US complicity with terrorists grows untenable, relations with Terror State, Saudi Arabia Fractures

How serious is the ‘rift’ in US-Saudi relations?
By Frank Gardner – BBC – 24 October, 2013

John Kerry and Prince Saud al-Faisal in Jeddah (25 June 2013) The United States and Saudi Arabia have been allies since
The Saudis are upset with Washington. But just how upset? Enough to break off co-operation over Syria, as has been suggested this week?

With conflicting messages coming from senior princes, it is hard to tell.

But the signs are that Washington’s most important strategic Arab partnership is now suffering the biggest strains since it emerged that 15 of the 19 suicide hijackers who had attacked the US on 9/11 were Saudis.
‘Major shift’

First came the shock announcement on 18 October that Saudi Arabia was turning down its two-year non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council in protest at the international body’s apparent inability to resolve either the Syrian or Palestinian situations.

Then on Tuesday it was widely reported that the Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, had told European diplomats his country would be making “a major shift” in its relations with the US.

Largely in protest over Washington’s reluctance to get involved militarily in Syria, the prince reportedly said Saudi Arabia would be scaling back its co-operation with the CIA over arming and training Syria’s Sunni rebels.
Prince Saud al-Faisal (left) and John Kerry (right) at a meeting of the Friends of Syria in London (22 October 2013) There was no apparent rift between Prince Saud and John Kerry in London

On the same day, another senior Saudi royal, Prince Turki al-Faisal – the former intelligence chief and ex-ambassador to the US and UK – gave a speech in Washington damning President Barack Obama’s policies on Syria as “lamentable”.

He dismissed the US-Russian deal to dispose of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile as a trick to excuse Mr Obama from having to order military action there.

Yet at the very same time, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, was sitting comfortably next to his US counterpart, John Kerry, first in Paris on Friday and then on Tuesday in London as they worked on finding a political solution to the Syrian conflict.

US diplomats say they have received no formal notification of a change in relations and that US-Saudi co-operation is solid and will continue. So what is really going on?
List of complaints

Firstly, Prince Bandar has a reputation of being somewhat at the megaphone end of Saudi communications.

Despite spending 22 years as Riyadh’s ambassador in Washington, he has a penchant for making overly dramatic gestures and statements that in the past have led to his exclusion from the inner circle of Saudi policy making. …more