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Commentary No. 322, Feb. 1, 2012
"The Bin Laden Trap: One Down, One to Go"
In October, 2001, just
after 9/11, I wrote the following:
“The
regimes in [Pakistan and Saudi Arabia] are based on a coalition of support from
pro-Western modernizing elites and an extremely conservative, popularly-based
Islamic establishment. The regimes have maintained their stability because they
have been able to juggle this combination. And they have been able to do so
because of the ambivalence of their policies and their public pronouncements.”
“The
United States is now saying, away with ambiguities. The U.S. may prevail, no
doubt. But in the process, the regimes in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan may find
that their popular base is irremediably eroded....”
“Consider
that this may have been bin Laden's plan. His own suicide mission may have been
to lead the United States into this trap.”
I believe that Bin Laden
has now achieved what he intended in Pakistan. The end of ambiguities has meant
that Pakistan is no longer operating geopolitically in the interests of the
United States. Quite to the contrary! It has taken its distances, and is
pursuing policies in Afghanistan and elsewhere that the United States strongly
opposes. One down, one to go.
What is happening in Saudi
Arabia? There is no question that Saudi Arabia is recently acting somewhat more
independently of the United States than it had been for the past seventy years
or so. But it has still not broken definitively with the United States, as
Pakistan has now done. Will it do so in the very near future? I think it may.
Consider the multiple
internal dilemmas of the regime. The wealth of the top 10% or so of the Saudis
has led to sharply increased demands on the state to "modernize" -
most visibly in questions concerning women (the right to employment, the right
to drive). But the demand for more rights for women is but the tip of the
iceberg in a wider call to lessen the constraints of Wahhabi orthodoxy. As the
king moves in a steady, but gingerly, fashion to meet these demands, he
antagonizes the religious establishment ever more. They are getting quite
restless.
In addition, the
"modernizing" elite have still other complaints. The Saudi government
is essentially a gerontocracy, run by people in their 70s and 80s. In the
curious system of succession, the Saudi regime is somewhat like the old Soviet
regime in the USSR. There is something akin to a real vote on succession, but
it is a vote among a mere dozen or so people. The likelihood that real power
can pass to persons in their 50s and 60s is extremely thin, if not impossible.
Note however that the group of these "youngsters," even just within
the royal family, has grown considerably in numbers, and they are impatient.
Could this lead to a serious split among the very top elite? Quite possibly.
The Saudi regime operates
a sort of welfare state for the rest of its citizenry. However, the gap in
income and wealth is growing there, just as everywhere in the world. And small
increases in redistribution from time to time may merely whet the appetite for
further demands rather than calming the lower strata. The middle and lower
strata may even (surprise, surprise!) echo the calls of the Arab spring for
"democracy."
And then there's the Shi'a
minority. It is said to be only 10% or so of the population, but it's probably
larger, and more important it is strategically located in the southeast of the
country where the largest oil reserves are located. Why should these Shi'a be
the only Shi'a in Sunni-dominated countries in the Middle East not to pursue
the claims of identity?
The Saudi regime has been
trying to play a major role in the geopolitics of the region. They are unhappy
about Iran's policies and aspirations. They are unhappy about Assad's
intransigence in Syria. But they have been, when all is said and done, quite
moderate in their approach to these issues in practice. They fear the
consequences of dramatic moves. And they find U.S. policy too much governed by
its internal needs, and its endless commitment to Israel.
On Israel, too, the Saudis
have been very "reasonable." They do not think their reasonableness
has been much rewarded - either by Israel or the United States. They may be
ready now to help Hamas in much more overt ways. They perceive nothing "reasonable"
in the policies of the Israeli government, nor any prospects that these
policies may change soon.
All of this does not add
up to a politically stable regime. It certainly does not add up to one that can
maintain the "ambiguities" that has permitted it to be an unflinching
ally of the United States in the region.
One down, and one to go?
[Copyright by Immanuel Wallerstein, distributed by Agence Global. For rights
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