Posted on 01/18/2002 5:13:23 PM PST by StopDemocratsDotCom
Saudis tell US forces to get out ;Foreign soldiers seen as political liability
Saudi Arabia's rulers are poised to throw US strategy in the Middle East into disarray by asking Washington to pull its forces out of the kingdom because they have become a "political liability". Senior Saudi officials have privately complained that the US has "outstayed its welcome" and that the kingdom may soon request that the American presence - a product of the Gulf war - is brought to an end.
Both the White House and the US state department insisted yesterday that the military arrangement between the two countries was still working. The White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said that the president, George Bush, "believes that our presence in the region has a very helpful and stabilising effect in a dangerous region".
Relations between the US and Saudi Arabia, Washington's closest Arab ally, have been severely strained since September 11. Both sides have been desperately denying for months that there is a rift.
The US is reluctant to withdraw its 4,500 troops from the Prince Sultan air base, south of Saudi's capital Riyadh, because it could be perceived as a propaganda victory for Osama bin Laden, who frequently protested at the presence of non-believers so close to the main Muslim holy sites.
But the increasingly brittle and vulnerable ruling House of Saud is nervous about an internal revolt by Bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network and other extremist militants, and has been publicly loosening its links with Washington.
The huge Prince Sultan air base played a crucial logistical role in the bombing of Afghanistan. Withdrawal would upset the military balance in the Middle East by providing a boost to the Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein. US planes based in Saudi regularly bomb along the Iraqi border as part of its policy of containment of Saddam.
Britain, which jointly patrols the Iraqi no-fly zone with the US, has planes based both in Saudi and Kuwait. A pull-out by Washington would switch the focus to the British air base in Kuwait, whose leaders try to avoid drawing attention to the British presence.
Two senior US state department officials have been in Saudi this week: William Burns, the assistant secretary for the near east, and Lincoln Bloomfield, the assistant secretary for political and military affairs.
The US state department insisted yesterday that at no point during Mr Bloomfield's visit, either formally or informally, had the Saudis said they wanted the US to leave.
But the US ambassador to Saudi, Robert Jordan, was quoted as saying when Mr Bloomfield arrived in the kingdom: "He is here for consultations with the Saudi government to review our presence here and to discuss what we need and what we don't need."
The US secretary of state, Colin Powell, who is in Nepal, denied the Saudis wanted a withdrawal: "There has been no discussion of such an issue."
Many in the US have been upset with Saudi because not only is it Bin Laden's native country but 15 of the 19 terrorists involved in the September 11 attacks were from the kingdom. The Saudi media have reported that about 200 Saudis have been captured in Afghanistan fighting with al-Qaida and the Taliban.
The kingdom is volatile, with a stagnant economy, high unemployment, no democratic outlets and King Fahd unable to crack down on militant clerics.
Hostility to the US is widespread but that is mirrored in the US where there is a huge well of resentment that, having fought to push back Iraq in 1991 and having protected Saudi since, Riyadh refused to provide military help during the Afghan campaign.
Reflecting this, Carl Levin, who heads the US Senate armed services committee, said: "We need a base in that region, but it seems to me we should find a place that is more hospitable."
Bin Laden listed as the main justifications for the attacks on New York and Washington the presence of the US soldiers in the kingdom, US support for Israel in the conflict with the Palestinians, and the US campaign against Iraq. He said six years ago: "There is no more important duty than pushing the American enemy out of the holy land [of Arabia]."
The US could continue its containment of Iraq from aircraft carriers based in the Gulf. But the US air force secretary, James Roche, said a pull-out would make life awkward: "It would be difficult, unless we could replicate the air operations centre somewhere else."
First, it's always a bad idea to reduce military strength for "policital" reasons.
Second, rather than mollify the militants (both internal, and Al Qaeda and others), it would only send them the message that they can get what they want if they cause enough chaos -- so they have every incentive to try *more*, for *more* "reforms" to their liking.
Third, if the militants ever get strong enough to mount direct confrontation, a US military presence would be a big asset to the Sauds.
Fourth, the nations of the Middle East are at a turning point. Do they choose the road which leads to further ties, commerce, prosperity, and peace with the west, or do they make further and further concessions to the forces of Islamic radicalism? This is a big step down the wrong path for the Sauds.
Why do I get the feeling that Saudi may be past its "best before" date?
First, you have to try to put yourself into the gold-plated shoes of the Saudi Royal family. They're fat, ultra-rich cowards. Their hold on their country is tenuous at best due to their repressiveness, rampant nepotism, and hoarding of the oil-rich nation's wealth. The U.S. made them. We found their oil while they were wandering the deserts shooting sh*t-eating lizards for dinner. We drilled for it. We pumped it. We built pipelines to transport it. We built the refineries. We provided the ships to get it out.
We protected them with OUR national treasure; our military, our boys and young ladies, OUR equipment, OUR cost when a**holes like Hussein would have overrun their pathetically weak butts in a day or two.
No, we're the only thing keeping them from utter mayhem, and as stupid, cowardly, ungrateful, and backstabbing as they are..........they're not total idiots.
With all that said, it wouldn't break my heart one little bit to tell them to "respectfully, f**k off" and pull out en masse. Then, we watch 'em fall to internal forces or Hussein or........whoever. THEN, we come back in and clean house and take over that freakin' lake of oil that they're floating atop.
US pulls out, there is joy in the streets. Then the mullahs start pointing fingers at the house of saud and before you can snap your fingers, the road to mecca is lined with the heads of the royal family, on pikes.
Whether it be fear or manipulation, the house of saud has absolute need of the infidels and their military technology. The US is the thin red/white/and blue line keeping them in power. If they want to cut off the tree branch they are standing on, then let them fall!
But I do think we should get out of Arabia.
Just long enough to let Sadaam thoroughly destroy them. We can ignore their pleas for help. "You kicked us out, it's YOUR problem."
Then we should go in and destroy Sadaam, take Arabia and Iraq as colonies and pump that oil out of the ground at bargain rates.
They have a black background with a dove flying across the middle of the page. Can't remember all the details - but it says something like "the people of Saudi Arabia stand in friendship with the United States".
This has run twice that I know of in the front page section of the paper. Anyone else notice this in their papers?
Let's see these people advance by themselves. They haven't invested a dime on infrastructure to be an industrious nation. They used all the money to live in opulence and luxury at the expense of the people.
And while we are at it we can let the Turks level Medina and build an even bigger fortress there.
When someone spits in your eye you had better piss on their grave.
Even better: let Saddam have the Muslim holy sites in the Hijaz in western Arabia, and let Israel have the "Sharqiyah" province of eastern Arabia by the Gulf where all the oil is! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Good Lord! Let's hope not one single American boy or girl is ever sent to die for Israel!
First we take the oil; then we leave.
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