IN diplomacy, a surprising number of things are undertaken so that they can have taken place—rather than because they make especial sense at the time.

Today in Doha, David Cameron held a free-ranging question and answer session with students at Qatar University. The prime minister held scores of “Cameron Direct” sessions during the 2010 general election campaign, inspired by the town hall meetings held during American presidential campaigns. Once in Number 10, he started holding “PM Direct” meetings in provincial towns up and down Britain, and today he held his first one overseas. I felt a faint (and geeky) thrill of recognition as we filed into a lecture hall at Qatar University and saw the same sick-green PM Direct banners that I had last spotted at a question and answer session in Manchester. On our advance programmes, it had looked like a pretty good idea: a British prime minister fielding all and any questions from students in a country where unfiltered access to political leaders is not the norm. Now that it has taken place, it still looks like a good idea, mostly because of that signal of openness that it sent.

I wish I could say it was an electric encounter. It was…ok. I hope it is not patronising to say the students were impressive. They asked serious, thoughtful and knowledgeable questions, many of them pushing Mr Cameron to be more robust in defence of international law and human rights. There was a flurry of questions about the bloodshed in Libya, and why the international community was not doing more to stop the Qaddafi regime. What about humanitarian intervention and the precedent set by the Balkans wars of the 1990s, Mr Cameron was asked. He ducked the chance to call for regime change by force, instead inviting students to consider how the west had intervened to stop ethnic cleansing of Muslims in the Balkans, disproving the canard that the west hates Islam. There were questions about a speech he gave in Munich earlier this month on British multiculturalism, about why he did not condemn repression in Saudi Arabia and several about the Palestinian-Israeli dispute. Mr Cameron said he had not condemned Britain’s multiracial society, but merely condemned state policies that had encouraged different communities to live separate lives. He dodged the Saudi question, and on the Palestinian question said a two state solution was the only feasible ending to this tragic conflict.

When it was over, I asked some of the students who had asked questions whether Mr Cameron had changed their views of British foreign policy. Not really, they said. It was good that he had come to answer questions freely, but he was a professional politician, and he had not given much away. Fair enough, and still, it is on balance a good thing that the event took place.

The same is true of the various press conferences that have taken place in vast, marble palaces all along this whistle-stop tour. In the flesh, they were not very exciting. But in at least one case, in Kuwait, it was the first time that the local prime minister had ever faced the press for unscripted questions. The Kuwaiti prime minister must be a quick learner in that case, because on his very first outing he managed to duck and dodge the questions put to him, and instead answer questions that had not been asked at all.

Again in Kuwait, Mr Cameron gave a speech to the parliament which clarified some important elements of his policy towards the Arab world. On paper, it was a revealing speech, that fleshed out Mr Cameron’s worldview in interesting ways. The very fact of giving the speech in one of the Gulf’s more lively and free parliaments was also, in and of itself, a sensible idea, sending a message about Britain’s support for universal suffrage and accountable government. But, sitting in the room, your correspondent could not help noticing empty chairs, a low hubbub of chatter among the Kuwaiti VIPs invited, and the rather louder hubbub of those members of the audience who answered their mobile telephones during the speech to conduct quite long conversations.

More broadly, Mr Cameron’s visit to Kuwait coincided with multiple celebrations to mark the 50th anniversary of the state’s independence from Britain, the 20th anniversary of Kuwait’s liberation from Iraqi invasion, and the fifth anniversary of the accession of the current emir. To recognise all these anniversaries, we were told that Mr Cameron would be receiving a formal welcome, alongside Britain’s prime minister during the first Gulf War, Sir John Major, and the Kuwaiti prime minister of today.

Our rag-taggle press corps duly headed for the Emir of Kuwait’s official tent in the Bayan Palace complex. We were due to see the three prime ministers past and present review a royal salute from Kuwaiti armed forces, then an honour guard of Grenadier Guards and veterans from the first Gulf War.

On paper, the solemn ceremony was a valuable reminder of the blood ties between these two allies. In reality, the parade ground was a small car park in front of a palace guesthouse that resembled an upmarket Holiday Inn. The Kuwaiti soldiers were not terribly martial. The guardsmen marched out of the guesthouse in their red tunics and bearskins and were technically splendid. There was much impressive shouting from a British warrant officer to make sure each man was in perfect alignment. Mr Cameron gave a short, well-judged speech. But all in all, it still looked like a group of Englishmen in curious uniforms marching around a sun-baked car park far from home. I do not mean to mock. I am quite old-fashioned when it comes to veterans, and nobody put a foot wrong. But stripped of all context, it looked plain odd.

What I thought, standing there squinting in the sun with my notebook, was irrelevant, of course. The ceremony mattered because it mattered, because it was going to take place, and then because it had taken place. In diplomacy, the message often is the message, I realised. What actually happens is merely physical evidence for the sincerity of that message.

This is the fourth dispatch from Bagehot's trip around the Middle East with Mr Cameron. The previous post can be found here. The next one is here.