Kuwait: With passing of emir, US loses an ‘unwavering friend and partner’

A valued friend.  The emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, passed away this week, and his loss to the region should give us pause.

There was a generosity of spirit about the emir. He was, throughout the region, a special and welcome guest and a valued friend. His regional counterparts knew there was no whiff of intrigue about the emir and Kuwait. His agenda was the avoidance of conflict, strengthening a united Gulf and Arab alliance against shared threats, and how to help the least fortunate in the region.

This assessment is not the stuff of the expected bromides when a respected statesman passes away. It is something real, routed in the legacy of the emir, who served for 40 years as foreign minister; in the moderate and progressive temperament for which Kuwaiti statecraft is known; and in a sophisticated realism about dealing with the many threats in the region through collective diplomacy. For Sheikh Sabah, the three-year rift in the GCC was an unqualified disaster for regional security, and he, more than anyone, working with the United States, tried to bring the parties together.

Building not burning bridges. In a region of often brutal fault lines and seemingly endless conflicts, Sheikh Sabah stood for building bridges, not burning them, in the interests of his country.