Did Bin Laden Come Home To Rule?

December 12, 2006

Do the Saudi’s think they got screwed? Or did Bin Laden come home to rule? Recent Saudi action, especially today resignation, may tell the tale.

There had been a series of warnings from Saudi Arabia over U.S. policy in Iraq. The most explicit one, which also includes a carrot offer of cheap oil, came in a November 29 OpEd which we did discuss here.
U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney was summoned by the king to receive an official down-dressing.

Given that the Saudi-U.S. relations have deep roots and are usually very good, these public warnings were serious, but they seem to have been disregarded.

Additionally, the Iraq Study Group report, delivered by longtime Saudi consultant James Baker has been deep-sixed by Bush/Cheney.

Today the Washington Post buries this sensation on page A23: Saudi Ambassador Abruptly Resigns, Leaves Washington. The ambassador, Prince Turki al-Faisal, is the former head of the Saudi intelligence services, a serious player in the Saudi power game.

The usual "to spend time with his family" is given as official reason for the sudden resignation but that is of course bullshit. As is WaPo’s speculation about illness of Prince Turki’s brother. Steve Clemons’ explanation of backstabbing in Riyadh does not sound credible to me either. So why is the ambassador being recalled?

The relations beween Washington and Riyadh are now tanking fast.

As was just published, in the first half of this year (newer numbers are not yet available) Saudi Arabia has moved further away from the Dollar and put a bigger share of its reserves into Euros.

Today the Saudi Arabia’s National Air Services annouced to spend $2 billion on new planes, mostly European Airbuses, no Boeings.

While the Saudi "offer" for cheaper oil was on the table earlier, the Saudi Arabian oil minister now calls for serious production cuts by OPEC.

Also today 30 prominent Saudi clerics have called for Sunnis worldwide to mobilize against Iraqi Shiites.

The last issue can be seen as an open declaration of war against U.S. troops in Iraq and their allies in the mostly Shia Iraqi army. Such a call to the weapons could never have happend without the explicite agreement of the highest authorities in Rihyad.

All these issues are related. So what has happened? Did Cheney rebuke all Saudi recommendations? Did Bin Laden come home to rule? Why isn’t the U.S. media all over this issue?

Posted by b on December 12, 2006 at 17:56 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Bernhard, you are way ahead of everyone… another amazing post!
What indeed, has happened? Clearly something big is afoot. I can only add this:

Prince Turki made an unscheduled visit to the State Department on Monday to meet with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, according to her spokesman Sean McCormack.
But McCormack was unable to give details of the meeting and said he learned about the departure of the Saudi envoy only through the Washington Post article.
Prince Turki’s departure would come at a time of increased tension in relations between key allies the United States and Saudi Arabia over Iraq’s descent into chaos.
He has made a series of recent speeches urging Washington not to precipitously withdraw troops from the violence-wracked country and has repeatedly urged the White House to try to break the deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 18:30 utc | 1

I think the rise in oil prices, in part, reflects the Saudi’s attempts to bolster Jr.’s election chances and now that the dems have a majority in the legis. for the first time in more than a decade, an economic mess could be blamed on them, too.
the bushies have been letting the dollar fall for a while (since Snow, at least). maybe the difference now is that nations who have been moving assets out of dollars have done so enough that it gets in the news. This, too, has been going on little by little, and as quietly as possible, to be the first off the sinking dollar ship.
but who knows about the resignation. maybe the House of Saud thought they made a deal with the bushies for containing oil prices. maybe the idea that the U.S. will not stay in Iraq is the deal breaker at this moment, and the Saudis are trying to make the U.S. stay in Iraq to protect Saudi interests and greater middle east instability.
the bushies have amply demonstrated that they have no regard for treaties, not simply privately brokered deals.
maybe the neocons hope they have set events in motion that cannot be undone, and the chaos in the middle east will worsen no matter what anyone does. maybe things have reached a tipping point.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 18:46 utc | 2

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, I’d also add that the way in which this resignation occurred also belies its official explanation. Ambassadors don’t typically just up and exit without warning. They have so many relationships and interests to wrap up properly. There should have been a good long notice, then farewell parties, etc etc. Unless someone in the family is on his deathbed, or the Saudi Kingdom is on the brink of a coup, I can’t think of any other plausible explanation for the abrupt departure than a serious rift in the US-Saudi relationship. Moreover, the last Saudi ambassador was in the post for 22 years, and this one had only just arrived 15 months ago. It is really bizarre.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 18:49 utc | 3

I can’t think of any other plausible explanation for the abrupt departure
here i wonder if the recent murders were the red flag that the SA proposals were spit on. i know its a long shot, but surely a slap in the face. the timing w/resignation, impeccable.
Bernhard, you are way ahead of everyone… another amazing post!
out of the ballpark b.

Posted by: annie | Dec 12 2006 18:59 utc | 4

should have read..”recent murders were the red flag that all SA proposals were spit on”.

Posted by: annie | Dec 12 2006 19:01 utc | 5

Great post, Bernhard.
I have nothing to add, except that a friend who had a relative expat working inside a Saudi palace said that the fighting within the Saudi Royal family sometimes got really vicious and deadly.
It is possible that the Saudi ambassador was recalled due to a serious family dispute – and there could be multiple reasons as to why he was recalled.

Posted by: Owl | Dec 12 2006 19:03 utc | 6

owl
no, i think what b is hinting at is closer to a correct analysis – something quite special is being passed from the house of saud to the colleagues in crime at the white house that will have an immediate effect on our history(ies)
tho i am not clear, other than those questions which are self evident – what they are up to but prettyboy al-faisal is about as important a functionary whose body intersect nearly all that has passed in the last 20 years – it is the point where cheny-isi(pakistan)-ubl intersect

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 12 2006 19:09 utc | 7

Over the past weekend at their summit meeting, the Gulf states, including S.A. decided they need nuclear technology. Just maybe George Bush decided that they don’t:
Arab Gulf States Say They Want Nuclear Technology

Posted by: Ensley | Dec 12 2006 19:43 utc | 8

Ensley, pls. cleanup yr. link..

Posted by: jj | Dec 12 2006 19:47 utc | 9

cleaned up ensley’s link – just a typo s/he made – the nuke stuff is longterm – here we have an unprecedented immediate resignation …
The issue I think is something really strange is going on and the MSM is asleep on it.
I don’t think it is just a palest revolt in Riyath – no side of such recolt would probably risk the U.S. relations over such.
The sanctioned call from the clerics is a very, very serious thing – just one level below sinking U.S. ships by Saudi (U.S. produced) fighter planes. What amazes me is the speed this train took.
Only days from issuing the warning to the implementation of the consequences. – 1914 all over?

Posted by: b | Dec 12 2006 20:03 utc | 10

Owl, well, yes. remember the various princes who died?
both left and right seemed to connect Zubaydah with those deaths after he named various ppl after he was tortured.
from the first link at Counterpunch:
shortly after Zubaydah spilled these red-hot beans, all three Saudi princes he had named turned up dead–within a single week, in June 2002. One died in a car crash, one reportedly had a heart attack, and the third wealthy prince somehow “died of thirst” in the Saudi desert. The following week, the top Pakistani official fingered by Zubaydah was also killed, along with his family, when his airplane suddenly fell out of a clear blue sky.
The resignation of “Bandar Bush” was assumed to be so that he could maneuver in the succession battle after King Fahd died. But that crisis over succession never happened. Who knows if the changes in succession will make a difference in the future.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 20:19 utc | 11

b- the Saudis said that they would intervene if the U.S. did not stay in Iraq for now, so…maybe this move is a way to pressure those who oppose Bush so that the U.S. will stay in Iraq.
The ISG and the elections have changed at least some of the debate about Iraq in the U.S., and neither Jr. nor the House of Saud likes this.
Maybe the Cheney meeting was about a way to get around the shift in opinion in the U.S. to make the “moderate” powerbrokers here feel they have to back up Bush.
This makes as much sense to me as anything else.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 20:25 utc | 12

Joseph Cannon posted on this today, as well. Here’s a snip or two:

This is not the first time he [Prince Turki] has suddenly resigned an important post. As some of you will recall, he quit his job as Saudi intelligence chief just before the attack on the World Trade Center.
The Prince was a controversial choice as ambassador, to say the least. According to a number of sources (including Craig Unger’s House of Bush, House of Saud), Osama Bin Laden was once Prince Turki’s protege.
Prince Turki belonged to a mysterious power group called The Safari Club, founded — according to one account — by then-DCI George H.W. Bush and Sheikh Kamal Adham, Turki’s uncle and predecessor as Saudi intelligence chief. We have looked at this group before. In a public speech, the Prince admitted that this “club” was an off-the-reservation covert action ring, unaccountable to any democratic government:

In 1976, after the Watergate matters took place here, your intelligence community was literally tied up by Congress. It could not do anything… In order to compensate for that, a group of countries got together in the hope of fighting Communism and established what was called the Safari Club. The Safari Club included France, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Iran.

This quote appears in Joseph Trento’s Prelude to Terror. Trento adds that the Safari Club, through Pakistan, ran the anti-Soviet effort in Afghanistan — which is to say, it created Osama Bin Laden’s network. The Club also funded A.Q. Kahn’s nuclear hijinks in Pakistan.
[…]
One possibility: The Prince fears that a Democratic Congress will investigate some of the connections mentioned here. This theory presumes that the clueless House intel committee head Silvestre Reyes can extract his cranium from his anus long enough to learn how the world actually operates.
Another possibility: Big Wedding II is a-comin’, and the Prince is getting out while the getting’s good.

While Joseph hasn’t tied together all the loose ends, he does present some interesting background info in his piece, which is worth reading all the way through.
Funny how Poppy Bush always seems to show up at the center of these machinations, isn’t it?

Posted by: Michael Hawkins | Dec 12 2006 20:33 utc | 13

@faux – 12,
it has been decided that the U.S. stays in Iraq – Baker said so much – since then the call is only for even more troops to Iraq – I do not see any real opposition to this that needs to be pressure (but the U.S. public that no pol cares for anyway) – so the reason must be elsewhere
@michael – 13
a possible house investigation, even one starting in three weeks from now is NO reason to take the plane today without ANY serious explanation or cover
—
I have no idea what is going on, but something serious is happening …
this was an emergency action of some kind …

Posted by: b | Dec 12 2006 20:49 utc | 14

b-, THANKS for this exc. post digging up context for the resignation. The “clerics” decision, is just an Saudi State Policy.
It is sooo Terrifying that we’re stuck w/that stooge, (who should be sent to St. Elizabeths (where John Hinckly is kept safely out of harms way) in WH for 2 more yrs. don’t have time to dig up links now, but he’s off in fantasyland again, telling himself that when historians evaluate his administration they will realize he was right – so, he’s absolved himself of listening to anything anyone says now…Holy Christ.
Frankly, I don’t see what choice world leaders have but to disassociate themselves from all things American, beg. w/the dollar, since a powerful family arranged a coup d’etat to put their half-mad illiterate son in power, and no one is doing anything to rein him in lest they limit their own political future or offend said powerful family…
Sounds like Bernacke’s trip to China to buy time, is just trying to set things up so that dollar doesn’t crash til he’s out of office. Though I understand that Chinese would be only too happy to do whatever they want, as long as they are willing to transfer to Chinese the only bit of the crown jewels of Am. technology not already surrendered – military technology.

Posted by: jj | Dec 12 2006 20:52 utc | 15

and, fwiw, Turki was the head of Saudi intelligence when Bush Sr. was at the CIA…and when Bush Sr. was prez.
Bush Sr. denied selling nuclear parts to Pakistan (which seems to be aligned with SA…or at least significant portions of ISI.) during his presidency and denied he knew Turki when Turki told about these arms sales.
…this was all reported in the book, Outlaw Bank the two ex-Time magazine reporters did about BCCI, long ago. Here’s an archived “demopedia” about BCCI. Didn’t read it, but looked like it had some good background.
Turki’s brother, Prince Faisal, had a bank, Bar al Islami, that was one conduit for bin Laden’s finances, too. Of course, the House of Saud is the power-broker in that country. In some ways, bin Laden could be viewed as someone making a play for power in that country…another power struggle. In those terms, hitting the U.S. is another way to hit SA to destablize that regime.
Another reason why the Sauds are so adamant that the U.S. keep troops in Iraq…fight them there so the Sauds don’t have to fight them at home…hey, I’ve heard that somewhere else…

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 20:53 utc | 16

@b – 14
…which may leave us with Joseph’s second alternative, “Big Wedding II”.
This really does feel ominous, like the lull before a storm.

Posted by: Michael Hawkins | Dec 12 2006 20:56 utc | 17

There is a Dkos diary on their recommended list about it – the writer has no idea either (forget his stupid remark about a “Saudi dirty domb” – it doesn’t need nation states to blow up fire detectors)
@faux – the Saudis definitly did finance the Pakistani nukes (with U.S. agreement I assume)
still – why did Turki resign like this – it’s good to know the history and there is some reason burried there – the dollar stuff is more longterm too – so why did Turki resign today, in this manner?

Posted by: b | Dec 12 2006 21:15 utc | 18

fauxreal @ 16
could you please fix the BCCI link
thanx

Posted by: andrew in caledon | Dec 12 2006 21:19 utc | 19

BCCI
hopefully that one works

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 21:24 utc | 20

well that’s weird. I know I copied the link and the html is correct.
just do a google search with the terms “demopedia” “DemocraticUnderground” “BCCI” it should show up.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 12 2006 21:25 utc | 21

*puts tin foil hat squarely on head*
Perusing the news, I find:
– Iran has prominent holocaust denial conference, announces VERY loud and clear that Israel will soon be wiped off the map
– Israel’s PM the day before “accidentally” let slip that Israel has nukes, causing a huge brouhaha
– Britain’s PM (who is in this up to his eyeballs) says Iran is a threat to stability and to the Middle East
– Saudi Ambassador up and bolts home without warning…
I don’t know, something about the concatenation of all those events together suddenly gives me a bit of a pause. On top of the timing. Not to mention the events we took note of yesterday.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 21:31 utc | 22

linking is working but result is
404 error – Not Found
The requested URL /2006/12/demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/BCCI was not found on this server.

Posted by: andrew in caledon | Dec 12 2006 21:37 utc | 23

And adding to my previous post:
Gulf States Call for Sanctions Against Israel for Having Nukes

Earlier Tuesday, Olmert said that “Israel won’t be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons into the Middle East.”
Olmert repeated the comments three times during a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, a day after the seeming confirmation during an interview. Olmert also said that nothing he said during that interview violated the official Israeli position.

Something that is repeated three times at a press conference with another world leader is not just a “slip of the tongue.”
For whom is this message intended? My guess? Iran. Why now? That is the $64,000 question.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 21:41 utc | 24

Adding even more from the end of that Haaretz article I cited in #24 – I did not see this at first.

Prior to the meeting, Olmert addressed a ceremony commemorating the victims of the Holocaust at Grunewald Station’s Platform 17 in Berlin.
“Woe are the weak and defenseless. Woe is he who refuses to believe the words of those who threaten to destroy him. Woe is the complacent man that fails to use his weapons to foil danger. Woe is he who entertains the delusion that he is beyond harm, and that is dependent upon the kindness of strangers,” said Olmert in his address, adding that this is the main lesson of the Holocaust, and that “this is a lesson that Israel has learned and memorized.”

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 21:48 utc | 25

Israel’s PM the day before “accidentally” let slip that Israel has nukes, causing a huge brouhaha
i believe this brouhaha started by gates at his confirmantion hearing, referred to israeli nukes

Posted by: annie | Dec 12 2006 21:52 utc | 26

There you go:
BCCI

Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Dec 12 2006 21:55 utc | 27

Yes Annie, but Israel had a 50-year old policy of not making its nuclear weapons known. Whatever Gates said, Olmert did not need to confirm in the way that he did. The fact is that even when Gates said it it was shocking to observers, leading me *tin foil hat on head* to speculate that all this is kind of pre-planned or coordinated. Of course *removes tin foil hat* it is equally and perhaps more plausible that they are all incompetent idiots.
🙂

Posted by: Bea | Dec 12 2006 21:56 utc | 28

faux,
if you leave out “http:// ” HTML reads it as starting from the current adress instead of starting from scratch. And this page is in folder “http://www.moonofalabama.org/2006/12/” to which was added “demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/BCCI”, thus creating “http://www.moonofalabama.org/2006/12/ demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/BCCI” which of course point no where.
Or at least I think so. Gotta try to recreate the problem: This link should lead to “http://www.moonofalabama.org/2006/12/ demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/BCCI”.

Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Dec 12 2006 22:03 utc | 29

Apparently I was right.
(Did not know for sure untill I posted.)

Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Dec 12 2006 22:05 utc | 30

as sloth would say behind all this is filthy lucre
& on the bcci as well as much else to do with the kind of monies cheney & his pal al-faisal are used to i would suggest the work of dr alfred mccoy, again – (i think he teaches somewhere in the northeast – a university that must posses both rigorous scholarship & courage)
again more on instinct – i agree with b – because something appears very altered & the visit of cheney was mysterious in a week that had all of the hoods traversing the globe – but that fat fuck hardly moves outside his republican oxygen tent – so a visit to the saud’s has hints of something exceptional
i do not know what it portends but whatever it is it is not good
i’d suggest – if it is available – even in the 15 minute version – the aljazeera english – tho watered down -is still substantial enough to place its competitors in a house of shame

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 12 2006 22:19 utc | 31

Israel’s policy of ambiguity over its nuclear capabilities appears to have taken another step toward clarity following a statement made by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in an interview on the German news channel N24. Olmert said that Israel should not be compared to Iran “when they are aspiring to have nuclear weapons, as America, France, Israel, Russia.”
Olmert, who began an official visit to Germany yesterday said that “we have never threatened any nation with annihilation. Iran, openly, explicitly and publicly threatens to wipe Israel off the map. Can you say that this is the same level, when they are aspiring to have nuclear weapons, as America, France, Israel, Russia?”
It is not clear whether this was a slip of the tongue on the part of Olmert or an intended statement. link
Looks to me like Olmert, while not in BoyBush’s league by a long shot, isn’t bright enough to be PM. It wasn’t a slip of the tongue, rather he got trapped. Iran is saying if Israel can have ’em so can we. PM didn’t know how to respond short of acknowledging that Israel has them.
Speaking of incompetence – b- particularly may also find this interesting:New report on IDF in Lebanon war: Halutz did not have plan, General Staff did not function. (Israel has already formed special dept. to plan for Iran.)
Looks frighteningly like things are starting to spin in the direction of out of control in ME, w/Western Aggressors under leadership unparalleled in its incompetence, delusion, etc. Threats to existence of S-A- & Israel are increasing…
If I were an Am. expat. in Saudi Arabia, I’d definitely be booking airplane reservations out now while I could.

Posted by: jj | Dec 12 2006 22:37 utc | 32

PAT LANG’S POST (The Children’s Crusade/Thirty Years War”) IS A MUST READ TODAY.

Posted by: jj | Dec 12 2006 22:45 utc | 33

Well why don’t you link to it JJ? I can’t find it…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 12 2006 22:55 utc | 34

Nevermind, I found it…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 12 2006 22:57 utc | 35

here you go…
The Children’s Crusade/Thirty Years War
/back to lurking
thanks for all the dialogue folks..

Posted by: wa sabi | Dec 12 2006 22:59 utc | 36

all this is kind of pre-planned or coordinated.
my sentiments exactly. i don’t know who it was that linked to the haaratz article (was it you) a few days ago that ask why gates would say that but i did read a fair amount of the comment section. these kinds of things just don’t slip out. imho. it is all part of some gradual acceptance we are supposed to have about the worst kept secret.
Iran, openly, explicitly and publicly threatens to wipe Israel off the map.
did he really say that? or is this anouther drive them into the sea statement. it is my understanding he actually said the regime should be wiped off the map. does anyone know what the actual translation is? how is this any different than saying the bush regime should be annihilated? not all of america.

Posted by: annie | Dec 12 2006 23:01 utc | 37

For some reason I don’t feel too comfortable linking to Pat’s site, since he banned b-. And since it was the top post, I didn’t think anyone would have trouble finding it. Sorry.

Posted by: jj | Dec 12 2006 23:03 utc | 38

well, i don’t feel too comfortable linking to the politikaerotika site that carries the brook article free of nyt select. but its there in all its glory!

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 12 2006 23:09 utc | 39

badger over @ missing links translates fandy who perhaps brooks was channeling (that lang responded to)

The problems in Iraq and the region are the combined fault of dictatorship and race. Not Saudi dictatorship, Saddam dictatorship; and not Arab race, but, well, he’s a little vague on that today. Baker-Hamilton showed laudable self-criticism, he says, but with he Mideast region “under the dark clouds that will rain death upon us”, what do we hear, he asks, except some of the people singing that they are the scions of the Pharaohs, others that they are Babylonians, still others that they are sons of the Phoenecians, or of the Caananites. What an irony! (Fandy writes). What a contrast between a miserable and hateful present and a supposedly proud past! Fandy does not tell us in so many words, but clearly it is those Babylonians you have to keep your eye on.
If we are really the offspring of these proud races, says Fandy, whence the Iraqis that are killing each other whence the Lebanese that are insulting one another on television? Resorting to his famous wit, he says: They did not come from outer space! Nor did the Americans bring them with them when they came.
No, says Fandy. “The Americans let the spirits out of the bottle, but it did not create them.”

Posted by: annie | Dec 12 2006 23:15 utc | 40

I understand JJ, and sorry, I had forgotten. Oh, btw, here’s is more racheting up of the slow burn….Iran: Israel ‘will end like USSR’

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 12 2006 23:29 utc | 41

Oh, and excellent find an comments annie regarding your #37…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 12 2006 23:36 utc | 42

@annie #37:
Juan Cole posted about this back in June. Someone in the comments of Helena Cobban’s blog linked back to it:

Thursday, June 15, 2006
Steele on Ahmadinejad: Of Arenas of Time and Intransitive Verbs
Jonathan Steele of the Guardian does a good piece about the controversy over Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s quotation from Khomeini that “the occupation regime over Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time” — which some Iranian activists and the Western press translated as “Israel must be wiped off the face of the map.”
__________________________________
Steele:
Again it is four short words, though the distortion is worse than in the Khrushchev case. The remarks are not out of context. They are wrong, pure and simple. Ahmadinejad never said them. Farsi speakers have pointed out that he was mistranslated. The Iranian president was quoting an ancient statement by Iran’s first Islamist leader, the late Ayatollah Khomeini, that “this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time” just as the Shah’s regime in Iran had vanished.
He was not making a military threat. He was calling for an end to the occupation of Jerusalem at some point in the future. The “page of time” phrase suggests he did not expect it to happen soon. There was no implication that either Khomeini, when he first made the statement, or Ahmadinejad, in repeating it, felt it was imminent, or that Iran would be involved in bringing it about.
______________________________________
Juan Cole again:
The only thing I would add is that mahv shodan is in fact an intransitive verb construction. Shodan is to become. An mard khoshhal shodeh is “that man became happy.” It is not a transitive verb. That is why mahv shodan is better translated “vanish,” also an intransitive verb. The transitive is mahv kardan, to “wipe out” or “eliminate.”
The New York Times was told by supposed Persian language experts in Iran, and appears to believe, that mahv shodan is a transitive verb construct. It makes me a little worried about the state of grammar in Iran, and in the Persian speaking staff of the NYT, and also about its newsgathering prowess. If they cannot find out that shodan is intransitive, something well known in Persian grammar for thousands of years, you wonder what other assertions they are swallowing. I told them this, by the way, before the article came out. I guess we academic Persianists are not trusted to know an intransitive verb when we see one. No wonder we’re mostly not trusted to know more important.

I have no idea whether the recent comments by Ahmadinejad were in the same vein or different, or whether the mention made of the comments referred back to the earlier (June?) comments in the first place, but I thought this was interesting. Thanks for questioning the accuracy of the quote Annie.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 0:03 utc | 43

Big Wedding II? What was the first Big Wedding?

Posted by: Scott | Dec 13 2006 0:07 utc | 44

anne,
Juan Cole dealt with the translation awhile ago, check out his site. I remember something like “disappearing with the sands of time”. The statement was probably directed at the Iranian public. It can and I believed will be used to justify a pre-emptive attack on Iran.

Posted by: Iron Butterfly | Dec 13 2006 0:19 utc | 45

Scott @ 44 –
Sander Hicks wrote a book called The Big Wedding: 9/11: The Whistle Blowers and the Cover-up.
Russell Wellen reviewed it at GuerillaNews.

Posted by: Michael Hawkins | Dec 13 2006 0:23 utc | 46

Laura Rozen has an update on Turki from the Nelson Report. Seems the current line is that Bandar got jealous over all the great press that Turki’s been getting. Sounds like BS to me, but what do I know?

Posted by: Dick Durata | Dec 13 2006 0:29 utc | 47

thanks bea and ironbutterfly. i will save the link, i run into these creeps on the blogs…

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 0:32 utc | 48

However Annie it’s important to be aware that this is how his comments are reported today in Haaretz, and these are current comments. And of course, as you know, perception is reality. So that might be one battle you don’t engage in.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 0:37 utc | 49

Maybe some friends warned Turki to get out of town before bin Laden strikes again….

Posted by: alabama | Dec 13 2006 1:01 utc | 50

maybe Prince Turki al-Faisal did not feel like going thru the societal rituals traditionally observed by exiting ambassadors. Unlike Prinnce Bandar, his predecessor, he does not seem to be the highly sociable type.
Prince Turki cut his teeth dealing with spooks of all types, Pakistani as well as Yanqui, as well a certain very tall Arabian with a radical disposition. Why would he care about such diplomatic niceties. Lets be real.
The Middle-East, from Tangier to South Waziristan is about to blow up and Prince Turki is asking himself what in the world he is doing stuck in Washington, DC hobnobbing with a bunch of Euro-centrics who just can’t seem to understand how badly they’ve messed up his neighborhood.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 2:07 utc | 51

Wow, I didn’t know there were so many ideas kicking around about the resignation. But I’d like to air mine.
1. Saudi threatens (through a surrogate) to intervene in Iraq.
2. Saudi’s greatest military accomplishment – the organization of the mujaheddin in Afghanistan. The mastermind of this effort – spymaster Turki al-Faisal.
3. Faisal resigns days after (1) to “spend more time with his family”.
If I were king and I were going to intervene in Iraq on the side of the insurgents, Turki al-Faisal is absolutely the man I want sneaking around with a golden briefcase uniting all the insurgent factions. Because he’s done it before, and won. We should keep an eye on his movements, but I bet he starts disappearing often for days at a time.
My worst fear is that he will try to arrange a big false-flag attack on Americans in Baghdad to be blamed on the Shia militias, as part of an endless campaign to keep the US in Iraq and killing Shia, perhaps even to escalate to full-scale war with Iran. However, I think Faisal must fear the consequences of a US-Iran war.
My lesser fear is that he will organize the mujaheddin so well that they run the US out of the country entirely. That might actually save American lives in the long run. But it would trigger an Iranian intervention, and these poor people would get stuck with another decade of war.

Posted by: super390 | Dec 13 2006 2:08 utc | 52

Don’t know anything, really, about the Saudi Arabian ambassador’s abrupt scramble back home, but there was an unusal account of a student play and of religious reaction to it in this morning’s Bangkok Post, written by an Australian who was there, apparently.
Students seize the day, launch a cultural revolution
He thought it was just peachy, and may have misinterpreted the direction a “cultural revolution” in Saudi Arabia is likely to turn.

Riyadh _ On the night of Nov 27, 2006, while millions of Saudis were sleeping, a handful of students in the capital unknowingly started a cultural revolution. Life imitated art when a stage play, Wasati Bila Wasatiya (”A Moderate without Moderation”) at Al Yamamah, an international college in Riyadh, triggered a violent confrontation between the Mutawa or Islamic religious police, and hundreds of students, expatriate teachers, actors and members of the audience. As cinemas and theatres in Saudi Arabia are outlawed, this was the first time a theatrical production exploring contemporary social issues was ever shown. The onstage struggle resulted in props being destroyed, lights smashed and actors battered. A firearm was discharged. The play was about social change in the kingdom.

Perhaps the Shia are rising in Saudi Arabia? Who would we be more aware of such a thing and whose presence more eagerly required than an intelligence man. Who whould have more to lose than a very well connected member of the royal family?

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 2:46 utc | 53

So, there are at least 2 issues. Why the recall & why was it done w/out observing SOP Diplomatic Protocol. But don’t forget diplomatic niceties, parties & the like are for peacetime, when time is not of the essence. Could that be a factor? Could there be an urgent need to call all brains on deck back home in da “kingdom”? Remarks @#52 are interesting. Things are definitely heating up in Afghanistan.

Posted by: jj | Dec 13 2006 3:32 utc | 54

bea:
Earlier Tuesday, Olmert said that “Israel won’t be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons into the Middle East.”
This message may well have been intended for the those in the US who are having second thoughts about whacking Iran.
In Neocon speak this means : “If you don’t take out Iran by conventional means (for the Neocon line is that Iran can be “taken out”) we will be “forced” to do it with the only weapons at our disposal. And it will be all you fault.”

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 3:59 utc | 55

skod- hmmm. still don’t know how I did that, but glad you fixed it cause I had to leave. so, thanks.
Reid warned of a terror attempt over the holidays on tv on Sunday. don’t know how realistic such a threat might be. Ever since 2001, the U.S. govt, at least, always assumed an attack was more likely beause of a holiday…any holiday. he doesn’t sound as totally whacky as the bushistas, but who knows.
the head of MI5 says the big issue for Britain is the rise of terrorism among British-Pakistanis who feel disaffected/disenfranchised. Beyond the racist sound of the comment, I wonder if it fits within the context of Turki’s resignation?
The reason I ask is because he was envoy to GB before he took over for Bandar in the U.S. He resigned as head of Saudi intelligence in 2001, and assumed the envoy position in 2003.
but, in this article, Turki claims he opposes Al-Q…but in the same article, he denies that the Bushies helped bin Laden family members leave the U.S. after 9-11 for fears of backlash. well, as far as I know, numerous sources have confirmed that one…so I’d be inclined to think he’s lying about the other stuff, too…p.r. and lying…isn’t that an ambassador’s job?
Arab News says he’s going to GB to attend his son’s graduation and will return in Jan.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 13 2006 4:01 utc | 56

faux:
The Arab News article makes this all seem to be much ado about nothing.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 4:16 utc | 57

I don’t buy it. He did not need to resign the post to attend his son’s graduation and return in January.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 4:32 utc | 58

There is a diary over at Daily Kos on this with a little more info and additional speculative theories.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 4:40 utc | 59

one point in posting the article, fwiw, was to note the discrepancy. I suppose we’ll see who is closer to the truth on this one…I am no more inclined to believe one possible propaganda source over another…let’s see. but, like bea, I think the arab news report isn’t very believeable considering events over the last few weeks in the middle east (and U.S.)
This may be the actual reason he left at this time:
The White House said Tuesday that President Bush would delay presenting any new strategy for Iraq until early next year, as officials suggested that Mr. Bush’s advisers were locked in internal debates on several fronts about how to proceed.
…The administration is also debating whether to back a Shiite government in the conflict with the Sunnis…
This article says Cheney favors the Shi’a, and Rice wants to work with both Sunni and Shi’a.
Ms. Rice has [ ] advocated propping up moderate Sunnis and encouraging them to support Mr. Maliki. As part of that approach, the United States would work with Sunni tribal leaders who have become disenchanted with the Sunni insurgency, a move long advocated by Saudi Arabia.
but again, who knows. maybe he left to attend his son’s graduation. Or to deal with the issue of the Saudi foreign minister’s failing health. Or to make sure the Sunnis have money and weapons in the Iraq civil war if the Bushistas won’t put out.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 13 2006 6:44 utc | 60

on observing that it takes nine wise men and Sandra, sitting around a table for months, to convince us of what we already know to be plain fact, Prince Turki probably realized the real action has moved away from DC.
James Baker’s office is not even in the homeland. Its in Riyadh.
Hasta la vista baby !

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 7:18 utc | 61

super 390, very intersting.
every ounce of my intutition tells me nobody left washington because of some graduation.
bush is not on schedule because the oil contract is not on schedule. he is waiting to see if it is signed. helpful
then there is this from badger..

After almost four years of the occupation of Iraq, it has become apparent that the aim is the seizure of Iraq jointly by the crusaders and Safavid rafida (“rejectionists”, referring to Shiites as heretics), enabling their ambitions in the region, protected by Jewish occupiers; the elimination of Sunni influence in it [in Iraq]; the deterrence of the Sunna in the region generally; and the creation of a Shiite crescent, the idea and the execution of which they do not conceal. It has come about that Iraq, by virtue of its Islamic and Arab character, and by virtue of its geography, its history and its [natural-resource] wealth is something they wish to dissipate and plunder. Its official division has become a public [plan], and it can be expected to occur at any moment. [Already] the rafida have the south and the main provinces of the center; the Kurds have the north; the Sunnis have what remains in the center.
Here is an another excerpt, via the Al-Quds al-Arabi account:
[Sunnis should not stand idly by as their brother Sunnis are killed, tortured and displaced in Iraq, but should] expose the practices of the rafida at every level and every position of every pulpit and gathering and opportunity–more than that, you should call special meetings on this subject [three dots here in the Al-Quds version] what was taken by force can only be removed by force…..clip
In any event, I think these two excerpts give you the gist of it: The Shiites, backed by the regional ambitions of the US-Persian alliance, have been taking by force from the Sunnis their lives and their property, and it is time to organize to take those things back by force.
In any event (according to the above-linked Elaph account today) that is the way the Shiite leadership in Najaf read the statement. Acting collectively, they issued a statement accusing these 38 Saudi sheikhs of “legitimizing [the taking of] blood and property and money of the Shiites”. And the Najaf statement called on the Saudi authorities to take a “resolute position against the statement.”

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 7:24 utc | 62

Josh Marshall has a thought on this that occured to me as well. Cheney and the Neocons are still thinking to back the Shia (the 80% “solution”). The Saudi’s freak out over this. I find this scenario likely.
TPM

Many readers have written in to say that there’s just no way we’re going to let ourselves take sides in what would likely be at least a borderline genocidal civil war between Iraq’s Sunni minority and Shi’a majority. To which, I can only say, why not? Is there anything we’ve seen in the last six years that makes you think we wouldn’t pull the trigger on a ridiculously foolish new plan? I don’t just mean that as trash talk. I think it’s the only sensible way to approach the case at hand.
The main mistakes I’ve made thinking about foreign policy over the last half decade were, I think, all cases where there were certain outcomes I just didn’t find credible because they were just too stupid and dangerous for anybody in a position of power to try. Goog luck on that.
Another point, and one I’m not sure is widely appreciated. The folks who brought you the Iraq War have always been weak in the knees for a really whacked-out vision of a Shi’a-US alliance in the Middle East. I used to talk to a lot of these folks before I became persona non grata. So here’s basically how the theory went and, I don’t doubt, still goes … We hate the Saudis and the Egyptians and all the rest of the standing Arab governments. But the Iraqi Shi’a were oppressed by Saddam. So they’ll like us. So we’ll set them up in control of Iraq. You might think that would empower the Iranians. But not really. The mullahs aren’t very powerful. And once the Iraqi Shi’a have a good thing going with us. The Iranians are going to want to get in on that too. So you’ll see a new government in Tehran. Plus, big parts of northern Saudi Arabia are Shi’a too. And that’s where a lot of the oil is. So they’ll probably want to break off and set up their own pro-US Shi’a state with tons of oil. So before you know it, we’ll have Iraq, Iran, and a big chunk of Saudi Arabia that is friendly to the US and has a ton of oil. And once that happens we can tell the Saudis to f$#% themselves once and for all.
Now, you might think this involves a fair amount of wishful and delusional thinking. But this was the thinking of a lot of neocons going into the war. And I don’t doubt it’s still the thinking of quite a few of them. They still want to run the table. And even more now that it’s double-down. I don’t know what these guys are planning now. But there’s plenty of reason to be worried.

Posted by: b | Dec 13 2006 7:56 utc | 63

Not much new in the NYT piece on SA today: Saudis Give a Grim What If Should U.S. Opt to Leave Iraq

Mr. Obaid also suggested that Saudi Arabia could cut world oil prices in half by raising its production, a move that he said “would be devastating to Iran, which is facing economic difficulties even with today’s high oil prices.” The Saudi government disavowed Mr. Obaid’s column, and Prince Turki canceled his contract.
…
The former adviser said Prince Turki’s resignation came amid a growing rivalry between the ambassador and Prince Bandar, who is now Saudi Arabia’s national security adviser. Prince Bandar, well known in Washington for his access to the White House, has vied to become the next foreign minister.
“This is a very high-level problem; this is about Turki, the king and Bandar,” said the former adviser to the royal family. “Let’s say the men don’t have a lot of professional admiration for each other.”

That anonymous “former adviser to the royal family” is of course Obaid, making the statement even more implausible.
…
This AP piece doesn’t help either.
The spin is that the Saudis threaten involvement if US troops leave. But the real reason is that the Saudis fear the US will ally with the Shia – that would be something they definitly can not handle. See the Josh Marshall bit I posted above – there is a real danger for the Saudis in that and they know it.

Posted by: b | Dec 13 2006 8:32 utc | 64

I suppose the Saudi’s could be nervous about the new Bush “plan”, the unveiling of which has been postponed — probably until the shake-up of the Iraqi government happens — which then will be spun as a “last great push” against extremism, aka Sadr and the mehdi militia. Cheney’s for it, Wormser, no doubt as well. The net effect of which, retrospectivly, will rate up there with disbanding the Iraqi army. They never learn, and will not, until the billion dollar embassy is a smoking hole in the ground.

Posted by: anna missed | Dec 13 2006 8:51 utc | 65

it would be nice if billmon could weigh in about now.
just for the hell of it and all that…

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 9:02 utc | 66

I think the Shia are going to end up on top in Iraq and in Lebanon. They have the numbers. They have made the commitment to the nation in both cases, at least Sadr has in Iraq, and the US and Israel have proven powerless to stop them.
If they nuke Iran they still will not stop the them. They will only make a bad situation unbelievably worse.
As far as you and I are concerned there is no reason that the Shia should not be the strongest voices in the countries in which they are in the majority. Including Saudi Arabia.
And the Oil doesn’t know or care who is pumping it.
The only ones fighting this are those afraid of “losing” what they never had and were never entitled to to begin with : the Israelis, who want Palestine (and Lebanon, and …, and …); the Sunnis, who want all the oil in the Middle East; and Big Oil, who want all the oil everywhere.
I hope the Shia prevail.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 10:57 utc | 67

Great catch Bernhard!
The sudden departure surely signals a rupture and a serious crisis–a diplomatic reversal or turning point.
One small thing to add: It cannot be true what we are being told, that the Saudis want the US to stay in Iraq. This really does the Saudis no good: It is unlikely they are benefitting from the blossoming chaos, besides, they have indicated as much.
So the media is lying to us–well, who could have guessed? 😉
What is the lie meant to hide?
The US has put together a new strategy and the Saudis are totally opposed to it. What this strategy is we don’t know, but it looks like it involves genociding Iraqi Sunnis. And this the Saudis will not accept. They have indicated they will fund and arm resistance, if need be. (Not to mention the many other things they could do.)
What do the Saudis want? Probably, they want the Iraqi Shi’ites restrained, by US persuasion or US force. But the US is doing neither, in fact the opposite, and will not reconsider. So an alliance is (about to be) broken and a new war is about to swing into motion.
In this encounter, the US is not strategically well placed.

Posted by: Gaianne | Dec 13 2006 11:01 utc | 68

Great post b,
Still absolutely Jack Shit about this on the Saudi Embassy DC website.
Ask Santa for a bicycle this Christmas.

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Dec 13 2006 11:57 utc | 69

US staying the course for Big Oil in Iraq

The crucial development in the next few weeks is Muqtada’s fine-tuning of a stunning Shi’ite counterpunch to demolish once and for all the US-created pro-sectarian strategy: a nationalist, pan-Islamist, anti-occupation coalition of the Sadrists and the neo-Ba’athists, plus any other religious or secular anti-occupation group.
Transcending the Sunni/Shi’ite divide, this would preempt any threat of all-out civil war – not to mention decide the fierce Shi’ite family feud between Hakim and Muqtada in the Sadrists’ favor. No wonder US Senator John McCain wants to “take out” Muqtada as much as the Pentagon does.
Already virtually ruled out by Bush, US dialogue with Iran on Iraq – were it to happen – would also imply some hard truths. Tehran might have some sway in forcing the SCIRI to dissolve the Badr Organization. But it would ask in return for a complete US withdrawal – sprawling military bases included. There’s no guarantee Iran would deliver: the SCIRI is not a puppet party. On top of it, Iran would be helpless against the Sadrists. Once again: Muqtada is above all an Iraqi nationalist.
So the conclusion is grim: militia hell will continue – no matter what the US tries in desperation – because the Sunni Arab guerrillas will only disarm when the occupation is over, and when the Shi’ite militias also disarm; and the Shi’ite militias will only disarm when the Sunni Arab guerrilla war is finished. Not likely, on both counts.
No wonder Saudi King Abdullah is concerned, warning that Iraq is a “tinderbox”. The new Greater Middle East hot war is already on. Baghdad is its horrific microcosm – public executions, non-stop ethnic cleansing, the Tigris as the Sunni/Shi’ite border with Shi’ite district Kadhimiya and Sunni district Adhamiya as ghettos under siege on the “wrong” sides of the river. Maliki is as irrelevant as Bush – who at least has his own militia, the US Army, just one more militia in militia hell or, as Hunter Thompson would put it, “just another freak in a freak kingdom”.
The neo-conservative hallucination of a puppet Iraqi regime as the centerpiece of a US-driven Greater Middle East – loads of cheap oil, Israel-friendly, anti-Iran – may have been derailed by a Mesopotamian sandstorm. But even with the defeat of the occupation, the US – or “the snake”, as Muqtada defines it – still is not going anywhere. The “snake” will redeploy. Sunni Arab US ally/client regimes fear that a US withdrawal would lead to a whole new regional ball game tilting toward pro-Iran or pro-al-Qaeda regimes.
Not even a long-drawn civil war – Arabs killing one another – may save Bush and Cheney. And Iraq won’t succumb to “divide and rule” and break up – because its identity as the eastern flank of the Arab nation is a geopolitical fact. So the real tragedy is how much longer millions of Iraqis caught in the crossfire will be paying with their own blood for the United States’ cataclysmic folly.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 12:43 utc | 70

@67:
“As far as you and I are concerned there is no reason that the Shia should not be the strongest voices in the countries in which they are in the majority. Including Saudi Arabia.”
Huh? Saudi Arabia? Shia are not in the majority in SA. Shia represent only 6-15% of the population (depending on who’s counting and how they figure it) in SA. Even in the Eastern provinces where almost all of them live, the Shia are in the minority.

Posted by: Scott | Dec 13 2006 14:13 utc | 71

I was under the impression that the Shia wer in the majority in the eastern provinces of Saudi Arabia.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 14:30 utc | 72

Looking I see 10% to 15% as the overall percentage of the Saudi population that is Shia. I cannot discover what the relative percentages are in the area between Kuwait and the UAE, where almost all of them live, and do the work involved with raising the oil from Saudi oilfields.
I still see no reason why the Shia should not have the strongest voices in the areas in which they are in the majority, including in Saudi Arabia.
Of course if there are no areas in Saudia Arabia in which the Shia are in the majority, then I will not be surprised to learn that theirs are not among the strongest voices there 🙂

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 13 2006 15:02 utc | 73

JFL @ 70
Thanks for the Pepe Escobar piece from the Asia Times – the best outline of the situation I’ve seen — how it puts to shame the US press.
For SA to support fellow Iraqi Sunnis in Al-Anbar province is dangerous as the AQ leaders of the insurgents hate the SA monarchy and other US regional clients. Josh Marshall’s account of the Neocon dream (cited above by b) — for a US backed regional Shiite majority with US in control of their oil sounds crazy enough for them to believe in it. Puts Bush-Cheney in the hot seat vis-à-vis their old pals SA and Bandar Bush, who apparently still has Jr’s ear.
Looks to me like Bush Jr. has carried out OBL’s plan to a T.

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 15:18 utc | 74

Here is an interesting commentary about the Holocaust conference in Iran written by someone named Elie Haroush — I don’t know anything about him but this newspaper is according to Helena Cobban “probably the world’s leading Arabic-language daily. It’s published out of London and distributes worldwide.” Their English website, however, she says, is a pale imitation of their Arabic one and is woefully under-maintained and poorly organized.
Anyway a few interesting things about this commentary: (1) the writer says this Holocaust conference is not serving the Palestinian cause in the least; to the contrary (with which I totally agree); and (2) the way he describes Ahmadinejad’s current control over thought, science, and politics in Iran was a little too familiar to me… see if you guys agree. I felt it mirrored or at least had echoes of what the Bush Admin has been doing here for the past 6 years. And that has got to be the weirdest, saddest thing of all.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 15:22 utc | 75

Is this what SA is trying to prevent (and warned Cheney against)?
Saudi Oil:

the world’s largest oil fields
demography and petroleum geology
Saudi oil fields are in the east, along the Persian Gulf
the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina are in the west, along the Red Sea
the neo-conservatives are floating the idea of partioning Saudi Arabia into two countries – one with the holy cities but without oil, the other without holy cities but with oil fields

Scroll down the page for: Redrawing the Middle East Map and The next war — in Saudi Arabia.

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 15:33 utc | 76

Sorry I meant to post #75 in the OT thread.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 13 2006 15:38 utc | 77

JFL @ 73
Here is an interesting map: Shia populations in the Middle East
Shia live on top of most of the oil

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 15:40 utc | 78

the chances of a Shia-Sunni regional war in the Middle-East are close to zero.
the era of Sunni domination in Iraq is over. No amount of Saudi money or arms can change this.
the Iraq Sunni/Baathists are more interested in forcing the USA out than in fighting the Shia. They have nothing to gain and a whole lot to lose by getting into all-out warfare against the Shia. Beyond gettting the USA out, most Iraqi Sunni will favor pragmatism towards the Shia.
Sadr will attempt to create a nationalist coalition in Iraq to include Shia & large segments of Sunni as well as Turkomen & Christians, maybe even a few Communists too. This is the one development that could significantly alter the balance of political legitimacy in Iraq today.
theres a lot of posturing ccoming thru from different fronts right now, but this would be big.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 15:45 utc | 79

Fascinating:

from the book “Saudis: Inside the Desert Kingdom,” by Sandra Mackey (1987: Signet / Penguin Books)
“By the Shiites’ numbers, geography, and the disdain with which they are regarded by the rest of the Saudis, the House of Saud can move its military against them with impunity.
snip …
… [but] the Shiites command their own sources of power. Through their willingness to do manual labor and their ambition for education, the Shiites have become heavily concentrated in both the oil fields and the management of ARAMCO [Saudi national oil company]. If the Shiites chose to rise up … they could close down oil operations.

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 15:54 utc | 80

Sadr is the key for Saudi Arabia in this juncture (comma? egro Bush) in this Mespotomian adventure. Sadr has been a guest of the Saudi King, no less, in the past 12 months. All the Sunni violence on Shia Sadr City in the past years has been Salvadorian option redux. Sadr is a working class hero, who are no more than ever unemployed, the greatest USA, percieved, threat is a Sadr unified Baghdad……… Hence Saudi noises and actions.

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Dec 13 2006 15:55 utc | 81

As Escobar argues in the Asia Times piece @ 70 above and jbc @ 79 says:

Sadr will attempt to create a nationalist coalition in Iraq to include Shia & large segments of Sunni as well as Turkomen & Christians, maybe even a few Communists too. This is the one development that could significantly alter the balance of political legitimacy in Iraq today.

this makes the ISG report irrelevant for the “reality”-based James Baker community and leaves little wiggle room for Bushco other than to take McCain’s advice, i.e., “to take him [Muktada al-Sadr] out.
Where do others here think Bushco is heading with his “new way forward”, to be announced after xmas, – I don’t mean the propaganda BS he’ll actually announce (if he does actually screw up his courage to say anything, given his new negatives) – but what desperate measures will he undertake?

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 16:14 utc | 82

Depending on what he’s trying to achieve, McCain may want to reconsider taking al-Sadr out.
Israel assasinated Abbas al-Musawi, former leader of Hezbollah in 1992 and Hezbollah has since become much more powerful, effective & nationalistic under his successor – Nasrallah

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 16:31 utc | 83

jbl,
you mean McCain will be against al-Sadr before he’s for him?? ;>)
Following the principle that Americans must always be able to pick out the bad guy (psst! the one in the black hat – or equivalent headgear), Bushco has adamantly and consistently depicted al-Sadr as an evildoer. Could he possibly flip at this late date?
What are the next steps to ensure control of the oil (surely their goal)? Getting the oil law passed by the Malaki “government” before the end of December, keeping the Chinese, Russians, etc. from getting their hands on it, appeasing SA? – but how? Something is in the works or, by not “deciding”, is Bush just hoping he gets a pony for xmas?

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 16:55 utc | 84

Prof Cutler speculates on a split in the House of Saud that reflects a split within the right Arabists in the U.S., i.e. between Cheney and Baker.
Steve Clemons has some more inconclusive inside spin from the Turki side.

Posted by: b | Dec 13 2006 17:08 utc | 85

Where do others here think Bushco is heading with his “new way forward”, to be announced after xmas
would that be before or after the fallujahing of baghdad? the problem w/the new map is baghdad is right on the border. there is no plan in the new middle east for a multi sect city. very inconvenient. modern iraq was primarily secular pre invasion and this is not part of the new ME plan w/all the many states divided by religeous affiliation. of course the oil is in the south and cheney wants to empower the shiite gov for they want to deal w/one smaller state that also includes the coastal areas in both SA and iran surrounding the persian gulf.
Something is in the works or, by not “deciding”, is Bush just hoping he gets a pony for xmas?
yeah, everything is riding on the oil deal. once that is signed the pressure is off.

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 17:08 utc | 86

The intention of the USA has always been to recolonize Iraq and to control 20% of the world’s oil supply. The White House has refused to recognize or publicly admit their goal; thanks to denial or adherence their radical neo-con ideology. They have not nor will they ever give up their goal of a new Middle East colony. The puppet government has to control Baghdad. US troops will surge. The Mahdi Militia will be attacked since they represent the anti-colonial opposition. Sadr City home to millions will be destroyed. Nothing will change except the USA will be at war with all of Islam and sooner or later oil shipment out of the Middle East will be cut off.

Posted by: Jim S | Dec 13 2006 17:11 utc | 87

Hamburger@84
this oil law thing has me very confused. Malaki may sign the law but he can’t do jack to stop sabotage of oil facilitties.
Its kind of like offering to buy the Brooklyn Bridge after the exit ramp has been blow up a couple of times.
It seems something is in the works and James Baker presumably knows what it is.
but GWB may not know anymore than you or I.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 17:17 utc | 88

So there are currently three seperate political initiatives going on within the Iraqi government. All three movements underscore the U.S.’s frustration with the failure of the occupation to manifest the desired client state status, and are time framed by the oil law deadline of the new year. The Sadr/Sunni nationalist alliance developed before the Bush/Maliki meeting is apparently (pepe escobar link) still alive, and represents an internal desire to unite the civil waring factions under a nationalist anti-occupation banner. The second movement is the reverse of the first seeking to dump the Maliki government and cut out and any support of Sadr and the Mehdi — and create an alliance between SCIRI and moderate Sunni factions with pro-privitization Adel Abdel Mahdi elected PM. The third movement, overtly promoted by Bush, is a watered down version of the second, or perhaps a prelude to the second, where the Maliki government is re=alligned in such a way to squeeze the Sadr faction out, but otherwisw maintain the current Shiite continuity. Its unclear whether any of these movements can be realized in terms of the parlimentry votes necessary, but rest assured, that the first option of a Sadr/Sunni nationalist alliance, while ironically representing the best and perhaps only hope of averting an overt civil war — is also the option that the U.S. will fight tooth and nail to prevent and use the second two options to scupper it, and failing that, theres always a “military” coup.

Posted by: anna missed | Dec 13 2006 17:32 utc | 89

from b’s cultler link
Was Cheneys trip to Riyadh was a farewell visit? Did Cheney tell King Abdullah that he was backing the Shiite Option in Iraq?
The last time Prince Turki resigned abruptly was on September 4, 2001, exactly one week before the September 11 attacks. Mark your calendars.
i do not think that was cheneys message because of the sudden (apparent) change in policy of israel towards palestine which would indicate one of SA’s requests was moving forward. i know this must seem far fetched but my guess is the pressure from the bushes allegience to neocon faction (israel) is a severe detriment to bush/cheney moving forward. i think 9/11 plays a part here. believing as i do it was an inside job everyone is promised their payback. israels goals are centered around the regional divisions. baker/bush, the oil. that is why i speculate the timing of assassination in palestine is relevant. i think it cannot be dismissed israel was playing a card against any agreements cheney made in SA and the resignation could have been a sign of ‘all bets are off’. maybe i’m wrong but something happened between cheneys visit and the current status. what stands out for me most is all the neocon howling in the msm. once the oil deal is signed one ‘obligation’ or ‘payback’ is accomplished. next on the agenda is the continuation of the neocon division plan. what all of this completely discards is any nationalistic (sadr/sunni baathist) independent intentions for iraq. this completely screws up everything. if those oil agreements don’t pan out (follow al mahdi) all hell will break out in baghdad. baghdad needs to be dismantled for the new ME map to go forward.
i also think israel is holding alot of cards w/regards to 9/11 knowledge of events. possibly SA also. i wouldn’t be surprised if there was some blackmail going on. can bush even afford to pick a side?

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 17:45 utc | 90

anna missed i wish i had read your post before i posted mine.
create an alliance between SCIRI and moderate Sunni factions
i read they are going to need some lieberman sunni types to pull this off. do you think they will find enough?

Posted by: annie | Dec 13 2006 17:51 utc | 91

I’ll take annie’s #90 for $100 and the win please…uh alex…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 13 2006 18:16 utc | 92

@ 88:
It seems something is in the works and James Baker presumably knows what it is.
I don’t get JB’s conflict of interest: with an office in Riyadh, he’s SA’s pocket lawyer and, at the same time, in the ISG report, an advocate of “direct” talks w/Iran, anathema to SA. Is JB winking to someone? If so, who? His SA employers or Jr. or …?
@ 89:
the first option of a Sadr/Sunni nationalist alliance, while ironically representing the best and perhaps only hope of averting an overt civil war — is also the option that the U.S. will fight tooth and nail to prevent
anna missed – I always appreciate your great insights and analysis. Any chance SA would join the above option (via the Sunni faction) to maintain “stability”? This would be a move contra Cheney-Bush but could conceivably keep their royal asses in power …?

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 18:23 utc | 93

Addendum:
especially her last part, which reads, “i also think israel is holding alot of cards w/regards to 9/11 knowledge of events. possibly SA also. i wouldn’t be surprised if there was some blackmail going on. can bush even afford to pick a side?“. You can bet your ass the Iraeli, SA, and American governments know more about 9/11 than, ‘we the people’.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 13 2006 18:30 utc | 94

its not hard for oil-producing states to find ways to tear up existing oils laws/PSA’s and rewrite them. Venezuela, Russia & Bolivia have done so recently.
so its hard to see whats to be gained from any oil laws signed by the currrent highly unstable Iraqi govt. There may be some leverage provided by having signed agreements in hand, but on the whole, it just does not rise to the high level of urgency it seems to have received.
the real reason withdrawal is such a no-no is not the oil. Lets not be distracted. Its because it would amount to about as total a humiliation & political disaster as any party has ever endured for Bush & the Repubs to leave Iraq having failed to achieve anything that can in any sense justify the overall results.
pushing oil laws to such a high priority may just be a clever ruse to get people thinking “so its all about the oil afterall, thats why we’re not leaving Iraq”.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 13 2006 18:34 utc | 95

the thing that Baker brings to this whole fucked up fuck up is leverage against the totally pro-zionist neocons. I would think, but maybe I’m wrong, that this is a good thing…Israel checked in the “great game” because U.S. pols cannot afford to let gas prices go crazy and expect to win an election, even with screwy machines in strategic states/districts.
in the meantime, the headlines over at Raw Story are about a 50-100 year generational war, and the need (and ability) to find 20k extra troops for a PERMANENT military enlargement…even tho the military could not meet recruitment goals this year…and the Pentagon’s meeting today about military options.
Sounds like ppl are making conciliatory noises with SA.
…not to mention the fact that Bush is convinced of his rightness, and none of the ptbs are willing to admit how badly the neocons screwed the pooch (and not just Blair.)
btw, on mainstream us news (cnn) the report is that the Saudis “read the riot act” to Cheney during his visit…which, of course, is denied.
rozen’s link claims Turki is admired for his honesty. maybe this is the sort of honesty ppl mean.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 13 2006 18:41 utc | 96

oh, and regarding the above, Cursor has all the links I didn’t include in the first three or so paragraphs.
jbc- isn’t the issue about oil an economic war? destroy Iran’s economy, and hit Chavez at the same time? I think there can be multiple reasons withdrawal isn’t an option for the ptbs…and they all extend from the ways they exercise power…psychologically, economically…

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 13 2006 19:02 utc | 97

Has it occurred to others that this is contemporary educated version of trying to read the tea leaves? 🙂
So Oval Office Squatter just met w/Pentagon Brass. At State his meeting was just w/NeoNuts. Does anyone know if that’s the case w/War Dept? Given the purges & resignations, hard to see how anyone sane & capable is left there. WaPo’s coverage was disgraceful – referring merely to State Dept. “experts”. All mention that they were all NeoNuts deleted. Sounds like their influence has radiated out from Edit. pages there…

Posted by: jj | Dec 13 2006 20:04 utc | 98

Just a question, and maybe this has already been answered but….
Explain this to me. The King of SA summons the VP of the USA to tell him that SA will back sunni insurgents fighting in Iraq against the shia militia and oh by the way US GIs? So says the King ‘don’t remove you troops or will begin backing the insurgent forces previously fighting your troops’. And Cheney, who is supposed to be a hardliner, suddenly understands: it’s ok King baby, go ahead and help the terrorists we’ve been fighting for 4 years, we understand, we’re going home anyway!

Posted by: Iron butterfly | Dec 13 2006 20:26 utc | 99

Just heard Bush post military-men meeting (about 9pm cet on CNNI), and he’s now including in his same-old, same-old rant of “not leaving till there is a govt that can defend and sustain itself” 2 references to oil:
1. we must keep oil out of terrorists’ hands, the enemy who wants to hurt us/blackmail us, and
2. we must make sure Iraq will pass oil legislation “because it’s in Iraq’s interests” that oil production benefit them and reconstruction.
He is clearly saying “stay the course” along with the same-old, same-old with the new bit that now Americans should worry that oil, not just WMD, may fall into the hands of the terrists.
He looked nervous and gaunt. Peter Pace, recently rumored to be soon abandoned, flanking his right.
Hearing all this with American ears, I don’t think the public is going to buy it and his negatives will be in the 80’s before long. The Congres. Rethugs must be going crazy.

Posted by: Hamburger | Dec 13 2006 20:31 utc | 100

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