Posted on 06/22/2004 7:05:05 PM PDT by blam
SAS ordered into Saudi Arabia to shield embassy
By Michael Smith, Defence Correspondent
(Filed: 23/06/2004)
A 25-man SAS team has been sent to Saudi Arabia to bolster security at the British embassy and plan a possible mass evacuation of foreigners, defence sources said last night.
The squad is backed by many more special forces troopers in neighbouring Qatar. This force would be summoned if the 20,000 British citizens in Saudi had to be withdrawn in a hurry.
The members of the SAS team are counter-revolutionary warfare specialists and were deployed last week.
The larger SAS force has been given diplomatic clearance by the Saudi authorities to move straight into the country should any threat develop against the embassy, which is seen as a prime target for Saudi militants linked to al-Qa'eda.
The kingdom has been shaken by a series of attacks in recent months that culminated last week in the beheading of Paul Johnson, an American expatriate worker.
The Saudi leader of the terrorists was later killed as he attempted to dispose of the body.
The deployment is the clearest sign yet that Britain is extremely worried about the worsening security situation in Saudi Arabia, despite assurances from officials that they have the whip hand over home-grown religious zealots.
This month, a television cameraman was killed and a BBC journalist, Frank Gardner, was wounded in a terrorist attack in the Saudi capital.
Two Britons were killed and 15 injured in a bomb attack on a British compound in Riyadh in May last year.
Security agencies have noted that terrorists have been able to strike even in well-protected areas, such as the Riyadh compounds and in al-Khobar, where large numbers of foreign contractors work.
There is a growing sense that al-Qa'eda poses a major threat to the Saudi regime.
"There is very serious nervousness about the situation in Saudi Arabia," one British official said.
Last night the Ministry of Defence dismissed the suggestion that the SAS were protecting the British embassy but would not deny their presence in Saudi Arabia.
The SAS troops, armed with MP5 machineguns and Glock 17 pistols, wear civilian clothes. They have been given clearance by the Saudi authorities to shoot any attacker who tries to kidnap or ambush embassy staff.
They are working closely with Saudi special forces and have surveillance equipment and hi-tech sensors.
A TEAM of Arabic-speaking intelligence officers recruited from Britain's Muslim community will help the SAS.
A senior official said they would act as "eyes and ears" for the SAS team inside the local community. "They will provide vital feedback from the streets and will give us a major foothold in the war against al-Qa'eda," he said.
MI5 and MI6 made strenuous efforts to recruit Arabic-speaking officers from within the British community after the rise of Islamic terrorism and the September 11 attacks.
A room in the embassy has been turned into an operations centre for the SAS team. A Royal Military Police close-protection team has also deployed to the embassy and will act as bodyguards for the ambassador.
Since arriving in Riyadh, the SAS team has been studying the types of target that al-Qa'eda has hit so far in an attempt to identify a pattern of operation.
Members of the team are working around the clock to ensure the safety of diplomatic staff and their families.
They are shadowing British diplomats travelling outside the embassy compound and ensuring that routes used by embassy drivers are changed daily. Anyone who leaves the embassy is offered protection.
The SAS team is making daily security assessments and briefing staff about potential threats as well as identifying weaknesses in protection at the building.
Embassy staff have been advised not to use local buses, to avoid using taxis and not to go shopping on Friday, the Muslim holy day.
Despite the reputation of the SAS, one source expressed concern about the difficulties of tracking al-Qa'eda and working out what it was planning to attack.
"We are always several steps behind them," he said. "They have the initiative because they have been preparing for so long.
"It is clear that safe houses, weapons caches and targets are all pre-determined. There is very little left to chance with these people. Their attacks are ugly but very clinical."
The team has already recommended that stronger defences, including metal mesh netting such as that used to protect police stations in Northern Ireland, be installed to protect the embassy against rocket and mortar attacks.
The Foreign Office is considering that but is reluctant to make the embassy into a fortress and is also considering proposals to move its location.
Contingency plans have already been drawn up to pull out British nationals if al-Qa'eda launches a big attack. The SAS team will be responsible for putting them into practice.
The SAS will act as a forward co-ordination cell for any emergency evacuation. Despite Foreign Office warnings that non-essential staff should leave, more than 20,000 British nationals are still in Saudi Arabia.
A key task for the SAS will be to identify assembly points in the event of an incident.
So many aircraft would be needed to fly the Britons to safety that they would initially be taken to a nearby third country to keep an air bridge free.
A team of Arabic-speaking intelligence officers recruited from Britain's Muslim community will help the SAS.
A senior official said they would act as "eyes and ears" for the SAS team inside the local community. "They will provide vital feedback from the streets and will give us a major foothold in the war against al-Qa'eda," he said.
MI5 and MI6 made strenuous efforts to recruit Arabic-speaking officers from within the British community after the rise of Islamic terrorism and the September 11 attacks.
>> "Saudi before Syria?" <<
I don't think so. But Saudi is close to Syria and Iran, and there very well may be some action soon.
I understand Algeria was so bad it turned the French into the 'neutrals' they are today.
But, credit where it's due, the French gave as good as they got. It just wasn't their ground.
Maybe we are anticipating civil war in Saudi caused by our going into Syria. 10 carriers at sea...12 including the Brits.
If we do Syria, Jordan might need our help also.
Okay lets do a little strategizing here. Let's say the House of Saud falls, Sort of like the fall of Siagon,
What happens next, How does it happen, where does the family ( all 30K of them) go? What happens to the markets, the fields, the ports...
Okay folks lets speculate.
The imported labor and management is fully of capable of running the economy without them. All that labor needs is air-strike capability and ground troops, and special forces if things get dicey.
Wow. Guess the House of Saud is entirely dispensable. Only thing left on their sides might be banks and businesses with SA investment cash on their books.
It's necessary. The same would have prevented the embassy takeover in Tehran.
something big is going on
Yeah my thought. Maybe the family is going to make a run for it? If so... What kind of freaking chaos will that be? DIdnt the saudis sign a deal with Pakistan to basically buy access to their nukes?
Any evident concentration of naval ships near Iran?
Ok.
1. Widespread chaos. None of the islamic groups involved in destabilizing the Saudi government are even remotely prepared to run a modern state. They're going to have to figure out who's in charge. Given that this is the Middle East, get lots of body-bags ready.
2. Economic Collapse- While there have been efforts to introduce Saudi's into the work force, they are by no means complete. Palestinans and Indians provide huge percentages of the Saudi workforce.
In the event of a Wahhabi take-over, these people are gone. The more technical and advanced jobs are often held by foriegners that will also be gone. This is a problem for the oil infrastructure (which is all I care about, frankly).
They might find someway to keep the ports and so on going, but they probably can't be both an totally Islamic state and economically functional at the same time.
3. As for the Saudi Royal Family, there is a lot of resentment towards them and their security forces. I don't know what will happen to them if the government falls. Some will go into exile, some will be killed. Standard revolution stuff.
4. Some sort of external conflict. The world needs that oil.
That's my guess. I personally hope the Saudis can hold it together. Best in a bad field.
a interesting question....
Nah, the Saudi's paid for them through the old BCCI Bank.
It's funny you mention it. SA is surrounded by US military, how odd.
I still wonder what Reagan would have done. (444 days)
I'm guessing SAS is there more for the Royals than the citizens. Gotta protect that oil treasury. This is escalating fast.
a) ask the Americans for help in retaining their kingdom
b) lose their kingdom.
Lots of body bags.
fyi
That turf includes the oil wells, of course. The problem is that they can't run both an international jihad to reclaim the Dar al Islam AND a calm international oil business with their intended victims. So if they do intend to run a puppet government it's going to have to be able to wear a very convincing mask, the more so inasmuch as the War on Terror has already taken down one government dedicated to state support of the jihad (Afghanistan) and that's a lot tougher terrain than Saudi Arabia.
I don't see a good option from the terrorists' point of view, frankly, which is why that point of view is likely to focus on killing everyone they can in the faint hope that they can thereby terrorize the WOT's prosecuting countries' voters into calling the war off. It did, after all, work in Spain. I don't see it working twice, especially not in view of the economic implications of shutting off, or even threatening to do so, Saudi oil. Well, let's say "Arabian" oil - Arabia was Arabia long before the House of Saud showed up and will be so long afterward.
Or I could be completely wrong about the whole thing. Who knows? ;-)
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