Obama Admin. Ignored Saudi Pleas to Combat Takeover of Lebanon
Once a key U.S. partner in the Middle East, the Saudis are unhappy with the Obama administration, and thus the United States. They are angry that the White House never consulted them about helping to bring down the Mubarak regime in Egypt. But their greatest wrath is reserved for the U.S. government’s failure to oppose the Iranian regime’s expansionism and subversion.
In one Wikileaks-leaked State Department document after another, Riyadh’s anger is apparent. The “traditionally confrontation-averse” Saudis — as a phrase in one of the reports calls them — also make clear that the threat of force as well as words is necessary to stop Iran. A recently released secret 2009 U.S. State Department memo written for General Petraeus discussed this Saudi view of Iran and U.S. policy toward Iran at length:
The Saudis see a dangerous Shia power bent on destabilizing the region. … They remain concerned that we might be prepared to accept an enhanced role for Iran in the region in exchange for concessions on its nuclear program.
In other words, the Saudis thought the United States might sell them out. The king correctly predicted that the Obama engagement policy toward Iran would fail.
The Saudis described Iran’s power, the spread of its radical Shia Islamist ideology pushing Shia minorities to revolt in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, and its nuclear program as the main threats to Saudi Arabia. Israel and the Palestinian issue didn’t make the list. In a meeting with U.S. Air Force Lt. General Mike Hostage, Saudi Air Force General Faisal al-Saud “asserted that he had conclusive proof of Iranian involvement in the Houthi insurgency” in Yemen.
In the spring of 2011, Saudi forces arrived in Bahrain, where the U.S. Fifth Fleet is based, to quash a mainly Shia uprising — in part backed by Iran — against the ruling Sunni minority. Additionally, the Saudis didn’t stand idly by as pro-Iranian Houthis (whose slogan is: “God is greatest, death to America, death to Israel, God curse the Jews, victory for Islam”) in neighboring Yemen attacked Saudi forces in 2009. In private, the Saudis were vocal in calling for Israel to strike Iranian nuclear facilities.
Faisal al-Saud offered a parable to show the Saudis’ critical view of U.S. policy toward Iran:
A neighbor’s house bursts into flame, and the closest neighbor [the United States] says he will come to help soon but then doesn’t, citing policy as preventing him, but hoping he will still be considered a very good friend. Meanwhile, others who are not close friends are helping.
In Lebanon, the government was ruled by the pro-Western, pro-Saudi March 14 alliance. That Sunni Muslims, Christian, and Druze coalition was a bulwark against the heavily armed, pro-Iranian Hizballah, and to Iranian and Syrian influence. The Saudis early on appreciated the danger of a takeover by radical forces and the need to do something about it. In 2007, Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Abdulaziz Khoja told then-U.S. Ambassador Jeffrey Feltman that he doubted “whether the GOL [Government of Lebanon] and the March 14 forces had the strength to sustain the fight over the long term” without significant outside help.
I just wish we had a president with some stones to fully develop all of the energy resources we have at home. With all the oil we have in Alaska and off our own shores, we could be mostly energy independent in a few years. But no, the tree huggers and the enviro-Nazis still want us to be dependent on a bunch of fat monarchs in the Middle East. If we were energy independent, though, we could do the worst thing a nation could ever do to the Saudis. We could just say “goodbye.” Let the Sunnis and Shias fight it out to the death. It’s what the deserve and we do NOT need to be a part of it.
Even more so, Canada needs to develop their oil sands without further delay.
Unfortunately, the KSA is doing all it can to stand in the way of that:
The Saudi-funded Norton Rose Group and Rahool P. Agarwal: Hypocrisy Unplugged
The Saudi-Funded Norton Rose Group Law Firm Goon Squad Starring Rahool P. Agarwal
We don’t need to drill offshore, or in remote Alaska. North Dakota, eastern Montana, and southern Canada are sitting on the best sweet crude available with a potential reserve greater than all present Middle East reserves. This is why private drilling is so intense in that region at this time. Google “North Dakota oil reserves” and read what is said on the government websites concerning the size of this thing, and there is more exploration into other fields of similar potential. East Texas panhandle and west Oklahoma holds enough natural gas to fuel America at her present consumption rate for over 100 years, all on private land, and drilling is going all-out at the present time…. Only thing to stop them is an economic collapse that is now beginning to unfold….
It looks like the Wahabist Saudis are getting a dose of their own medicine. In the mean time, their brothers are taking over Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt. In a battle between the Moslem brotherhood and the Shia I would think long and hard before I sided with either. This is one of the few cases where Obama might just be correct by voting ‘present’.
That Obama could be correct even accidentally is a stretch. Letting Lebanon fall completely into the hands of Hezbollah was probably preventable. Obama didn’t care because Syria was to one of the countries he needed for the unprecedented mid-east peace he wanted for his crowning foreign policy achievement. Peace itself only mattered to the degree that it would enable us to abandon the region and redistribute resources domestically. This is why he continued to pander to Iran. He needed a less belligerent Iran to help get cooperation from Syria, forcing Israel to accept a palestinian state, not caring how precarious this would leave Israel, would still leave Syria and Israel in conflict. I doubt he even cares about keeping the oil flowing as reducing our supplies furthers the green agenda. His goals in the Mideast are a peace treaty achievement where all had failed before him, retask funding resources from the Mideast to his domestic agenda. I don’t think he cares a whit if Iran gets the bomb.
Actually the following is not completely correct
Letting Lebanon fall completely into the hands of Hezbollah was probably preventable.
because the rot started big time in 1983 when after the Marines in Beirut were blown to bits by Iran’s fledgling foreign legion the “Realists” Baker and Weinberger pulled out, with their tails between their legs according to Arab observers, and basically told the Ayatollah that he was free to proceed.
Look back at the actions of UNIFILth over the years when Foggy Bottom turned a blind eye to their inaction in applying SC resolutions governing Southern Lebanon and Israel and their complicity in helping Hezbollah several times over the years.
The 9/11 hijackers were Saudis
This is a meaningless datum. Nationalities are irrelevant in the Global Jihad.
This leftist Obama/Power/Jarrett regime is hoplessly mired in 1954, and the supposedly dastardly Anglo/CIA “coup” that replaced the saintly Marxist Mossadegh by the diabolical pro-Western Shah.
That’s their narrative, and they’re stickin’ to it.
As always with the American left, America is the villain. The best we can hope from these people is incompetence.
I’d say that assessment is spot on.
But that is not the only reason. Zero has his own Muslim sympathies, not to mention the fact that Washington DC is aswarm with Muslim Brotherhood moles.
We need to do some major housecleaning in BOTH parties.
I can’t decide which is more disturbing: the content of the article, or the fact that the USAF has a general named Hostage.
Don’t forget that the Saudi’s are one of the main sponsor and proliferator of islamist radical ideology across the globe. Letting the Saudi’s dictate US foreign police is no less suicide than trying to appease overt threats.
I would sell the “Saudis” out in about 38 seconds, they have EARNED IT.
Dr. Shalit
That is very informational post