Our enemies the Saudis

Fifteen of the 19 September 11 hijackers were Saudis. Perhaps as many as 80 percent of the prisoners held at Guantánamo are Saudis. Osama bin Laden is a Saudi, and al Qaeda was supported by large contributions from Saudis, including members of the Saudi royal family.

The Saudis' cooperation with our efforts to track down the financing of al Qaeda appears to be somewhere between minimal and zero. They got us to let members of the bin Laden family scamper out of the United States on a private jet shortly after September 11. They refuse to provide–as almost every other country has–manifests of plane passengers flying to the United States.

Such behavior is nothing new. The Saudis stymied the FBI investigation of the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing. The Saudis refused a U.S. request in 1996 that they take custody of bin Laden; he went to Afghanistan instead. They refused in 1995 to hand over Imad Mughniyah, believed responsible for the bombing of a Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983.

Far from aiding our efforts against terrorism, the Saudis have worked against them–to protect the terrorists in their own ranks. Also, the Saudis have praised suicide bombings and raised money for the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.

Government-controlled Saudi media have frequently spread the vilest kinds of anti-U.S. and anti-Jewish propaganda.

Such has been the behavior of those the State Department has long referred to as "our friends the Saudis." It would be more accurate to call them our enemies the Saudis.

Freedoms? Zero for seven. The Saudis run a totalitarian society. Not one of the seven freedoms identified by President Bush in his State of the Union speech–the rule of law, limits on the power of the state, respect for women, private property, free speech, equal justice, religious tolerance–is honored by the Saudis.

There is no free speech and no freedom of religion (during the Gulf War the Saudis did not allow President Bush to conduct a religious service on Saudi soil), and women are restricted and physically assaulted by religious police who prowl the streets (and, by some accounts, would not allow teenage girls to leave a burning school, lest they not be properly clad; 15 girls died).

But the Saudis are not content to run a totalitarian society at home; they are trying to export their totalitarian Wahhabi Islam around the world. Since the Gulf War, the Saudis have financed Wahhabi clerics and Wahhabi-run mosques and schools in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Western Europe, and the United States.

The results can be seen on the Edgware Road in London or Leesburg Pike in Northern Virginia: Journalists have no trouble finding young people spouting the most vituperative anti-U.S. and anti-Jewish propaganda and swearing that they would fight for Islam against the United States. The Saudis are waging war against us, financing the spread of the idea that our free society must be overthrown and totalitarian Wahhabi Islam must be imposed by force.

So why do some still call the Saudis our friends? Because they have the power to keep oil prices down? That leverage is being reduced by increased oil production by our friends Russia and Mexico. Because they are anti-Communist? Communism is no longer a threat. Because they are used to heeding the mellifluous advice of Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar? What has he done to stop al Qaeda or the propagation of totalitarian Wahhabi Islam? Because we depend on Saudi military bases? Despite Pentagon denials, it seems we are wisely dispersing our forces in the gulf.

It may not be prudent yet to speak the truth out loud, that the Saudis are our enemies. But they should know that it is increasingly apparent to the American people that they are effectively waging war against us. And they should know that we have the capacity to destroy their military, presumably in a matter of hours. The Saudis' eastern provinces, with their oil, could be given to their Shiite Muslim majority, now oppressed by the Sunni Muslim Saudi rulers.

The holy cities of Mecca and Medina could be returned to the custody of the Hashemites (Jordan's King Abdullah's family), who unlike the Saudis are direct descendants of the prophet Mohammed. Let the Saudis have the sands of central Arabia and their bank accounts in Switzerland, hotel suites in London, and villas on the Riviera.

President Bush has said that we must have regime change in Iraq to be safe from terrorism. It is increasingly clear that we must have regime change in Saudi-ruled Arabia as well.

Dang, it's getting hard to tell those "Religion of Peace" muslims from the "Baby-bombing bastard" muslims, ya know? I mean, I hope this doesn't sound too bigotted, but they all seem to be pretty much the same bunch to me.

I'm starting to come to the conclusion that before somebody comes to the "kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out" endgame, that perhaps we could do something to convince the "good" ones to reign in the bad guys, so that it would be a little easier for us to tell who is who. The problem is, coming up with the proper carrot/stick approach.

It's times like this I almost wish we had a real outright straight-talking Prez like Pat Buchanan, who might just come up with a solution like pre-emptorily targeting the Grande Mosque at Mecca, "just in case" somebody speaking in the name of Islam decides to use some sort of weapon of mass destruction against us.

Radical thought, admittedly, but maybe it would provoke some serious debate within Islam as to who actually spoke for the religion, the "Religion of Peace" folks or the IslamoNazis who just wanna kill all the rest of us.... [just my $.02 worth]

We own and operate both Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. However, we have a stupid State Department, and a stupid CIA, both abandoned their duties to America by disregarding the hate of Moslems that is wall to wall in these countries.

Both the Egyptian, and Saudi governments are in our pocket, and both government funds their media, and their clerics, and we never attempted to ask them point blank to reform their culture of hate.

We know that all the venomous hate comes from the clerics and the media, so why we have never insisted that these government ONLY PROMOTE PRO-WESTERN MEDIA AND CLERICS? If they do, we can have some hope that future generations can be better. Just imagine the cultural engineering that is taking place in this country because of the leftist media, and education system! If the governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt both orchestrated a revamp of its clerics and media bosses, then the soft sell, and the gradual changes, coupled with taboo subjects can be accomplished in these countries.

The longer the US keeps thinking that Islam is a “religion”, and as a government, we should not interfere in anybody’s religion, we will never see the end of this hate. Our leaders keep betraying us by avoiding these confrontations with our enemies, the Egyptians, and the Saudis. The Egyptians are the brains behind the hate, and the Saudis are the purse that funds these terrorists.

I'm not sure this is the right thread to discuss it. In fact, I'm sure it's not. But since you asked . . .

There are two reasons. First, there is distributivism. The Federal government has no business in enforcing its will on states in contravention of the Tenth Amendment. Second, I do not agree that there is such a thing as an hereditary contract; if slavery is morally insupportable, then so is Lincoln's idea of an indissoluble Union. They are both based on the concept that it is possible to inherit a condition of servitude -- in the one instance to a single master, and in the other instance to an institution, the Federal government. Whether or not the southern states seceded because of slavery or tariffs is immaterial. In my opinion, they could have seceded because they didn't like Lincoln's hairstyle. In effect, the southerners were simply refusing to renew a contract that they never initiated, unless one assumes the legal fiction that the persons who ratified the Constitution in 1787 were "virtual" representatives of ALL who came after - a sort of political version of Original Sin.

The gradual assumption by the Federal government of absolute power and authority follows a set pattern:
1) Locate an "evil."
2) Drum up popular support to eradicate that evil
3) Re-interpret (or totally ignore) the Constitution, in order to
3) Pass laws to eradicate the evil . . .
. . . and here's where the fun begins . . .
4) Construe the laws passed in 3) as the new de facto interpretation of the Constitution, thus bypassing the amendment process.
5) Use this precedent to extend Federal authority into areas not directly related to the original evil.
6) Repeat as desired, until the Constitution comes to mean the opposite of what is written and what had been (under "original intent") commonly understood.

This was done with slavery, racial discrimination, drunken driving, the war on drugs, child pornography, and terrorism. Each evil has been used by the government as a lever to pry apart the Bill of Rights, by playing upon the good intentions of an easily deluded, but well-intentioned, electorate.

"The simplest remedy is to replace the fundamentalist regimes with secular regimes....The Arab man-in-the-street has no real reason to hate Jews or Christians, but is incited to fanaticism by the mullahs and imams. It is this leadership class that must be eliminated with extreme prejudice...."

I don't believe you typed this Wilsonian tripe. The simplest remedy?! How to bring continental Europe into the Promised Land of Anlgo/Saxon moderation and prosperity and stop all that nasty blood-letting? Why, by eliminating the Roman Catholic Royal families---the whole fanatical, superstitious leadership class--with extreme prejudice.

The mythical "Arab man-in-the-street", on whose psychology everyone seems to be an expert these days, will probably make us long for the good old days of mere mullahish fanaticism and corruption when he gets a chance to fashion his version of a People's Paradise.

(It must have been a friend; maybe sitting on your lap; maybe with an advanced degree in human psychology....)

It worked for Ataturk.

The elimination or re-indoctrination (forcible or otherwise) of the leadership class is the surest way to win the "hearts and minds" of the population, if only by default. This is why post-reformation regimes in England executed Catholic clergy on sight. And England became securely Protestant thereby.

And the Soviets short-circuited Polish resistance by doing the same to the Polish aristocracy, educators, clergy, and military officers.

On a tactical level, this is why snipers exist.

Of course, this is ungentlemanly (which was always the criticism of aiming for the officers), but it is the most humane solution insofar as it eliminates the threat from Islam without requiring the complete annihilation of the Moslem population. Political assassination is preferable to genocide.

I am open to the suggestion of alternate courses of action.

"...And the Soviets short-circuited Polish resistance by doing the same to the Polish aristocracy, educators, clergy, and military officers...."

And a lucky thing the Soviets did that or they wouldn't be the thriving society they are today.

But I can see the charm of the clean cut, the new deal, the fresh start as well as the next person. A few well-trained psychologists and the Man-On-The-Street---any street, anywhere---will be like putty in our hands.

The future is so difficult to predict anyway. Why worry about banana peels?

"...Habsburg--the very name evoked memories of Roman Catholicism, of the Armada, the Inquisition, Metternich, Lafayette jailed in Olmutz and Silvio Pellico in Brunn's Spielburg fortress. Such a state had to be shattered, such a dynasty had to disappear. Thus--finally--the House of Austria went into exile, to be replaced by a simple common man from Austria, and allged house painter, a man who drowned the world in a flood of blood and tears...."

More bananas------

US Forces In Philippines Facing CIA-Trained Abu Sayyaf Terrorists

By MICHAEL A. BENGWAYAN

Basilan, Philippines (March 10, 2002) --- Unknown to most, the U.S. troops especially the Special Forces now in this Abu Sayyaf lair, are facing not merely a rag-tag band of bandits but hard core Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)-trained fighters.

Most of the Abu Sayyaf leaders have fought...in the deserts and mountains of Afghanistan in the 1980s after receiving training from the CIA, battling some of Russia1s best fighting paratroopers, a reality the Philippine military seemed to have forgotten.

And they are now better and well armed, thanks to the millions of dollars of ransom collected from the so many hostages they have taken, some of which they brutally tortured, beheaded and killed.

According to former Philippine Senate Minority Leader Nene Pimentel, the Abu Sayyaf are remnants of about 800 Filipino Muslim Moujahideens who, together with thousands of other Muslim jihad warriors from several countries, were recruited, trained and financed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to fight the CIA-sponsored proxy war in Afghanistan against the Russians in 1980. Pimentel, a senator from this war-torn island of Mindanao, said that the terrorists1 training as well as familiarity with the terrain in Mindanao, has made it very difficult for Philippine government troops to put an end to the Abu Sayyaf rampage. Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, coming into grips with reality and putting pride aside, has turned to the United States for assistance resulting to the deployment of 650 U.S. troops, a part of which are from the Special Forces, otherwise known as the Green Berets. She earlier saber-rattled last year the fighting words "I will pulverize you, you are just one bullet, I will decimate you" in which the Abu Sayyaf responded in July 4 by beheading hostaged American missionary Guillermo Sobero. Pimentel's disclosure is bolstered by the book of John K. Cooley titled "Unholy Wars". Cooley, in this book claimed "thousands of Muslim fighters from many parts of the world, including many young men from the Muslim-dominated but impoverished areas in Mindanao, enlisted to fight in Afghanistan with pay incentives ranging from $100 to $300 a month."

"The training of the moujahideens for guerilla warfare was undertaken by the CIA with the active collaboration of secret, usually, intelligence, services of the armed forces or select military officers in various countries, including our own," Cooley said. "When the Russians pulled out of Afghanistan in 1989, the Moujahideens either returned to their home countries or proceeded to other countries and put their Afghan war military experience at the service of certain fundamentalist causes of Islam", the book revealed.

"This group (of Filipino Muslim Moujahideens) was the core of an armed guerilla band of several hundred men who moved from its Peshawar, Pakistan base to the southern Philippine Islands after the end of the Afghan war. Under the name of the Abu Sayyaf group, it operated on the fringe of the Moros Muslim insurgency," the Cxooley's book added.

The Abu Sayyaf took its name from Professor Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, an Afghan intellectual, who had preached an ultra-conservative Islamic ideology called Wahabi. Acoording to Pimentel, in the case of the Filipino Muslim moujahideens, most came back to various parts of Mindanao from their base in Peshawar, Pakistan. Cooley calls the Abu Sayyaf in the 1990s as "the most violent and radical Islamist group in the Far East, using its CIA and ISI (Pakistan1s intra-military directorate for intelligence services) training to harass, attack and murder Christian priests, wealthy non-Muslim plantation-owners and merchants and local government in the southern Philippine island of Mindanao......"

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