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Politics : World Affairs Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: lorne who wrote (3080)1/1/2004 9:01:44 PM
From: ChinuSFO  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 3959
 
The Saudi Paradox

By Michael Scott Doran
From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2004

THE DUAL MONARCHY

When an attack on a residential compound in Riyadh killed 17 people and wounded 122 in early November 2003, U.S. officials downplayed the significance of the incident for Saudi Arabian politics. "We have the utmost faith that the direction chosen for this nation by Crown Prince Abdullah, the political and economic reforms, will not be swayed by these horrible terrorists," said Deputy U.S. Secretary of State Richard Armitage, in Riyadh for a visit.

But if any such faith existed, it was quite misplaced. Abdullah's reforms were already being curtailed, the retrenchment having begun in the wake of a similar attack six months earlier. And despite what was reported in the American press, an end to the reforms was exactly what the bombers and their ideological supporters hoped to accomplish. To understand why this is the case -- and why one of Washington's staunchest allies has been incubating a murderous anti-Americanism -- one must delve into the murky depths of Saudi Arabia's domestic politics.

.....continued at foreignaffairs.org