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Sultan Qaboos 1962.
Qaboos bin Said Al Said was born in Salalah, Oman, on 20th November 1940, the only son of Sultan Said bin Taimur. After early education in his country, Qaboos was schooled for two years in the UK before entering Sandhurst on Intake 29, becoming an under-officer and being commissioned on 3rd August 1962. After a year attachment with the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles) serving in Germany, he studied local government in the UK and undertook a world tour.
In 1965, the province of Dhofar revolted, and Qaboos’s father survived an assassination attempt in early 1966. His rule became increasingly erratic and conservative as he began to suffer from paranoia, with people banned from playing football, wearing sunglasses, or holding conversations of over 15 minutes. When Qaboos returned home later that year, he was placed under virtual house arrest, with his father barely acknowledging his existence. Despite the signing of an oil deal, there was little to show for it – literacy dropped to 5% and infant mortality climbed to 75%, with the whole country served by three schools, a single hospital and ten kilometres of paved roads.
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