Maybe I just wasn’t paying attention, but I didn’t notice that the Obama Administration had approved a $60 billion (with a B) arms sale to Saudi Arabia until Instapundit linked to that Jonathan Tepperman piece.
I have mixed feelings about the deal.
- The Saudis are not our friends. The ties between the House of Saud and fundamentalist Wahabbist Islam go back over two centuries, and Wahabbism is (along with the fundamentalist Shia of Khomeinist Iran, and the teachings of Hassan al-Banna and his followers in the Muslim Brotherhood) one of the chief sources retrograde radicalism in modern Islam, an influence that the Saudis have continued to support with their petrodollars to this very day.
- My impression (and if someone has any contradicting evidence, feel free to share it in the comments below) is that the Saudi’s continuing support for Wahabbism is one of manipulative cynicism rather than deep religious belief. The Saudi ruling class is happy to swill alcohol and enjoy other forbidden Western pleasures behind closed doors, but continues to support Wahabbism as both a means of controlling their own country’s populace, and of maintaining their influence in the Ummah, the worldwide community of Islamic believers. Whether this makes them more or less evil is a matter of interpretation.
- Despite their outward hostility to Jews and ostensible support of Palestinian nationhood, one of the biggest open secrets in the Middle East is that the Saudis are in regular secret communication with Israeli leadership about matters of mutual interest. (Also, the Saudis, much like the vast majority of Arabs everywhere, don’t really give a rat’s ass about the Palestinians.)
- Their biggest area of shared concern is a nuclear armed Iran, which both view as an existential threat to their existence (albeit it of different types). This is why, as the Atlantic piece notes, Israel hasn’t lifted a finger to stop the arms sale.
On that basis, the arms sale should probably be approved. But it’s no substitute for actually taking out Iran’s nuclear program, or the mullahs pushing it.
