Egypt: Against Geopolitical And Engineering Odds, Plans Emerge To Build A Red Sea Bridge

Post-revolution Egypt is reportedly about to embark on an audacious joint construction project with Saudi Arabia: A bridge over the Red Sea that would link the two country's roads and railways. The bridge is slotted to take the form of a series of suspension spans and causeways on the lines of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. Although the bridge is not expected to interfere with shipping, nearby Israel and Jordan are livid that construction could potentially hurt their geopolitical position--and the Egyptian public is worried the crossing is a sign of increased Saudi influence.

The proposed 20-mile bridge would be built over the Red Sea at the Straits of Tiran, a series of narrow sea passages between Egypt and Saudi Arabia located near some of the world's best scuba diving. However, the Straits of Tiran are also a highly strategic waterway--both Jordan's lone seaport of Aqaba and Israel's only Red Sea port, Eilat, send all their cargo through the straits. United Nations peacekeepers actively patrol the Straits of Tiran to guarantee freedom of navigation.

Building a successful road/rail bridge between Egypt and Saudi Arabia would have massive economic and geopolitical implications. Saudi Arabia would be able to export oil via rail to African markets--and African ports--by land. Shipping patterns would change massively as a significant portion of Red Sea maritime traffic would disappear. Israel would have to deal with the likelihood of an unfriendly Egypt being able to easily block Red Sea shipping traffic passing through the bridge in the future. Jordan would be pushed firmly into the Saudi economic camp due to a drop in seaport traffic, while Saudi Arabia would gain a massive amount of influence over unstable post-revolution Egypt. For the first time since Israel's declaration of independence in 1948, the Arab states of Africa and Asia would be linked by road and rail. Due to the poor state of relations between Israel and most of the Arab world, rail traffic has not been able to pass through Israel from one Arab state to another and automobile traffic has been severely circumscribed. Meanwhile, the talk in Egyptian newspapers is of Saudi Arabia trying to lead the Egyptian “counterrevolution.”

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