How revolutionary values survive repression in postwar Dhufar
The Dhufar region of Oman was famous in ancient times for its frankincense. Visitors today can learn about this past in “The Museum of the Frankincense Land” near the ruins of the former port city where medieval traveler Ibn Battuta sojourned. Visitors can later enjoy a frankincense flavor ice cream at a peaceful café that looks out from the edge of Dhufar’s mountain interior, across its coastal plain, to the city of Salalah and the Arabian Sea beyond. But it was not always frankincense that brought Dhufar renown, nor did the mountains, plain, and coast always offer such peaceful landscapes.
From 1965 to 1976, Dhufar captured global attention for its anti-colonial revolutionaries and their liberation movement. Fighting against the British-backed al-Busaid dynasty of Sultans, the front pursued political and social emancipation, initially for Dhufar but later for Oman and the Arabian Gulf under formal and informal British colonialism. The increasingly internationalized, British-led counterinsurgency militarily defeated the movement in 1976. This campaign deployed indiscriminate violence such as airstrikes and food and water blockades that destroyed Dhufari lives and livelihoods. Subsequently, the Sultanate expunged the revolution, and other episodes of dissent, from official history.
In postwar Oman, former revolutionaries have lived, worked, raised families, and buried peers while living under the authoritarian rule of the very government that they once opposed. As such, theirs is a predicament reminiscent of that of later generations of disappointed activists and sympathizers of the revolutions in Southwest Asia and North Africa that met with backlash, repression, counterinsurgency, and counterrevolution. Taking a close look at the postwar lives of former revolutionaries in Dhufar offers the opportunity to ask: what happens to the ideas and values of revolution after military defeat and repression?
