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US official says"Saudis Arabia poised to make shift AWAY from relations with US"

CougarKing

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I never trusted the Saudis in the first place...

Some Saudi officials obviously want to benefit from selling oil to western countries, but there are others who hate the open, secular culture of western nations such as the US and Canada, and only want to spread Wahhabism/fundamentalist Islam.

They may have crafty diplomats such as Prince Bandar, a former Royal Saudi Air Force pilot, but their interests are distinctly different.

Defense News

House Intel Chairman Sees 'Negative Consequences' if Saudis Shift Away from US


WASHINGTON — The chairman of the US House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday warned that Saudi Arabia’s shift away from a longstanding relationship with the United States could severely hurt US interests.

Reuters reported Tuesday that Saudi Arabia’s intelligence chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan says his nation — perhaps Washington’s second-best friend in the Middle East after Israel — is poised to make a “major shift” away from its relations with the US.

Saudi officials are upset about the Obama administration’s decision to avoid military action in Syria, as well as extending diplomatic olive branches to Riyadh’s top rival, Iran.


Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, warns a weakened or severed US-Saudi relationship would breed “significant negative consequences” for Washington and the region.

Rogers called for US officials to quickly take steps to convince Saudi officials to not “walk down that path.”

But with the US trying to pivot strategically toward Asia, and with energy experts predicting a major American natural resources boon to begin soon, it’s unclear whether the US-Saudi relationship will ever return to its peak.

(...)
 
Well...good riddance. This was a pact with the devil anyway. The Saudis are just about the most reactionary and fundamentalist of all the Arab League nations, and IMHO were playing a double game long before it became common to accuse Pakistan of the same offense. The US freeing itself from having to please this lot can only be good news. Maybe it will speed achievement of the US strategic objective of de-linking itself from Middle East oil altogether.

And (long shot...) the US will be able to wean itself off its perennial habituation with nasty regimes in general.
 
Agreed.  I don't trust them.  Many of our terrorists have originated in SA.  I believe they're false friends and would enjoy to see the West's downfall, in all honesty.
 
What kind of impact will this have on the scores of westerners who work and live in SA ?
 
Halifax Tar said:
What kind of impact will this have on the scores of westerners who work and live in SA ?

This is a good question. I don't know for sure, but based on what I saw in Dubai, the Saudis will not be able to indulge in any mass expulsion of Westerners. My guess is that like some other nations in that region, much of the technical and managerial expertise comes from Western nationals, while most of the dirty work is done by South Asians. The native population could expand to fill the gaps, but I doubt it could happen overnight.

What will probably happen is that foreigners will be subjected to an even heavier enforcement of Islamic religious laws than they are now, since whatever moderating influence the US may exert would be reduced or removed.

I think you might also see the expat Westerners replaced by East-bloc types and Chinese over time.
 
I agree with pbi. When I was in the Kingdom, many years ago I hasten to add, I was dismayed at the near total dependence of the Saudis on foreigners: Americans, Brits, Canadians (lots of 'em) Filipinos, Pakistanis, Palestinians, and so on. Foreigners totally provided many essential technical services, including, for example, maintenance of the Saudi Air Force. Saudis were/are well, but often too narowly educated. I met many, many MBAs but too few (often no) mathematicians, engineers, doctors, electronic technicians and plumbers. I was told, by a Brit expat with many, many years in Saudi Arabia, that many Saudis think some kinds of work are beneath them ~ and that included repairing aircraft engines or working in a seaport.


 
pbi said:
I think you might also see the expat Westerners replaced by East-bloc types and Chinese over time.

I would even question that.  Don't overlook the fact that East-Bloc types and the Chinese are also engaged in fighting with fanatical Islamist factions.
 
George Wallace said:
I would even question that.  Don't overlook the fact that East-Bloc types and the Chinese are also engaged in fighting with fanatical Islamist factions.

Well as ERC currently pointed out, Saudi Arabia currently employs thousands of Filipinos among the foreign expats there. This is in spite of the fact that the Philippines, a predominantly Catholic country, is engaged in on-again, off-again, counter-insurgency operations against Islamic separatist groups in their southernmost islands such as the MILF or BIFF.

My point is that the Saudis may see greater value in maintaining relations with certain countries in spite of their governments cracking down on Islamic separatist groups that Riyadh may or may not find common cause with.

Furthermore, China needs Saudi oil to fuel its growing energy needs and China also has many workers intent on going overseas. Note the number of Chinese resource extraction/energy companies in Africa, in the mining sector for example, which have imported their own legions of Chinese workers instead of hiring locals in the host country.
 
S.M.A. said:
Well as ERC currently pointed out, Saudi Arabia currently employs thousands of Filipinos among the foreign expats there. This is in spite of the fact that the Philippines, a predominantly Catholic country, is engaged in on-again, off-again, counter-insurgency operations against Islamic separatist groups in their southernmost islands such as the MILF or BIFF.

What they do currently is not the question.
 
George Wallace said:
What they do currently is not the question.


The fact is that the Saudis need those foreign workers: dentists and deckhands; mechanics and mathematicians; and they don't (can't)* produce them domestically. They will pay the going rates to hire the skilled (and unskilled) labour they need; many Filipinos hate working in the Gulf but the wages are high and they need the jobs to support their families. The law of supply and demand is pretty much immutable, George, a lot like the laws of physics.

_____
* Saudi Arabia has many, many colleges and universities but, I think they suffer from indifferent standards and low interest in many subjects by Saudis, themselves ~ back to that idea that some occupations are beneath them.
 
E.R. Campbell said:
~ back to that idea that some occupations are beneath them.

I think, based on what I have seen, and from speaking with others who have spent time in various Gulf states, that this is a serious problem and probably a vulnerability. IMHO it is aggravated by an entitlement society (for native born Arabs) funded by oil revenues. Dubai, IIRC, was a particularly extreme example of this. My impression is that this is not true in all Arab nations: it doesn't seem to be as much of an issue in North African states like Morocco and Algeria, etc, or in Lebanon or Egypt, but then we are speaking about quite a different kind of Arab culture.
 
Interesting topic, which interests me greatly considering I'm currently working in Saudi Arabia.  Great posts by everyone as well!  Personally, and I see it every day, the Saudi's are trying to "Saudize" everything here.  They decided that the jobless rate, especially amongst the Saudi youth is unacceptable and are now forcing expats, primarily, Indian, Pakistani, Filipinos out of jobs in order to get their own working.  The problem is, most (not all) are notoriously lazy and don't want to work that job the expat was working...why?...as someone alluded to earlier, the job is beneath them.

There's no doubt in my mind there are interesting times ahead here.  The MOI (Ministry of the Interior) has set a deadline of Nov 4th for most these expats to have proper documentation or else, face deportation.  Should be interesting to see what happens when there aren't enough warm bodies to do all the jobs the Saudi's wont.  There definitely isn't a shortage of people from the countries I listed earlier coming here though.  I came back on Saturday night to Riyadh and the customs area had at least 400 Pakistani folks, all with initial entry paperwork, trying to gain access.
 
From Instapundit. Full article is behind a WSJ paywall:

“SMART DIPLOMACY” UPDATE: Saudi Royal Blasts U.S. Policy. “A leading Saudi prince demanded a place for his country at talks with Iran, assailing the Obama administration for working behind Riyadh’s back and panning other recent U.S. steps in the Middle East.”
 
Foreign workers from other islamic countries are a security threat to the monarchy.Ex-pats are safe.
 
Not sure how credible this is, but if true, it only gives us further cause not to trust Riyadh:

Two Congressmen claim secret report on 9/11 pins the blame on Saudi Arabia
posted at 8:23 am on December 16, 2013 by Ed Morrissey

What we know from the New York Post’s report on the claim from Democratic Rep. Stephen Lynch and Republican Rep. Walter Jones is that two administrations have kept 28 pages of a 2002 report on the 9/11 so highly classified that they don’t contain redactions — just an ellipsis noting their absence. Lynch and Jones claim that the report from Congress after the attacks that left 3,000 Americans dead contain material that “absolutely shocked” them — and pins the blame on Saudi Arabia for state support of the attack:

President Bush inexplicably censored 28 full pages of the 800-page report. Text isn’t just blacked-out here and there in this critical-yet-missing middle section. The pages are completely blank, except for dotted lines where an estimated 7,200 words once stood (this story by comparison is about 1,000 words).

A pair of lawmakers who recently read the redacted portion say they are “absolutely shocked” at the level of foreign state involvement in the attacks.

Reps. Walter Jones (R-NC) and Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) can’t reveal the nation identified by it without violating federal law. So they’ve proposed Congress pass a resolution asking President Obama to declassify the entire 2002 report, “Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001.”

Some information already has leaked from the classified section, which is based on both CIA and FBI documents, and it points back to Saudi Arabia, a presumed ally.

The Saudis deny any role in 9/11, but the CIA in one memo reportedly found “incontrovertible evidence” that Saudi government officials — not just wealthy Saudi hardliners, but high-level diplomats and intelligence officers employed by the kingdom — helped the hijackers both financially and logistically. The intelligence files cited in the report directly implicate the Saudi embassy in Washington and consulate in Los Angeles in the attacks, making 9/11 not just an act of terrorism, but an act of war.
 

Three years later, Congress — essentially the same Congress, by the way — produced another report on the 9/11 attacks that didn’t make these accusations, nor the specific allegations mentioned by Paul Sperry in this article. (Be sure to read it all.) Congress would have had the ability to refer to its own materials, one would presume anyway, and clearly the minor changes in the 2002 midterms wouldn’t have wiped out the memories of those who worked on the 2002 report.  That leaves a big question as to whether this intel Sperry cites may have later been discredited, or whether the executive branch interfered with one or both reports.

Why would the Bush administration interfere with the report? Saudi Arabia was a strategic partner for the US in the region, but hardly our only option. If what Lynch and Jones claim is true, the US would have been forced to declare war on Saudi Arabia, which would have touched off a much wider war, especially if we had gone after the holy sites of Mecca and Medina, as was being suggested anyway at the time by some public figures as retaliation for the terrorist attack. Covering up their involvement would still leave the US covering up an act of war out of what can only be charitably called an overabundance of caution.  If the Saudis declared war on us, then we should have responded in kind or forced a very public surrender on our terms.

That still doesn’t explain why the successor Obama administration would have kept this locked away if the data was accurate and conclusions correct, assuming that’s what the report says.  Democrats spent years floating conspiracy theories about the Bushes and the Saudis — and this would have been the smokiest smoking gun of all. It would have helped Obama explain and draw support for his decision to warm up to Iran and snub Saudis over the last few months, if not the last few years.

If I had to guess, I’d say the reason it remains classified is that the data may not be as solid as it appears, but we’re not going to know that until it’s actually declassified. More than 12 years after the attack, it’s time to see that initial review of the intelligence and let the American people make up their own minds about it.

 

Sources:
hotair.com/archives/2013/12/16/two-congressmen-claim-secret-report-on-911-pins-the-blame-on-saudi-arabia/

nypost.com/2013/12/15/inside-the-saudi-911-coverup/

 
Over all, the Americans and Saudis have had more interests in common than diverging in the past, hence the utility of maintaining some sort of relationship.

Now, this Administration has essentially dumped the delicate arrangements (not just in Saudi Arabia), and the Saudis are working hard to assert their own interests in the region.

Perhaps in the long run, this is for the best (and perhaps this was an inevitable outcome anyway), but what is annoying is the creators of so called "smart diplomacy" do not seemed to be prepared for this, or have any sort of road map for where to go next, having alienated all their former allies in the region and now standing around with their thumbs up their wazoos while the region is engulfed in conflict.

The incoming administration in 2016 will have a huge mess to deal with.
 
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