HOW EMIRATES REDEFINED THE SOFT POWER OF UAE

Flying beyond commerce, the airline shapes the country's global identity and influence

- BY KRISTIAN P. ALEXANDER | Special to Gulf News

When an Airbus A300 lifted off from Dubai International Airport bound for Karachi at 11.45am on October 25, 1985, few could have imagined that this modest inaugural flight, crewed by pilots borrowed from Pakistan International Airlines and operated with only two leased aircraft, would mark the birth of one of the world's greatest aviation success stories.

Forty years later, Emirates Airlines stands as a towering emblem of the United Arab Emirates' ambition, ingenuity, and global outreach, a symbol not just of commercial achievement but of the UAE's distinctive brand of soft power.

Emirates emerged out of a challenge and a vision. In the mid-1980s, when Gulf Air reduced its Dubai services, His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, who was then also overseeing the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority, tasked Maurice Flanagan, the head of dnata, with launching a new airline on a shoestring budget of just $10 million.

That directive has since become legend. From two short-haul routes to Karachi and Mumbai, Emirates now serves more than 150 destinations on six continents with nearly 270 aircraft, including the world's largest fleets of Airbus A380s and Boeing 777s. It transformed Dubai from a regional trading post into a global crossroads for commerce, tourism, and culture, helping turn the emirate into one of the most connected cities on Earth.

Soft power in motion