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Topic: White House warns Saudis over machinations in Iraq (Read 871 times) |
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
  
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White House warns Saudis over machinations in Iraq
« on: 2007-07-28 14:18:38 » |
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[Blunderov] Pakistan is on the brink. Afghanistan is ungovernable and getting worse. Iraq makes Dante's Inferno look like a Sunday school picnic. Iran is about to go nuclear. China has become the world's leading superpower. Former friends are "not at home". Including, now, Saudi Arabia.
"Here is no water but only rock
Rock and no water and the sandy road
The road winding above among the mountains
Which are mountains of rock without water
If there were water we should stop and drink
Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
If there were only water amongst the rock
Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit
There is not even silence in the mountains
But dry sterile thunder without rain
There is not even solitude in the mountains
But red sullen faces sneer and snarl
From doors of mudcracked houses
If there were water
And no rock
If there were rock
And also water
And water
A spring
A pool among the rock
If there were the sound of water only
Not the cicada
And dry grass singing
But sound of water over a rock
Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
But there is no water."
(From The Waste Land - What the Thunder Said)
guardian
White House warns Saudis over machinations in Iraq
Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Friday July 27, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
Iraq's prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, on a visit to Diyala province’s government headquarters, in central Baquba. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images
The extent of the deterioration in US-Saudi relations was exposed for the first time today when Washington accused Riyadh of working to undermine the Iraqi government.
The Bush administration sent a warning to Saudi Arabia, until this year one of its closest allies, to stop undermining the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki.
The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and the defence secretary, Robert Gates, are scheduled to visit Jeddah next week. A diplomat in Washington said of the two governments: "There is a lot of bad blood between the two."
In a sign of the extent to which the relationship has deteriorated, the US made public claims that the Saudis have been distributing fake documents lying about Mr Maliki.
The Bush administration, as well as the British government, is telling the Saudis, so far without success, that establishing a stable government in Iraq is in their interest too and that they stand to suffer if it collapses.
Relations have been strained since King Abdullah, in a speech earlier this year, unexpectedly criticised the US, describing the Iraq invasion as "an illegal foreign occupation."
That was the first sign of a rift between the two who have enjoyed a solid relationship for decades, based on Saudi's vast oil reserves.
The state department spokesman, Sean McCormack, at a briefing, did not refer directly to US frustration with Saudi, beyond saying that Ms Rice and Mr Gates on their trip to the region "will be wanting more active, positive support for Iraq and the Iraqi people".
The British government, which retains a close relationship with the Saudis, shares many of the US concerns about Riyadh's role in Iraq but, unlike Washington, is unwilling to go public about its concerns.
A Foreign Office spokesman said today: "We have always encouraged the Saudis to participate in the political process in Iraq. Saudi Arabia has a crucial role to play and the Saudis recognise the success of the whole project for the region's stability."
The US claims that the Saudi royal family are offering financial support to co-religionist Sunni groups in Iraq opposed to Mr Maliki's Shia-led government.
In a graphic example of the tension, Zalmay Khalilzad, until recently the US ambassador to Baghdad, protested to the Saudis over fake documents distributed in Baghad which claimed Mr Maliki was an Iranian agent and had tipped off the radical Shia cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr, about a US crackdown on his Madhi army militia.
Mr Khalizad, who is now US ambassador to the UN, wrote an opinion piece in The New York Times last week in which he said: "Several of Iraq's neighbours - not only Syria and Iran but also some friends of the United States - are pursuing destabilising policies."
As well as allegedly undermining Mr Maliki, the Bush administration is also expressing its unhappiness with the Saudis for failing to stem the flow of Saudi jihadists crossing its border to fight in Iraq, often as suicide bombers. The US estimates that about 40% of the 60 to 80 foreign fighters entering Iraq each month are from Saudi Arabia.
The Bush administration, like Britain, is still dependent on oil supplies from Saudi and until now has been reluctant to go public about the increasing differences with the kingdom. But it has briefed the US media about the strained relationship ahead of Ms Rice's trip to Saudi.
Diplomats caution that the rift at this stage, while alarming for those used to the old certainties, is not about about fundamental ties but is tactical. Other causes of tension include Saudi's support for Hamas, which now controls Gaza, and Riyadh's lack of support for a US Israel-Palestinian peace plan.
The repositioning of Riyadh reflects the concern of other Gulf states - which, like the Saudis, are primarily Sunni - about the increasing influence of Iran, which is Shia-dominated.
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Walter Watts
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Just when I thought I was out-they pull me back in
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Re:White House warns Saudis over machinations in Iraq
« Reply #1 on: 2007-07-28 23:13:12 » |
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Quote from: Blunderov on 2007-07-28 14:18:38 [Blunderov] Pakistan is on the brink. Afghanistan is ungovernable and getting worse. Iraq makes Dante's Inferno look like a Sunday school picnic. Iran is about to go nuclear. China has become the world's leading superpower. Former friends are "not at home". Including, now, Saudi Arabia.
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Well, I have lots of canned goods, firearms and ammunition, and I live in a city that is an unlikely hard-target for terrorists, indy or state-sponsored.
That's about all I can do at the moment, seeing as the presidential election is still a year and a half away and congress doesn't have the balls (or ovaries) for impeachment, which wouldn't do any good anyway since Cheney would be left and he's running everything anyway.
Was all that a big, run-on sentence?
It's been a long time since I took an English course and I've forgotten the rules.
Walter 
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Walter Watts
Tulsa Network Solutions, Inc.
No one gets to see the Wizard! Not nobody! Not no how!
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
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Re:White House warns Saudis over machinations in Iraq
« Reply #2 on: 2007-07-29 01:11:01 » |
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Quote from: Walter Watts on 2007-07-28 23:13:12
Quote from: Blunderov on 2007-07-28 14:18:38
Was all that a big, run-on sentence?
It's been a long time since I took an English course and I've forgotten the rules.
Walter
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[Blunderov] I've got nothing against big, run-on sentences myself; subsidiary clauses are just nuts to me as I'm sure they are to many, so please feel free to indulge. Thanks, BTW, for your various recent posts. Been some good reading there!
With regard to cellphones, we had to fight quite hard to get our cellphone numbers transferable to other networks; a great deal of kicking and squealing there was, as Yodah might say. Trouble is that, here, cellphones are a significant crime magnet. Quite often people are mudered for just that one item. I kid you not. The phones are now "blacklistable" (LOTS of kicking and squealing about that one you may be sure) but hardly anyone takes the (rather considerable) trouble that this requires and so the phones are still very negotiable property and the murder and robbery continues unabated.
Best Regards. |
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