OMG 60-80 per month! Why, .. in less than 200 years there will be as many Saudis fighting in Iraq as there are Americans!
What is bizarre is that if there are Saudis in Iraq fighting on the side of Sunnis, some are probably people who identify with the goal of overthrowing the SA government, and would therefore could reasonably be identified as al-Qaeda affiliates or sympathizers. To the extent that Saudi fighters in Iraq are made up of such people, this is precisely what the Bush administration would have meant by "fight them there so we don't have to fight them here." Why is the administration objecting to the very game it set up? Or did they really really really not mean it?
As for those fighters sponsored by the SA government, how can the US object much? If the Sunni are too seriously overbalanced by the Shia, Iraq will become an annex of Iran. Is that really the goal? I cannot believe that.
Maybe they fear that a large Saudi force, if tolerated, will lead to Iran supporting Shia in a similar way. And the region then slips into a de-facto war between Iran and Saudi Arabia fought on Iraqi soil. Fear of this kind of scenario begins to make sense. But if this is the fear, why broadcast to Iran the SA presence - as if a kind of invitation to Iran to do the same?
No matter how one slices and dices it, it just doesn't make a lot of sense.
Bush administration officials are voicing increasing anger at what they say has been Saudi Arabia’s counterproductive role in the Iraq war.
But the Saudis are old family friends!
Bush holds hands with Prince Abdullah and they stroll lazily through flower gardens and whisper secrets in one another's ears out of range of the media's microphones.
He can't be angry at the Saudis.
Posted by Christopher at July 27, 2007 04:33 AMWell uh, it was SAUDI "fighters" who attacked New York and Washington on 9/11. Oh, the stoopid, it hurts. Don't a worry, friends, when the Ghawar oil field dries up, the Saudis will be just another band of a-rabs to be kicked to the curb and stomped -- they'll be road kill along the American highway to oblivion.
Posted by iron skunk at July 27, 2007 04:55 AMI doubt the Saudi Royals want war with anyone. They'd be perfectly content if the world would stop killing each other and they could peacefully enjoy their riches. Unfortunately for them they unleashed (or at the least tolerated) the forces of Islamic fundimentalism on the Saudi peninsula following the 1979 attack on the Grand Mosque in Mecca. They saw it as a necessity to keep themselves from being overthrown. Also the reason they're in bed with the US. The Saudi royals seek nothing more than the perpetuation of their own rule. But they're not very astute rulers.
Posted by snark at July 27, 2007 05:40 AMHave we heard yet whether the Saudis are now funding "al qaeda in iraq?" That's probably just a matter of time, if it's not already happening.
And I think it's been pretty well confirmed that "foreign fighters" (i.e. "al qaeda") are a miniscule portion of the insurgency---thus the recent Bushco need to call the whole insurgency "al qaeda". I think the LAT reported that of 19,000 sunnis in "custody" (i.e permanent detainment without charges), something like 130 were "foreign". So there's yer "al qaeda" proportion, or close to it.
Saudi Arabia is concerned that the US, al-Maliki and Iran are simply going to wipe the Iraq sunnis off the map of Iraq. Sunnis are only 20% of the Iraq population and they ran the show for centuries. They're the ones that are trying to get the US out, and killing the most soldiers. So we're killing them off, or driving them out of the country (Most Iraqi refugees are sunni).
The shi'ites (60% of Iraqis) like that, that's why they're tolerating our 4 year presence and "surge" against the sunnis. The Saudis (protector of the sunni) don't like it so well.
A regional diplomatic conference of all the big players could get everybody's interests represented and could perhaps come up with some solution to all this power-sharing fear. But Bushco simply refuses to hold such a gathering, or start building towards one. Wonder why?
"an estimated 60 to 80 foreign fighters who enter Iraq each month“ , "That would get into disagreements over who is an insurgent and who is not.”
Both of these nuggets caught my eye as well. The 60-80 foreign fighters statement completely blows the Bush Al Qaida story out of the water, 100% completely. The recognition that we don't know an "insurgent" from any other Iraqi confirms what many of us have been saying from the start: that we are being opposed by Iraqi inhabitants trying to oust an invader..not some mystery force.
That these two statements eminate from senior Bush Admin officials tells us one very plain thing... Bush is lying to us about the nature of the enemy in Iraq, and he and his minions are quite well aware they are lying. They havn't stopped lying since 2003, and they know it. Once that realization sinks in, then all the other mechanisms of this White House -torture, abuse of Constitutional Rights, manipulation of the Justice System, and on and on are all part of a coverup to sustain this Big Lie until the end of time.
T2:
Very well put.
Posted by tempus at July 27, 2007 07:47 AMDon't a worry, friends, when the Ghawar oil field dries up, the Saudis will be just another band of a-rabs to be kicked to the curb and stomped -- they'll be road kill along the American highway to oblivion.
I hate to disagree, the Saudi's have major U.S. holdings in real estate. Along with banking interests and computer investments, like Apple and Hewlett Packard.
Saudi investors have $750 billion in the US.
It's from 2002. I wonder how much the Saudi's have invested now.
Posted by Seven of Six at July 27, 2007 09:22 AMIt has long bewilderd me why the Bush administration thinks it has greater right to be active in a country half-way around the world than nations that share long borders with it. Like we'd keep our nose out if someone, even an ally, toppled the government of Mexico and was showing no signs of getting the place under control.
It is nice to hear them actually admitting that the Saudis haven't been sitting with their hands politely folded, since they've been ridiculously silent about that as they've tried to pin the "foreign interference" charge on Iran and Syria.
That 60-80 number is bizarre. Only 2 or 3 a day? Really? The mind boggles.
Posted by biggerbox at July 27, 2007 10:07 AMSnark said something profound, that which defines everything the Saudis do these days.
This is not a popular regime; they cannot bend the world, or even their small corner of it, to their will. Many in the country, especially in the Hijaz, see them as unlawful occupiers of Islam's two holiest cities. It is not an isolated sentiment. Therefore, from time to time, the Sauds have to do something to placate this subversive element. If that means supporting...enthusiastic... Sunnis in Iraq, so be it.
Pat
Posted by Patrick Shapland at July 27, 2007 11:13 AMEuzolus pointed out the fundamental: Saudis are Sunni, Iranians are Shia. Iraq is both. We are neither. Bush has blundered into a very old streetfight between gangs that hate each other. They will join to rob him, beat him and then resume their fight. In fairness, he was told not to go into that neighborhood, but nobody tells him what to do. He's the Decider. Making deadly stupid decisions.
Posted by T2 at July 27, 2007 12:06 PMHeard one of Bush' polips looks like Gannon, one speaks arabic, and the other three invoked the "executive privilege".
Posted by anonymous at July 27, 2007 03:10 PMWell apparently they aren't too upset with the Saudi's as Bushco's planning on selling weapons to them . Gotta feed the Corporatecronypoliticalmilitary complex.
Posted by emal at July 27, 2007 04:29 PMAnd yet this from the NYT today. "U.S. Set to Offer Huge Arms Deal to Saudi Arabia."
Posted by jen at July 27, 2007 07:58 PM