One of the great things about being an Aggie is bumping into fellow former students all over the world. Unfortunately, due to a recent decision by the Texas A&M Board of Regents, fewer Aggies will be in the Middle East region during this critical time.
I recently returned home from a work trip to Qatar. One of the most rewarding parts of the visit was seeing Education City, which includes the Qatari campuses of six elite American universities, among them Texas A&M at Qatar. These U.S. universities are fully reimbursed for their costs to host campuses by the Qatar Foundation, a nonprofit founded by the former emir’s wife, Moza bint Nasser.
I’ve always been proud to see my alma mater represented in the region, along with renowned institutions like Georgetown, Carnegie Mellon, Northwestern and Cornell.
Unfortunately, in February, following a disinformation campaign, the A&M Board of Regents voted 7-1 to shut down the campus by 2028 and end the relationship. There was no debate or discussion, or even so much as a phone call to the Qatar Foundation.
Wild accusations accusing A&M Qatar of leaking national nuclear secrets were tossed about without evidence by a foreign-funded D.C. think tank.
These unfounded accusations were easily knocked down in a detailed statement by A&M President Mark Welsh III, who noted that the Qatar campus does not even offer a nuclear engineering program or any classes of the sort. We can all agree that Welsh, a former four-star Air Force general and chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force, can be trusted to make evidence-based decisions about protecting our country’s national security and the reputation of A&M.
The regents’ decision is short-sighted, harmful to our bilateral ties with a key regional ally, and harms the international reach of A&M and our former students.
For A&M, the loss is real. More than 1,500 students have graduated from the program, and it currently enrolls 730 students — Aggies from College Station who are gaining Arabic language and culture training, Qataris and other Arabs who are becoming part of the 12th Man, and exporting the Spirit of Aggieland to the Middle East.
Qatar is a top supplier of natural gas, and we should want to continue the pipeline of Aggies in Qatar’s energy sector, which is powering the world during Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
Some will cite Qatar’s dealings with Hamas, the Taliban, or Iran as reasons to cut ties. But if you dig into the details, this is for a good reason — these all aided the U.S. Having elements of the Taliban leadership in Qatar allowed the Trump administration to negotiate the Doha Accord in 2020 for the U.S. pullout of Afghanistan.
Hosting Hamas in Qatar has allowed us a clear line of communication, including the current negotiations between Hamas and Israel. And Qatar facilitated the U.S. deal with Iran to give Iran its $6 billion back in return for hostages — and U.S. Ambassador Timmy T. Davis assured us Qatar won’t let a dime go to the Iranian regime without the U.S.’s signoff.
Others may cite human rights concerns with Qatar, and there I can agree there are certain areas that need improvement. As a gay man, I certainly think more can be done to ensure LGBTQ+ rights. Workers’ rights and safety were a serious concern in the years ahead of the 2022 World Cup.
However, this all being acknowledged, I think more engagement rather than less is the best way to improve Western democratic and human rights values in the country.
In its decision to close, the board cites, “heightened instability in the Middle East,” as the reason to pull out, but I’ve never known Aggies to retreat from the challenges of the world. As a former student, I want to see A&M continue to grow, to have more relevance around the world, and a seat among the best research institutions. With the decision to “best advance its core mission … by concentrating its focus in Texas,” I worry the university’s leaders are deciding the future of A&M will be smaller, less competitive, and less relevant worldwide.
Further, their paper tiger excuses for closing the Qatar campus don’t hold up.
Qatar is a major non-NATO ally in a difficult region. It hosts thousands of U.S. service members at Al Udeid Air Base, the largest military installation in the Middle East. Qatar has invested more than $8 billion in Qatari funds to ensure the base is well-equipped for American men and women in uniform.
Other Gulf Nations restrict what types of missions the U.S. military can operate from their bases. Meanwhile, as recently as last month, Qatar allowed U.S. Air Force pilots to launch and be refueled from Al Udeid as they defended Israel from missile and drone attacks by Iran.
Qatar played a key role in the U.S. evacuation of Afghanistan, and without Qatar we would have left thousands of Afghans who supported our American troops behind.
Today, Qatar and Egypt are playing key roles mediating between Hamas and Israel for the release of hostages and a possible cease-fire in Gaza.
Gov. Greg Abbott and the A&M Board of Regents have time to reverse this decision and restore Texas A&M at Qatar before we lose generations of future Aggies. Surely, it’s worth at least one minute of debate.
Robert Edmonson, Texas A&M Class of 2007, is chief of staff to Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif. He received the Core Values Coin from the Texas A&M Association of Former Students in 2020.
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