NYTIMES: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

[MikeWB]

WOW! I'm utterly shocked that NYTimes decided to publish this. Saudis will be livid and yet they have a LOT of pull in the US.


http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/21/opinion/saudi-arabia-an-isis-that-has-made-it.html

Black Daesh, white Daesh. The former slits throats, kills, stones, cuts off hands, destroys humanity's common heritage and despises archaeology, women and non-Muslims. The latter is better dressed and neater but does the same things. The Islamic State; Saudi Arabia. In its struggle against terrorism, the West wages war on one, but shakes hands with the other. This is a mechanism of denial, and denial has a price: preserving the famous strategic alliance with Saudi Arabia at the risk of forgetting that the kingdom also relies on an alliance with a religious clergy that produces, legitimizes, spreads, preaches and defends Wahhabism, the ultra-puritanical form of Islam that Daesh feeds on.

Wahhabism, a messianic radicalism that arose in the 18th century, hopes to restore a fantasized caliphate centered on a desert, a sacred book, and two holy sites, Mecca and Medina. Born in massacre and blood, it manifests itself in a surreal relationship with women, a prohibition against non-Muslims treading on sacred territory, and ferocious religious laws. That translates into an obsessive hatred of imagery and representation and therefore art, but also of the body, nakedness and freedom. Saudi Arabia is a Daesh that has made it.

The West's denial regarding Saudi Arabia is striking: It salutes the theocracy as its ally but pretends not to notice that it is the world's chief ideological sponsor of Islamist culture. The younger generations of radicals in the so-called Arab world were not born jihadists. They were suckled in the bosom of Fatwa Valley, a kind of Islamist Vatican with a vast industry that produces theologians, religious laws, books, and aggressive editorial policies and media campaigns.

One might counter: Isn't Saudi Arabia itself a possible target of Daesh? Yes, but to focus on that would be to overlook the strength of the ties between the reigning family and the clergy that accounts for its stability — and also, increasingly, for its precariousness. The Saudi royals are caught in a perfect trap: Weakened by succession laws that encourage turnover, they cling to ancestral ties between king and preacher. The Saudi clergy produces Islamism, which both threatens the country and gives legitimacy to the regime.
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One has to live in the Muslim world to understand the immense transformative influence of religious television channels on society by accessing its weak links: households, women, rural areas. Islamist culture is widespread in many countries — Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Mali, Mauritania. There are thousands of Islamist newspapers and clergies that impose a unitary vision of the world, tradition and clothing on the public space, on the wording of the government's laws and on the rituals of a society they deem to be contaminated.

It is worth reading certain Islamist newspapers to see their reactions to the attacks in Paris. The West is cast as a land of "infidels." The attacks were the result of the onslaught against Islam. Muslims and Arabs have become the enemies of the secular and the Jews. The Palestinian question is invoked along with the rape of Iraq and the memory of colonial trauma, and packaged into a messianic discourse meant to seduce the masses. Such talk spreads in the social spaces below, while up above, political leaders send their condolences to France and denounce a crime against humanity. This totally schizophrenic situation parallels the West's denial regarding Saudi Arabia.

All of which leaves one skeptical of Western democracies' thunderous declarations regarding the necessity of fighting terrorism. Their war can only be myopic, for it targets the effect rather than the cause. Since ISIS is first and foremost a culture, not a militia, how do you prevent future generations from turning to jihadism when the influence of Fatwa Valley and its clerics and its culture and its immense editorial industry remains intact?


Is curing the disease therefore a simple matter? Hardly. Saudi Arabia remains an ally of the West in the many chess games playing out in the Middle East. It is preferred to Iran, that gray Daesh. And there's the trap. Denial creates the illusion of equilibrium. Jihadism is denounced as the scourge of the century but no consideration is given to what created it or supports it. This may allow saving face, but not saving lives.

Daesh has a mother: the invasion of Iraq. But it also has a father: Saudi Arabia and its religious-industrial complex. Until that point is understood, battles may be won, but the war will be lost. Jihadists will be killed, only to be reborn again in future generations and raised on the same books.

The attacks in Paris have exposed this contradiction again, but as happened after 9/11, it risks being erased from our analyses and our consciences.

[Michael K.]

It seems apparent, according to the sources we have before us on the internet, that there are three main states who have had obvious dealings with ISIS:  The US, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

The Russian state media is blaming the US almost solely, with the goal of making it the key to uniting the UN and EU against America.  The Kremlin makes almost no mention of Israel's obvious role.

So, the US is saying: "Look at the Saudis, they frigging ARE ISIS here". And to a large extent, it seems self-evident. 

But the Saudis made a secret deal with Russia this spring, as evidenced by a $10billion contract, and a plan for Russia to build them nuke plants.

Will anybody tell me, with America's political and defense establishment interpenetrated by Israeli dual citizens with dual loyalties, leading our neoconservative think tanks and so forth, where American responsibilities are clearly distinguished from Israeli ones?

I think the answer is obvious, that anyone who is listening to Russia will see only America as the unseen hand, and since " blaming the Jews" is reprehensible...

The only choice left is for America to plead Saudi Arabian culpability, so now we will see how the Jewish global media empire spins it.  Will our "allies" scapegoat us?  Moving forward, does Israel need the US as much as it needs Saudi Arabia, now that it has big, strong Russia as its playground bodyguard?

[yankeedoodle]

Excellent analysis, Michael.

And, of course, lurking in the background is the "missing 28 pages" that are something of a Sword of Damocles over Saudi Arabia that the US media has planted into the back of the public's mind.  https://duckduckgo.com/?q=saudi+28+pages

Hmm...insinuations about Saudis doing 911, and now insinuations about Saudis being ISIS-like, thus linking them to Paris.   

Wouldn't take too much of a media blitz to link the two, which would bring damned-near universal support for war, and, suddenly, Uncle Sam owns all the Saudi oil, and the sands of the Arabian Peninsula might be blood-red from the chopped-heads of thousands of Saudi princes.  It might be known as the Saudi Arena.

[MikeWB]

Saudis have over a Trillion dollars in US economy. They have more investments in our stock exchanges and individual companies than Israel.

That's why no one dares talk about KSA power.

And this NYTimes piece is in an opinion page. It's buried in the back of the paper. But make no mistake, no one will talk about this on US media. Not CNN, not FOX.

And Russians and Saudis are not exactly on best of terms. Russians are producing more oil than ever and are flooding the markets and are driving the price of oil down to hurt Saudis. On the other hand, Saudis started selling oil to Europeans and are undercutting Russians.

Finally, at G20, Putin released a list of ISIS financiers and implicated Saudis and Qataris.

Again, don't fall for all this anti-Russian propaganda. Russians are a tangential player in this. Ties that bind USA and KSA are strong and many and are decades long.

Finally, Israel and Saudis are allies. They both have a common enemy: Iran. KSA even offered Israel its airspace if it ever needs to bоmb Iranian nuϲⅼеаr facilities.

[yankeedoodle]

Israhell has no allies.

Allies come and go, even for those who have allies. 

[MikeWB]

US doesn't have any allies either. Only interests.

[yankeedoodle]

Well, then, there's nothing to stop the US invading Saudi Arabia, if and when the time comes.

As for Saudi investments in the US, they can be frozen, just as were the Iranian investments after the Iranian revolution and the seizing of the American Embassy.

[MikeWB]

US wouldn't gain much by invading KSA. It would just start a world war and don't forget that KSA has "purchased" nukеs from Pakistan. Pakistan basically has several nukеs inside of Pakistan that KSA has keys to. As for seizing assets, that will probably never happen. Whole system would basically fall apart.

Here's a good overview of KSA's miscalculation.. basically it's a giant powder keg:



The Saudis Are Stumbling (And They May Take The Middle-East Down With Them)

For the past eight decades Saudi Arabia has been careful.

Using its vast oil wealth, it's quietly spread its ultra-conservative brand of Islam throughout the Muslim world, secretly undermined secular regimes in its region, and prudently kept to the shadows while others did the fighting and dying. It was Saudi money that fueled the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan, underwrote Saddam Hussein's invasion of Iran, and bankrolled Islamic movements and terrorist groups from the Caucasus to the Hindu Kush.

It wasn't a modest foreign policy, but it was a discreet one.

Today that circumspect diplomacy is in ruins, and the House of Saud looks more vulnerable than it has since the country was founded in 1926. Unraveling the reasons for the current train wreck is a study in how easily hubris, delusion, and old-fashioned ineptness can trump even bottomless wealth.

Oil Slick

The kingdom's first stumble was a strategic decision last fall to undermine competitors by scaling up its oil production and thus lowering the global price.

They figured that if the price of a barrel of oil dropped from over $100 to around $80, it would strangle competitors that relied on more expensive sources and new technologies, including the U.S. fracking industry, companies exploring the Arctic, and emergent producers like Brazil. That, in turn, would allow Riyadh to reclaim its shrinking share of the energy market. There was also the added benefit that lower oil prices would damage oil-reliant countries that the Saudis didn't like – including Russia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Iran.

In one sense it worked. The American fracking industry is scaling back, the exploitation of Canada's tar sands has slowed, and many Arctic drillers have closed up shop. And indeed, countries like Venezuela, Ecuador, and Russia have taken serious economic hits.

But it may have worked a little too well, particularly with China's economic slowdown reducing demand and further depressing the price – a result that should have been entirely foreseeable but that the Saudis somehow missed.

The price of oil dropped from $115 a barrel in June 2014 to around $44 today. While it costs less than $10 to produce a barrel of Saudi oil, the Saudis need a price between $95 and $105 to balance their budget. The country's leaders, who figured that oil wouldn't fall below $80 a barrel – and then only for a few months – are now burning through their foreign reserves to make up the difference.

While oil prices will likely rise over the next five years, projections are that the price per barrel won't top $65 for the foreseeable future. Saudi debt is on schedule to rise from 6.7 percent of GDP this year to 17.3 percent next year, and its 2015 budget deficit is $130 billion.

The country is now spending $10 billion a month in foreign exchange reserves to pay the bills and has been forced to borrow money on the international financial market. Recently the International Monetary Fund's regional director, Masood Ahmed, warned Riyadh that the country would deplete its financial reserves in five years unless it drastically cut its budget.

Buying the Peace (While Funding War)

But the kingdom can't do that.

When the Arab Spring broke out in 2011, Saudi Arabia headed it off by pumping $130 billion into the economy, raising wages, improving services, and providing jobs for its growing population. Saudi Arabia has one of the youngest populations in the Middle East, many of whom are unemployed and poorly educated. Some 25 percent of the population lives in poverty. Money keeps the lid on, but – even with the heavy-handed repression that characterizes Saudi political life – for how long?

Meanwhile they're racking up bills with ill-advised foreign interventions. In March, the kingdom intervened in Yemen's civil conflict, launching an air war, a naval blockade, and partial ground campaign on the pretense that Iran was behind one of the war's factions – a conclusion not even the Americans agree with.

Again, the Saudis miscalculated, even though one of their major allies, Pakistan, warned them they were headed for trouble. In part, the kingdom's hubris was fed by the illusion that US support would make it a short war. The Americans are arming the Saudis, supplying them with bombing targets, backing up the naval blockade, and refueling their warplanes in midair.

But six months down the line the conflict has turned into a stalemate. The war has killed 5,000 people (including over 500 children), flattened cities, and alienated much of the local population. It's also generated a horrendous food and medical crisis and created opportunities for the Islamic State and al-Qaeda to seize territory in southern Yemen. Efforts by the UN to investigate the possibility of war crimes were blocked by Saudi Arabia and the US

As the Saudis are finding out, war is a very expensive business – a burden they could meet under normal circumstances, but not when the price of the kingdom's only commodity, oil, is plummeting.

Nor is Yemen the only war that the Saudis are involved in. Riyadh, along with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, are underwriting many of the groups trying to overthrow Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. When antigovernment demonstrations broke out there in 2011, the Saudis – along with the Americans and the Turks – calculated that Assad could be toppled in a few months.

But that was magical thinking. As bad as Assad is, a lot of Syrians – particularly minorities like Shiites, Christians, and Druze – were far more afraid of the Islamists from al-Qaeda and the Islamic State than they were of their own government. So the war has dragged on for four years and has now killed close to 250,000 people.

Once again, the Saudis miscalculated, though in this case they were hardly alone. The Syrian government turned out to be more resilient than it appeared. And Riyadh's bottom line that Assad had to go just ended up bringing Iran and Russia into the picture, checkmating any direct intervention by the anti-Assad coalition. Any attempt to establish a no-fly zone against Assad will now have to confront the Russian air force – not something that anyone other than certain US presidential aspirants are eager to do.

The war has also generated a flood of refugees, deeply alarming the European Union, which finally seems to be listening to Moscow's point about the consequences of overthrowing governments without a plan for who takes over. There's nothing like millions of refugees headed in your direction to cause some serious rethinking of strategic goals.

The Saudis goal of isolating Iran, meanwhile, is rapidly collapsing. The P5+1 – the US, China, Russia, Great Britain, France, and Germany – successfully completed a nuclear agreement with Tehran, despite every effort by the Saudis and Israel to torpedo it. And at Moscow's insistence, Washington has reversed its opposition to Iran being included in peace talks around Syria.

Bills Coming Due

Stymied in Syria, mired down in Yemen, and its finances increasingly fragile, the kingdom also faces internal unrest from its long marginalized Shia minority in the country's east and south. To top it off, the Islamic State has called for the "liberation" of Mecca from the House of Saud and launched a bombing campaign aimed at the Kingdom's Shiites.

This fall's Hajj disaster – a stampede that killed more than 2,100 pilgrims and provoked anger at the Saudi authorities for their foot dragging on investigating it – have added to the royal family's woes. The Saudis claim just 769 people were killed, a figure that no other country in the world accepts. And there are persistent rumors that the deadly stampede was caused when police blocked off an area in order to allow high-ranking Saudis special access to the holy sites.

Some of these missteps can be laid at the feet of the new king, Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, and of a younger, more aggressive generation of Saudis he's appointed to key positions. But Saudi Arabia's troubles are also a reflection of a Middle East in transition. Exactly where it's headed is by no means clear, but change is in the wind.

Iran is breaking out of its isolation. With its large, well-educated population, strong industrial base, and plentiful energy resources, it's poised to play a major regional, if not international, role. Turkey is in the midst of a political upheaval, and there's growing opposition among Turks to Ankara's meddling in the Syrian civil war.

Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, is impaled on its own policies, both foreign and domestic. "The expensive social contract between the Royal family and Saudi citizens will get more difficult, and eventually impossible to sustain if oil prices don't recover," Meghan L. O'Sullivan, director of the Geopolitics of Energy project at Harvard, told the New York Times.

However, the House of Saud has little choice but to keep pumping oil to pay for its wars and keep the internal peace. Yet more production drives down prices even further. And once the sanctions come off Iran, the oil glut will become worse.

While it's still immensely wealthy, there are lots of bills coming due. It's not clear the kingdom has the capital or the ability to meet them.

[Michael K.]

YD- That 28 pages stuff is very interesting.  But I think we would agree that the global media spin will be strong for either a Saudi Arabia narrative (backing a US invasion of Saudi Arabia); or it will pull for a RT-Sputnik led campaign of American vilification (backing a Russian UN coalition), but not ultimately both.  This makes verification as easy as reading the headlines in the days to come.  I would consider European press to be the weathervane here.

Also, I don't think that any analysis is complete without mentioning Turkey, which I am sorry I didn't say before, since their involvement in the middle of both the ISIS and the mass migration issues makes them an obvious major part of it.  However, there seems to be some strong Sunni extremist linkage between the Erdogan's Turkey and the house of Saud.  That being the case, going after the Sunnis involves going after an ***EU member state***.