Buh bye, 'friends'.....been nice. Well, actually, it hasn't. They've been a 'royal' pain in the ass in even in the best of circumstances.

Bearing in mind that the vast majority of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi and that most of the al-Quida funding comes from Saudi Arabia.

Guess who's just gone on the list

It will get interesting in Saudi Arabia when the rotten royalty group is attacked by their own people.

Politics makes for strange bed-fellows.

Are we selling them this base for what it's worth? or are we going to destroy it when we leave?

Surely, we're not going to just let them have it for nothing.............

I wonder if Usama is now sitting in his cave saying "See! I told you we would drive the infidels out of the land of the holy places of Islam!"

Thank goodness we're getting out of there. Let them defend themselves from now on.

Defend themselves from whom? Most of the evil originates there. They may find themselves the unwanted stepchild....but then agian, they have all that money......they'll always have 'friends'.

So, let's see, we'll no longer be on the soil of the Muslim holy land. We've aleviated the suffering of the Iraqi people by effectively ending sanctions with the deposition of Saddam. Does this mean that if we can get the Palis and Israelis to quit bitching at each other, Binny Laden will have no cause? Seems like each step slowly decreases the prospect of terrorism. Hmmmm, food for thought.

The US no longer needs Saudi Arabia as it has over 100,000 troops in Iraq, many of them there for the long term. Don't forget they have Iran hemmed in now, as the Americans are also in Afghanistan.

This strategic victory is immense for the Americans. They no longer need the Saudis and can start to apply maximum pressure on the corrupt regime there. The pumping of Iraqi oil will have a downward pressure on Saudi oil revenues.
The House of Saud just lost a great deal of negotiating power and economic leverage. Good riddance.

"The House of Saud just lost a great deal of negotiating power and economic leverage. Good riddance."

Perhaps, but keep in mind that they still have about a trillion dollars tied up in American stocks and bonds, make billions each year in defense purchases, and have bought out and/or ingratiated themselves with God knows how many politicians and Beltway bureaucrats. Have you read Matt Welch's stuff on Bush 41 and Colin Powell's friendship with the Saudi Ambassador?

Cutting our military ties with the Saudis was easy. Merely cutting back our diplomatic and economic ties with them will be much harder, though reviving Iraq's oil industry won't hurt.

Bob, the fact that the Saudis have a big placement in our country but our's in theirs is reduced means that we've increasingly got them - they don't have us.

We can label this the "German treatment". As I recall it, just before the attack on Iraq we moved some aircraft out of Germany. The reason? We suspected the Germans might embargo them to prevent them being used in the war. The Germans know the shift has just begun. Now, no matter what else we might do in the Iraq/Iran/Gulf region, the Saudis know they are effectively out of the loop. They'll feel like Chiraq did the other day when he found himself getting his important news about U.S. rebuilding plans in Iraq from the press.

It also sends a message to other countries - your actions will not go unnoticed. The U.S. State Dept. might be content, no matter what you do, to muddle along playing the diplomatic game, but if you screw us the Administration will methodically kick you in the teeth. Want to keep your seat at the table? Then better play it straight. That Newt chose this moment to very publicly attack State should be interpreted as significant by ill-intentioned foreign governments.

I am no expert, but the Suadi "regime" and USA still have tremendous interests in each other for the foreseeable future, not the least of which is the cost of a barrel of oil. While not seemingly helpful in "cleaning up the block", the Saudi elite could be counted on NOT to not be belligerant adversaries, which they were under pressure to do from the Arab street. They could have been much less helpful in some very real ways.
They may not look like allies, but the 5% in charge in SA have a great problem keeping the 95% with no voice in check, and believe me, we wouldn't like the style of government the other 95% would put into place.

Tim, what kind of BS equivelency are you peddling when you refer to the the Israelis and Palestinians bitching at eachother?

Is that what they are doing? Or is it that Palestinians have been used as pawns for 50+ years now with the goal to eradicate Jews from the Middle East?

How's that for food for thought?

No worries.. The Americans may be "visiting" yet again...

Saudi Arabia may have some economic ties but its a very fragile country. It looks modern and has the best of everything, but Saudi Arabian people run almost nothing, its mostly done with foriegn workers and only foriegn workers know how to run the vital infrastructure of Saudi Arabia. The average citizen is uneducated in Saudi Arabia.

Also they are totally dependent on de-salinization plants for fresh drinking water. If Saudi Arabia was to get out of line the US could just bomb the water plants to apply pressure on the Royals, or even better yet force them to accept a democratic government.
Their a paper Mid-east nation, they just need someone to blow for the house of cards to come crashing down.

The airbases in Saudi Arabia were paid for mostly with Saudi dollars. However, the base in Qatar was paid for by DoD.

Note for Jeff B - the facilities at PSAB were constructed by the Saudis, believe it was supposed to be, at one point, their new 'AF Academy' locale. The US has actually spent very little as far as infrastructure goes - mostly concrete pads and such for basically temporary buildings, power/phone lines between the temp buildings, etc. Majority of that will not be worth much more than scrap.

When we moved out of PSAB the first time (after GW-I) the place was pretty well trashed. When we came back after Khobar, the place was a mess - as far as power and comms went. Patching the old stuff was almost useless, and consumed so much time that in many cases they just laid down more.

We won't be leaving a lot behind for them - the entire thing was treated as pretty much transitory in nature the entire time we were there.

I guess that rental agent in Riyadh can finally have his brown toyota bus back now, but the aren't getting back the big stone ball from the Al Yamama (yes that is the name) Hotel lobby...

Good riddance.

Ben Noah,
There are a host of equivilencies in the Palestinan Israeli conflict.

Are you all out of your bloody minds? Your war-mongering imperialism will only serve to disrupt the delicate balance that is the middle east. I'll start why I'm against this war (keep in mind this is off of del's site. I am against the war with the entirety of my being. As much as I respect and support the armed forces of our nation, I simply do not agree with our government and its endeavors in foreign nations. I will start my disapproval by counter-pointing the most prominent pre-texts for the war at hand
Weapons of mass destruction- We have yet to discover any findings of the existence of WMD's yet despite extraneously numerous false calls. This does not worry me too much by itself; however, in conjunction with the refusal of the United States to allow UN inspectors back into Iraq to find the WMD's leads me to great suspicion and any evidence found solely by the Americans shall be viewed with beyond extreme suspect.

Freedom of the Iraqi people- The residential bombing aimed at re-deposing Saddam and destruction of "military" positions. I'm unfamiliar with the forum decorum so if one of you could inform me into the details of what links would be deemed overly explicit. If gore is allowable I can show you a multitude of pictured articles detailing the "liberation" of the peoples of Iraq. Continuing, the American armed forces will be unable to hold Iraq indefinatly without major opposition by people within and outside our own country.Therefore, our government must replace the the deposed regime. As much as our Western ideals misinform us, the people of Iraq are of a culture not allowing a democratic government do the historic instability of the region, the mindsets of the people (including the legacy they leave to their children), the racial instability and the tendencies of the people to become subject to extreme governments. The factors given portrait an Iraq left to the dogs just as Somalia and Afganistan were, with the unique exception of resource drainage. My thrid point being of the nature of the urgency for the liberation of the Iraqi people. Only one thing needs to be said; why are the repressed, war torn, starving, disease stricken, radical, and opposingly multi-racial/religous/tribal countries of Africa not taken into consideration?

back to the present post: the people of this world whether they reside within the territories we have conquered or in countries with vested interests in the prior owners of Middle Eastern/South West Asian countries will not tolerate the monopoly you speak of. This kind of rascism and chauvinism has not been seen since the last world war and our imperialist profits shall fall by the wayside just as Britains. Do you really think we are doing good in the world? The only city we truly control in Afganistan anymore is Kabul the rest is warlords that sell America 90% of it's heroin and opium import. What are terrorists then? those who sell drugs for power, or a minority that seeks power through destructive means? then what is the Northern Alliance?http://rawasongs.fancymarketing.net/na-appeal.htm
Nothing but power hungry rapists, looters and drug dealers. If you think terrorism will diminish thinkk again, we didn't even apprehend half the Al-Queda members when we invaded afganistan and will it matter that we've taken away major contributors of money from them? of course not, 9/11 only cost a few thousand dollars, they could get a loan for that much. perhaps you would like to see how successful our bombing has been?
http://www.ccmep.org/usbombingwatch/2003.htm

"The conspiracy theory of society... comes from abandoning God and then asking, 'Who is in His place?'" Karl Popper

Circlek, killing is bad. We know that.

Why don't you show some pictures of Saddam's atrocities--there are 500,000 to 2,000,000--perpetrated deliberatley to maintain his power?

None of us are happy that innocent civilians died. But that doesn't mean it was more moral to let Saddam have his way with them.

And that's what you're arguing. If you mean it, you are a foul and disgusting creature. Why don't you go deny the Holocaust somewhere?