
What if the Umayyad Caliphate Reunited Today?
Last updated: Thursday April 8th, 2021
Report this blog
The Umayyad Caliphate (more commonly known as the Arabian Empire) was one of the major Arabian Caliphates which were the main part of spreading the new religion, Islam. This empire lasted for 89 years which may not seem long but it achieved many things during this time. It would be very interesting to think about what would happen if the Umayyad Caliphate reunited today, to the exact same borders of its territorial peak in 705CE, which is what I am going to talk about here.
Population and Land
So, the first thing we need to think about is what the population and land the caliphate would have. To start off, it would have a giant population of about 665 million people which would put it in third place far ahead of the United States (331 million) but far behind India (1,380 million) and China (1,447 million). The caliphate would also have a massive land area of 4,300,000 sq miles putting it in 2nd place but far behind Russia (6.612 million sq miles).The capital city would probably be Damascus as it was the historical capital of the empire back in 705CE. The largest city in this caliphate would easily be Karachi with a population of almost 30 million people which is larger than the population of Israel, Palau, Nauru, and Cape Verde combined! Here would be the top 5 most populous cities in the caliphate.
1. Karachi (27,506,000)
2. Cairo (20,500,000)
3. Tehran (9,014,000)
4. Riyadh (7,033,000)
5. Baghdad (7,000,000)
Money and GDP
The next thing we need to think about is what the GDP and GDP per capita would be. First of all, the nominal GDP would be a staggering $5.34 trillion USD which would put it in 3rd place just ahead of Japan ($4.94 trillion USD) but well behind China ($12.238 trillion USD) and the United States ($19.485 trillion USD). The GDP per capita however would be quite low at only $8,027 due to the poor conditions in Syria and Iraq despite the very rich living standards in Qatar and the UAE. To make up for this though, the caliphate would be by far the largest oil producer as it consumes all of Saudi Arabia and Iran which have some of the largest oil reserves in the world.
Military Size
The next thing we need to think about is military size. It would start off with a mind-boggling 4.5 million active-duty personnel making it by far the largest army force in the world. For example, China has 2,695,000 active-duty personnel and the United States has 1,379,800.00. This shows that the Umayyad Caliphate would have more than both of them combined!
That about wraps it up there. I hope you enjoyed this new blog! It would be difficult to think about what it would do with this much power and wealth so let me know what you think! Also, thanks to RLL for giving me this idea but for now... Goooood Bye!
https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Umayyad-Empire.png