“It’s a hypothetical situation, and we’d work hard to avoid such a structure,” one Arab diplomat in Washington said. But, he added, “If things become so bad in Iraq, like an ethnic cleansing, we will feel we are pulled into the war.”
Saudis Say They Might Back Sunnis if U.S. Leaves Iraq
By HELENE COOPER
WASHINGTON, Dec. 12 — Saudi Arabia has told the Bush administration that it might provide financial backing to Iraqi Sunnis in any war against Iraq’s Shiites if the United States pulls its troops out of Iraq, according to American and Arab diplomats.
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia conveyed that message to Vice President Dick Cheney two weeks ago during Mr. Cheney’s whirlwind visit to Riyadh, the officials said. During the visit, King Abdullah also expressed strong opposition to diplomatic talks between the United States and Iran, and pushed for Washington to encourage the resumption of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, senior Bush administration officials said.
The Saudi warning reflects fears among America’s Sunni Arab allies about Iran’s rising influence in Iraq, coupled with Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. King Abdullah II of Jordan has also expressed concern about rising Shiite influence, and about the prospect that the Shiite-dominated government would use Iraqi troops against the Sunni population.
A senior Bush administration official said Tuesday that part of the administration’s review of Iraq policy involved the question of how to harness a coalition of moderate Iraqi Sunnis with centrist Shiites to back the Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki.
The Saudis have argued strenuously against an American pullout from Iraq, citing fears that Iraq’s minority Sunni Arab population would be massacred. Those fears, United States officials said, have become more pronounced as a growing chorus in Washington has advocated a draw-down of American troops in Iraq, coupled with diplomatic outreach to Iran, which is largely Shiite.
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studying jrmaclean.,
and the TEP hypothesis, I'm inclined to believe that a regional escalation involving the Saudis is now an inevitability - because if James is correct, they've got TEP-ish governance problems out the wazoo about now too.
Rich Saudis are already
Rich Saudis are already financing the Sunnis in Iraq, just like they financed al Queda in Afghanistan.
kwestin O...,
are those rich Saudis in sync with the royal family, or, are they insurgent in the sense of an internecine power conflict?
Everyone with money is Saudi
Everyone with money is Saudi Arabia is a prince.
And yeah, the Saudis can't escape a regional conflict...they're too tightly wound up in the structures everyone is out to change.Â
"are those rich Saudis in
"are those rich Saudis in sync with the royal family, or, are they insurgent in the sense of an internecine power conflict?"
The divisions that exist among the Saudi elite are mostly grounded in how they interpret and actuate the tenets of their particular brand of Islam: Wahabism (Salafism). Despite these fissures, however, I think both factions are equally complicit in the financing of radical Islamist groups. The royal family is as committed to advancing this brand of Islam as are those--like Osama Bin Laden--who call for their overthrow. It makes for a complex situation, but it doesn't alter the fact that the entire ruling class is conspiring against its purported ally, the U.S., while simultaneously engaging in an internecine struggle.
Saudi Internecine Struggle
O, this is the very essence of what Maclean argues in TEP.