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."
Actually, they're not even reliable at that. Their statement:
the American presence - a product of the Gulf war
is incorrect. There has been an American presence there since 1946.
I wonder how many such ads have been seen in Saudi Arabia during this timeframe, or ever, for that matter.
On September 11 the Saudis showed clearly enought that they are not really our friends. Let's make the fuel cell the kind of important project that John Kennedy made of the space program. "By the end of this decade..."
Their position on this matter is absolutely ridiculous and what they REALLY want is for there to be no "infidels" on earth and that is their version of Islam's true goal and want.
I can't tell you how white hot angry their stupid childish position makes me everytime I hear it.
I really think that to stop their nonsense we'll one day have to go in and either take over Mecca and Medina and open up those towns to the people of the world or else bomb them back to glassy desert sand.
They also need to learn to base their God and religion on the truth for once instead of on their wet dreams and envious hatred.
They seem to be anal retentive and anal compulsive as well as being retromigent reactionaries.
*spits to the side* Worthless, childish animals is all they are now.
P.S. The above is for all Muslims except for the good Muslims, you know who you are (paraphrasing Mark Twain).
Exactly my thoughts.
IMO, the main reason we are as prosporous as we are today.
Speak for yourself, bubba.
Let us pull out. Leave smoking rubble where "our" base was.
Send a note to Saddam Hussein that we will not lift a finger to save the Saudis, should he happen to invade.
Maybe build a 4-lane highway to the border with Iraq.
--Boris
It's the Guardian, an ultra-leftist newspaper.
Sure we should. We've paid fifty times what their freakin' oil is worth. The rest belongs to us.
It's time to pitch the sand diggers out in their just desserts. Anybody want to screw with us? Face the consequences.
Now why would this be? Wouldn't the death of thousands of men, women and children by terrorists engender great sympathy and a single purpose to destroy this kind of terrorism? Not if you believe the Saudis are funding the Pan Arab Islamic agenda including the Jihad.
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