The Polish professors believed in last part that Iran was an emerging regional power and can even play a broader role in international politics. The roundtable discussion is concluded by a look at Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia and closing remarks on Polish policy in this region.

Recently, there was a conference in Grozny, Chechnya on who Sunni Muslims are and there was high controversy as they did not invite anyone from Saudi Wahhabi figures; is t a sign that other Arab states are trying to undermine Saudi Arabia’s role and influence in the region?

Ożarowski: I am not completely sure but I do not think that Saudi Arabia can undermine Iran’s role in the Persian Gulf because of three reasons. First, all their income comes from selling the crude oil and they lack a diversified economy. Second, they have a lot of internal issues like the pressure of Wahhabi on the King family. Of course, behind them there exists the same factor for several decades which is oil. They possess 21 or 22 percentage of the world’s oil resources which proves to be a huge figure that has major influences on the international areas. They can use oil as a means to improve relations with the US, Russia and many other countries. Given that they are a rich country, they can decide on oil prices or manipulate them. They can also convince different smaller states to follow them.

The third issue is that if you compare Iran with Saudi Arabia, Iran enjoys several advantages including human resources, oil and gas as well as geographical position and the geopolitical role it can play at the moment in various areas like Caspian Sea, Persian Gulf, Middle East and Central Asia. Iran has many advantages since it has several factors which can be used in creating certain policies while Saudi Arabia lacks them because of its own geopolitical conditions. In conclusion, I think whatever might happen in the world is dependent on external military support because I do not believe that Saudis can manage to lead a war by relying on their own military capabilities. Although they can buy a lot of military equipment, the strength of the army is quite low in Saudi Arabia and you do not need to be a military man to realize this. If you just take into consideration the previous war in Yemen, Saudis lost many of their soldiers which shows that they have no military potential. The second case pertains to the year 1990 just after the invasion of Kuwait when Saudi Arabia asked for US intervention, US command and US forces because they themselves had no military capability. So, this is the reason that it is not worth consideration if they accept or nor accept Iran’s role since all facts are now on the side of Iran for it to become a regional power.

Grabowski: My opinion on Wahhabi Islam is that it is being blames by other Muslim states over the conflict which Saudi Arabia is leading. Therefore, the question is whether the two, Saudi authorities and Wahhabi clergymen, can be divided. Of course, there is a long history of cooperation between the two; still, it would be somehow helpful to perceive Saudi Arabia’s stance on some Muslim and Islamic issues. Of course, some Muslim states blame Saudis for its conflicts with Egypt, Iran and some other Muslim states like Syria.  This is because of the Wahhabi version of Islam and its hatred towards Shias. They want to dominate and they want to impose their own version of Islam which is aggressive. We know that they will never manage to do so but if they could, it would be helpful to Saudi Arabia.

If there is any final comments, please take your time.

Ożarowski: I would like to touch upon the role of Poland in the Middle East at the current time. Indeed, Poland is not very much capable to act in the Middle East but I do not want to mention the US and Russia because they are out of question. Because of historical reasons, French and Britain were the first countries to make presence in the Middle East since they were ruling some states. Despite their administration over some countries, their presence remains as a historical complex. However, it was in the first decade of the 21st century that Poland became much more engaged because of the case of Iraq. Poland was sending troops to Iraq alongside the US after the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in order to overthrown the Saddam Hussein regime.

Afterwards, we just took part in this military intervention and then we controlled one zone which was given by the US authorities. It needs to be mentioned that the decision was not an easy one for the government of Poland. You need to remember that we joined NATO in 1999 and only after two years, terrorist attacks took place in the US. Then George Bush said he wanted to take revenge with Iraq being the first aim. Poland, as a young member of NATO, was in an extremely tough position. We could not refuse to take part after two or three years of being a NATO member. I am not seeking to bring up an excuse or justify Poland’s taking part in the military intervention but it was a really difficult situation as compared with several other states like France, Germany or the Netherlands who were members of NATO since the beginning of its formation.

Poland was present in Iraq for many years until 2008 when its government decided to withdraw Polish troops from Iraq completely. Also in Afghanistan, there was the case of International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) which was established under the United Nations (UN) and the UN decided to give the control of the mission to the NATO. Due to the UN activity, there was not such a big problem with the international law like in the case of Iraq in the past. A lot of NATO states were engaged in Afghanistan and the same case held true for Poland until 2014. This is a very crucial case since after the presidential elections in Poland, the new Polish president officially declared that no troops will be deployed to Syria even if there will be an urgent need to send troops posed by international organizations. “Even if there will be some kind of a coalition, we will not send troops to Syria because the chapter of our military presence in the Middle East is over,” he noted.

Presently, we are trying to conduct good relations with all countries. Interestingly, Poland has good relations with all Middle Eastern countries at the present time. Even though not very friendly, current relations are at a very positive level with all of the states like Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey. This gives us some specific position just to create mutual relations with all countries although we are not able to play a specific role in the Middle East like other stronger countries.

HIGHLIGHT:

Iran has many advantages since it has several factors which can be used in creating certain policies while Saudi Arabia lacks them because of its own geopolitical conditions.

This is a very crucial that the new Polish president officially declared that no troops will be deployed to Syria even if there will be an urgent need to send troops posed by international organizations.