oman. While a visit to Oman was discussed on several occasions, I didn't arrive in Muscat until more than a year later, when I landed as a tourist. Even before I landed, when I looked out the airplane windows to see craggy mountains - a welcome sight after a year of flat Kuwaiti desert - I began to fall in love with the Sultanate.

Shortly thereafter, as I continued to learn about the locale that now gripped my attention, I learned of a war that was, at that time, nearly forgotten - or, in most cases, never known of to begin with. From 1962 to 1979 - and primarily between 1970 and 1976 - a Marxist insurgent force consisting of local combatants, supported by the Communist bloc, had attempted to "liberate" Oman's southwestern province, Dhofar, from the control of its Sultan. In 1970, in the wake of the contracting British Empire's withdrawal from nearby Aden, the simmering conflict escalated. In July of 1970, Oman's crown prince, Qaboos bin Said, deposed his father, Said bin Taimur, in a bloodless coup. Then, with the help of military and civilian participants from several allied nations, Qaboos' army managed to overcome the insurgency. Today, the episode is most commonly referred to as the "Dhofar Rebellion." The conflict became a textbook case of how to defeat an insurgency. While Dhofar was transformed in the short term, the unified Sultanate of Oman was transformed in the long term. Today, following the forty-nine year reign of the late Sultan Qaboos, Oman remains a beacon of stability in a region well known for turmoil.

To say that I was riveted by this story would be an understatement. Upon leaving the Middle East and arriving at the University of Aberdeen to enroll in their MSc program in Strategic Studies, I read every source I could find on the conflict in Dhofar, and ultimately wrote my dissertation on the conflict's strategic lessons. When I arrived back in the States, I continued intermittent research, with the ultimate goal of writing a book. A decade later, this goal languishes on - I need to finish another project first - but I've since published several articles, and I'm in the process of planning a potential PhD effort focused upon combat geography.

About the Dhofarchive

The Dhofarchive - obviously, a portmanteau of "Dhofar" and "archive" - consolidates more than a decade of intermittent research, found resources, and personally-developed products related to the war in Dhofar. Of particular note are the following resources:

Now Active: An index of sources on Omani history generally, and the war in Dhofar specifically;

Now Active: The late and dearly missed David Cuthberton's personal website, "Snap Shooting in Oman," restored to the Internet after several years with the kind permission of his sons; (NOTE: This resource is presented "as-is," in an archival format.)

Now Active: My own digital map of Dhofar War sites, an ongoing effort, which includes the Internet's most accurate maps of the Hornbeam and Damavand Lines;

Pending: Declassified British government documents mirrored from the Qatar Digital Library and the Arabian Gulf Digital Archives (currently available from the QDL and AGDA via the source index); and

Pending: Declassified American government documents mirrored from the CIA's FOIA Reading Room, the U.S. National Archives, and George Washington University's National Security Archive (currently available via the source index).

Of course, that's just scratching the surface. In addition to organizing these items to make my own future research efforts more efficient, the Dhofarchive's ultimate goal is to make these resources accessible to other researchers and interested parties. You can search the Dhofarchive below.

To search the Dhofarchive, click here. Click here to return to the HARDAC index.