Jackson Diehl: Amid the Mideast protests, Where is Saudi Arabia?
[Jackson Diehl is a columnist for the WaPo.]
Two months into the Arab revolution, one very fat lady has yet to sing. But the turn of Saudi Arabia - home to one-fifth of the world's oil reserves, and the United States' most important remaining Arab ally - may be coming soon....
King Hamad probably has broken some bad news to King Abdullah: I no longer have the option of ending this by force. It won't work - and the Americans won't let me. That leaves the Saudi ruler with a couple of hard choices. He can order Saudi forces through the causeway to put down the Bahraini Shiites, in what would be an Arab version of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Or he can let the al-Khalifas bargain away their power, while hoping that the democratic infection doesn't spread.
The invasion is a real possibility: Saudi troops helped put down a Shiite rebellion in Bahrain in the 1990s. Earlier this week, the Saudi Council of Ministers issued a Brezhnev-like declaration: "The kingdom will stand by the sisterly state of Bahrain with all its capabilities." A lot of experts in Washington are convinced that the Saudis won't hesitate to act if the Bahraini regime appears in jeopardy....
Read entire article at WaPo
Two months into the Arab revolution, one very fat lady has yet to sing. But the turn of Saudi Arabia - home to one-fifth of the world's oil reserves, and the United States' most important remaining Arab ally - may be coming soon....
King Hamad probably has broken some bad news to King Abdullah: I no longer have the option of ending this by force. It won't work - and the Americans won't let me. That leaves the Saudi ruler with a couple of hard choices. He can order Saudi forces through the causeway to put down the Bahraini Shiites, in what would be an Arab version of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Or he can let the al-Khalifas bargain away their power, while hoping that the democratic infection doesn't spread.
The invasion is a real possibility: Saudi troops helped put down a Shiite rebellion in Bahrain in the 1990s. Earlier this week, the Saudi Council of Ministers issued a Brezhnev-like declaration: "The kingdom will stand by the sisterly state of Bahrain with all its capabilities." A lot of experts in Washington are convinced that the Saudis won't hesitate to act if the Bahraini regime appears in jeopardy....