
Washington Should Prepare for Saudi Arabia's Collapse - prostoalex
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/02/saudi-arabia-collapse/463212/?single_page=true
======
nabla9
Boko Haram, al-Qaida, ISIS, Ansar al-Shariah, Jund al-Khilafan, al-Nusra, ...

You can backtrack basically all active jihadist groups that attack west back
to to the Saudi funded ideology. Even ISIS is offshoot of Wahabbi/Salafism.
The "traditional" Islamist like Brotherhood put their efforts in Arab
countries. Saudis are not in control of these groups, but they are responsible
for the ideology.

Saudi Arabia's Curriculum of Intolerance
[https://freedomhouse.org/report/special-reports/saudi-
arabia...](https://freedomhouse.org/report/special-reports/saudi-arabias-
curriculum-intolerance)

Saudis Must Stop Exporting Extremism ISIS Atrocities Started With Saudi
Support for Salafi Hate [http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/opinion/isis-
atrocities-st...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/opinion/isis-atrocities-
started-with-saudi-support-for-salafi-hate.html?_r=0)

~~~
salafi
I can't, for the life of me, understand why people associate being a Salafi
with the various terrorist groups.

I have never heard a Salafi scholar promote any acts terrorism. In fact, every
single high-ranking scholar in Saudi Arabia (those who call themselves
Salafi), are all opposed to groups like ISIS, Al Qaida, and Al Nusra. There
are dozens of audio clips on Youtube from such scholars who clearly warn the
Muslims from these types of groups.

Here is one such video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xAZLE6JiqE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xAZLE6JiqE)

And another: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNL9cwB-
plY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNL9cwB-plY)

And another (from arguably the most respected Saudi scholar):
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9J5s2PPwZcY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9J5s2PPwZcY)

Here are two from a Muslim student of knowledge from the UK:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05yw1IXM1k4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05yw1IXM1k4)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ocvexFXCo8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ocvexFXCo8)

There is also a great book that references many of the Islamic verdicts given
by the contemporary Salafi Muslim scholars that dispels much of the "Wahhabi"
myth:

[http://www.amazon.com/The-Wahhabi-Myth-Dispelling-
Fictitious...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Wahhabi-Myth-Dispelling-
Fictitious/dp/1553953975)

I'm not here to preach; it just bothers me when people hijack words to push an
agenda.

~~~
tptacek
I really have no idea what it means to be a Salafist, but there's something
unsettling about an HN debate about whether a particular religion is or isn't
fundamentally terroristic.

That's especially true if you are yourself somehow affiliated with the
religion, in which case: I'm sorry you find yourself litigating this here.

Whether or not you are, and whether or not these are good faith comments, I
think this is a pretty weird place for HN to go.

~~~
dionidium
Why is that weird? You don't think different religions can be more or less
supportive of violence in their foundational texts? What would be weird is if
that weren't possible for some reason.

~~~
hackuser
> You don't think different religions can be more or less supportive of
> violence in their foundational texts?

I don't think that's relevant: 1) We can't read the texts except for
translations; 2) Within every religion, among experts with great familiarity
with the texts, there are a very wide variety of interpretations - so wide
they sometimes fight wars over it (e.g., Protestants vs Catholics, Sunnis vs
Shia, Jews vs. Christians vs. Muslims (all share the Old Testament; Muslims
and Christians share the New Testament)), etc. 3) Adherents to religions are
usually ignorant of and completely disregard the texts (lay Catholics didn't
even read or hear them until the 20th century IIUC), except when convenient.
For example, the Ten Commandments, the highest law, requires people to observe
the Sabbath. I wonder if that includes posting on Hacker News?

------
tristanj
Saudi Arabia is not going to collapse anytime soon. The thesis (budget deficit
of $98B budget leads to political instability and collapse) simply doesn't
make sense when you look at their finances. Some facts:

* Saudi Arabia has one of the lowest debt-to-GDP ratios in the world, last year at only 1.6%. Their credit rating is A+ to AA; they can easily issue more debt.

* Has $640B of assets overseas

* Has $10 trillion of proven oil reserves, even at today's oil prices

They easily have enough money to handle this. An oil downturn like this won't
wreck the country. Heck, there are a half-dozen countries in much worse
positions that are way more likely to collapse than Saudi Arabia (i.e. North
Korea, Greece, Argentina, Ukraine, Venezuela, Brazil). You could write an
article like this for each of them. It's not hard to find problems in any
country.

I'm guessing the authors are not happy with Saudi Arabia's treatment of
political dissidents, and wrote an article to match.

~~~
fit2rule
I think you've missed the point - which is not that Saudi Arabia will collapse
for financial reasons - but rather that the corrupt infrastructure which
composes the system of organization (it could hardly be called government) of
the House of Saud is getting more and more unstable, and less able to be kept
together with mere funds alone - since there is already so much money in the
empire, that the costs of the corruption are rising at a rapid rate.

Its like, Saudi Arabia has all the oil money it would need, but it doesn't
have an ethical/non-criminal infrastructure strong enough to deal with the
weight of the corruption at the very top, and also (the article points out):
the very bottom. The society has a systemic corruption problem, and no society
ever in the history of humanity has ever lasted beyond the tipping point of
this corruption. The article warns that this may happen sooner rather than
later.

My issue with the article is that it assumes that the Pentagon doesn't run
this model, pretty much monthly, in its simulacra exercises. It seems we've
forgotten that the Pentagon has an entire army divisions worth of resources
alloted to just this task. This is too naive a point of view; more likely,
then, is that this article is actually propaganda to mask the fact that the
USA and its military partners, do in fact model for Saudi collapse, and are in
fact actually prepared for it. That is an even more terrifying conclusion,
given the state of the region today, and the degree to which American foreign
policy has impacted the stability of the enemy states; where enemy=anyone the
Sauds don't exercise corrupting control over, yet, in the region.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Re: corruption I don't think the Saudis are any more corrupt than Western
economies. The patronage networks are personalised and familial in a way
that's (mostly) unfamiliar to the West. But it's naive to think that Western
politics isn't any more bought and paid for - in its own way.

My understanding is that Saudi Arabia has been directing a large part of
Western foreign policy since at least the oil shocks of the 1970s.

SA is a particularly nasty regime. Not only has it been politically and
diplomatically untouchable even when clearly linked to anti-Western terrorism,
but many US-led foreign interventions have been of obvious benefit to the
Saudis and the US MIC, while making little sense at home.

So even if the Pentagon can game the Fall of the House of Saud militarily,
that doesn't mean putting boots on the ground is a viable political solution.

At this point I don't think anyone knows what a viable political solution
looks like in that part of the world.

~~~
macspoofing
>I don't think the Saudis are any more corrupt than Western economies.

Not.even.close. This level of hyperbole is just annoying.

Saudi Arabia, and the corresponding billions (trillions?) dollars of oil
wealth is comoletely controlled by one unelected, corrupt, family. There is
nothing anaologous to this in the modern world.

------
jpatokal
I've worked a fair amount in Saudi Arabia, and yeah, even by (low) Gulf
standards it's a deeply fucked-up place and definitely a ticking time bomb. A
few things people don't realize until they've actually been there:

\- Not all Saudis are rich. Quite the opposite, there are destitute beggars on
the streets of Riyadh. The women were the saddest side, kneeling by the
roadside begging for alms in their all-enveloping pitch-black abayas in the
scorching 45-degree heat (110+ F).

\- The extent of the sex segregation. If you're female, you're _literally_ a
prisoner of your own family, as you can't go anywhere in Saudi without a car,
women aren't allowed to drive, and women also aren't allowed to enter the
_vast_ majority of shops, restaurants etc on their own.

\- Riyadh's population is projected to hit 10 million by 2020. It was
originally a dinky oasis in the middle of the desert, with enough resources to
support _maybe_ 500 people. If anything ever disrupts the constant stream of
imports paid for by oil money, the results will be apocalyptic.

\- The state is _deeply_ corrupt. Want a business visa? You can wait forever
for the Chamber of Commerce to rubber-stamp your invitation letter... or you
can pay a "facilitator" several hundred bucks and have it the next day. This
repeats at every level, only with the sums going up an order of magnitude
every time.

\- "Hypocritical" doesn't begin to describe the opulence of the Sauds (the
ruling family; yup, Saudi Arabia is the world's only country named after its
rulers). For example, the massively lucrative alcohol smuggling racket is
generally acknowledged to be run by one of the princes (of whom there are
hundreds; Ibn al-Saud was such a horny old goat that he had _45_ sons who
survived to adulthood and had children of their own).

\- Unless you belong to the 0.01% with enough _wastah_ (connections) to flaunt
the rules, there is _fuck all_ to do in Riyadh. No cinemas, no clubs, no bars,
not even shisha shops (they're banished beyond city limits). Can't drink a
coffee with an unrelated woman at Starbucks without risking arrest, can't even
go to the shopping mall on the weekends if you're a "bachelor" (unamrried
male). So people either play a lot of Playstation and drive dangerously, go to
the mosque, or go nuts.

\- The education system is completely useless. _All_ companies in Saudi are
operated almost entirely by imported labor. I was working to set up a new
mobile phone operator, with a motley crew of American, Europeans, Lebanese,
Syrians, Jordanians, Sudanese etc, all hard-working and competent. And then
there were the token Saudi dudes, who generally both had no idea about
technology _and_ couldn't speak more than few words of English... but each
company had to hire a few to fulfill their "Saudification" quota.

Random stories if you'd like to read more:
[http://driftingclouds.net/tag/saudi-
arabia/](http://driftingclouds.net/tag/saudi-arabia/)

~~~
tome
> Saudi Arabia is the world's only country named after its rulers

How about the "Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan"

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan)

~~~
jpatokal
Hashim ibn 'Abd Manaf died around 510 AD, so King Hussein's connection is
rather tenuous to say the least. The state called Saudi Arabia, on the other
hand, was founded by Ibn Saud in 1926, give or take a few years depending on
where you draw the line.

~~~
tome
(The fact remains that the country has that name because the royal family has
that name. The way the family obtained that name is irrelevant. Without that
family on the throne the country would be called something (slightly)
different.

But ...)

This is a tenuous nitpick of an otherwise very interesting comment, thanks.

------
DonHopkins
"Kleptocracy" is much too mild and kind a word for Saudi Arabia. If all they
wanted was to steal money, they wouldn't fund right wing religious
fundamentalism, fly airplanes into buildings, and violate human rights.

------
coldcode
The bigger problem in the future is Iran vs Saudi Arabia. Given they are the
leaders of the two major sides of Islam and rivals in the oil business some
day they will start shooting at each other. The Iranians may not be a totally
unified country but they have experience at war and being a single people
whereas SA does not have sufficiently internal loyalty to sustain any kind of
real war. The house of Saud would run away with all their money leaving the
country behind, somewhat like the Kaiser did at the end of WWI.

~~~
blisterpeanuts
The U.S. would protect Saudi Arabia.

------
dorfsmay
When I read the title, I thought this was about the fact that the current
monarch broke the unwritten rule that power must be shared between all the
families that originally formed Saudi Arabia (wifes coming from 40 different
tribes).

This is a bit long but worth a listen. I have not found as good as an
explanation in the written form:

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hh8isVX3H9w](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hh8isVX3H9w)

------
roymurdock
> But the highly educated Sunni majority, with unprecedented exposure to the
> outside world, is unlikely to stay satisfied forever with a few favors doled
> out by geriatric rulers impervious to their input.

They pay 0% taxes. Hardly a small favor. But it will be an interesting
economic experiment when Saudi Arabia is forced to raise some revenue from its
citizens.

------
tootie
The system of buying patronage and relying on exploited foreign workers who
outnumber citizens sounds exactly like ancient Rome. Big distinction is
getting cash from oil instead of spoils.

------
ck2
One of the most heavily armed countries btw.

At least we haven't sold them nukes, at least not the public knows about.

~~~
rjsw
I think the expectation is that they would get nukes from Pakistan.

~~~
dangerpowpow
It is rumored that they funded the research

------
scott_s
Robert Bear, a former CIA case officer, wrote a book with this theme called
"Sleeping With the Devil". He gives a history of the country, US relations
with it, and argues that the situation in Saudi Arabia is not sustainable.

Bear might be better known as the author of "Hear No Evil", a memoir of his
time in the CIA, which the movie Syriana was loosely based on.

------
stickybit512
Saudi Arabia's sponsorship of Wahabism is the root of all terror in the middle
east.

------
arca_vorago
The angle everyone forgets about when it comes to SA is that the British
pullsbits strings more than any other entity. It really makes you question the
British level of knowledge of 911...

------
known
Too little; Too late;

------
justincormack
The poster recommended listening to "their media" for a balanced view on Saudi
Arabia, which is nonsense in a country without a free press. And also
suggested that the alternative to Saudi Arabia was Iran. Looked like a typical
paid commenter.

~~~
ptaipale
I think there is a common fallacy that people who you disagree with need to be
paid by someone, otherwise they wouldn't be as they are.

I disagree with the poster but I'll grant that he may completely believe what
he says and doesn't need to be paid in any way.

The same phenomenon works for pro-Russia trolls, for instance. I don't think
they are "paid", particularly paid with money.

~~~
jdimov9
I am very much pro-Russia. You got a problem with that?

~~~
ptaipale
No, I have a problem with pro-Russia (pro-Putin) trolls. Still, I don't think
they are "paid".

~~~
ceejayoz
Some appear to be.

[http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/the...](http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/the-
kremlins-troll-army/375932/)

[http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/documents-show-how-
russias...](http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/documents-show-how-russias-
troll-army-hit-america)

~~~
ptaipale
Quite, but I think that most who I meet are not.

Likewise, most of those who spread various 9/11 conspiracy theories are not
paid by anyone, they are quite sincere.

------
TheOtherHobbes
And Russia.

In the harsh world of realpolitik no one cares if Venezuela falls apart,
except for the Venezuelans.

If Russia falls apart it's a serious problem for everyone, because it won't
fall apart quietly or peacefully.

~~~
swombat
> If Russia falls apart it's a serious problem for everyone, because it won't
> fall apart quietly or peacefully.

It might still be an improvement over its current approach - which is not
falling apart, but is neither quiet nor peaceful. There's a fair bit of
political analysis that suggests that Russia is for example about to test NATO
by starting a war with Turkey, and that it is deliberately killing civilians
in Syria to increase the flow of refugees to Europe (which destabilises the
EU, naturally).

I'll take a Russia falling apart noisily over a Russia attempting to
hegemonise half of Europe again...

~~~
gdy
"There's a fair bit of political analysis"

You mean propaganda?

~~~
swombat
Well, as they say, the first casualty of war is truth, but there are a number
of factual events that fit the narrative of Russia under Putin being willing
to flex its muscle and encourage instability in its neighbour to the west
while inspiring Russians to dream of days of yore when they ruled half of
Europe...

There's the numerous videos and reports from organisations like Amnesty
International, accusing Russia of basically doing the Assad thing of bombing
the shit out of civilian populations in Syria (which is bound to cause more
refugees to flee). And then the whole Turkey airspace thing. And then reports
of Russian troops conducting large "training exercises" in the exact region
they'd need to be to start a war with Turkey... There's the Crimea/Ukraine
thing, which fit into that pattern as well.

Overall, no matter which source you read, Russia is currently spelling
trouble. I was worried about Trump being elected and starting World War 3 -
I'm now worried that even without Trump we might get there thanks to Putin.

~~~
MisterWebz
You're clearly not following the Syrian civil war very closely if you think
Russia's the one acting irresponsibly.

~~~
swombat
I think everyone is acting irresponsibly there.

------
gasull
The militarism in the article is repulsive:

 _U.S. military and intelligence officials should at the_ _very least, and
immediately, run some rigorous planning_ _exercises to test different
scenarios and potential_ _actions aimed at reducing codependence and
mitigating_ _risk._

Why? Why cannot we just leave them alone? Why do we have to invade every
country whenever there is an opportunity to do so?

~~~
JoeAltmaier
I think that quoted phrase may have been all about doing just that -
retreating to non-Saudi air bases; getting out of the way of a Saudi conflict.

~~~
gasull
I don't think so. It talks about " _rigorous planning exercises_ ".

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Exercises are anything from all-out wargames to moving cargo from one base to
another.

------
meapix
Collapse of a gas station? who cares

------
golemotron
And Hacker News should prepare for The Atlantic's collapse.

------
et2o
Disappointing that people aren't thinking more critically about this article.
Yes, no one likes the Saudis and they often act unethically. That doesn't mean
they are on the brink of imminent collapse, and there is no real evidence
given here to that thesis.

------
jonyt
Hmmm...neither author is an expert on Saudi Arabia. Alex de Waal is an expert
on Africa[1], Sara Chayes is a journalist of some sort[2]. Why is this opinion
piece any different than asking John Doe about his ideas on the Saudi
monarchy?

[1] [http://fletcher.tufts.edu/World-Peace-
Foundation/About/Staff...](http://fletcher.tufts.edu/World-Peace-
Foundation/About/Staff/de-Waal-publications) [2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Chayes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Chayes)

------
baliansa
This article comes from someone who clearly doesn't understand Saudi Arabia.
It keeps on portraying Saudi Arabia as an extremism exporter while it is a
very moderate country, just turn on their media
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_East_Broadcasting_Cente...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_East_Broadcasting_Center))
and you will see a very different nation from what is portrayed here. Saudis
have suffered a lot in the War on Terrorism, the number of Saudis who died in
the Al-Qaeda insurgency is unbelievable, but no, Saudis are behind Al-Qaeda
and they export terrorism. The authors are ignoring the fact that alternative,
Iran, is a direct supporter of Hezbollah and many other militant groups in
Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. If you wanna keep on avoiding the reality and not
participate in solving the Middle East's mess then it is your right to do so,
but at the very least keep a fair view and stop calling us an extremism
exporter.

~~~
simonh
Everyone please stop voting this person down, I don't completely agree with
the post but it's a commonly held view in SA and is given politely and
respectfully. I think it deserves addressing in the same spirit.

The SA government doesn't support Al Qaeda of course, but the government does
heavily fund extensive networks of religious schools and charities that push a
very intolerant and view of non-Muslims and non-Wahhabi sects of Iskam, to the
point of preaching violence and repressive treatment. In countries like
Pakistan these schools are recruiting and training grounds for violent groups.
Whether this is a deliberate policy by the SA government or just the result of
poor governance and oversight of these organisations and their funding is an
open question, but the result has been a dramatic radicalisation of Islam in
many of these countries, far more so than in Saudi Arabia itself. I think many
Saudis would be shocked to discover how much Saudi money is being diverted to
fund terrorism and preach violent Jihad and intolerance of others.

To your point on Iran, yes hey are in some ways an even bigger concern. Where
Saudi Arabia is funding extremism largely by accident, Iran is doing so
deliberately. Still, that is a question for dealing with Iran which is a
separate issue. Unless you are arguing that it's OK for Saudi Arabia to fund
radicals and terrorists because Iran does it? But I don't think that's what
you mean.

~~~
merpnderp
"Where Saudi Arabia is funding extremism largely by accident..."

It's pretty hard to believe that the Kingdom hasn't figured out this is
happening and are completely helpless to stop it. They either can't or won't,
but they certainly know who is doing it and the extent it is occurring.

~~~
simonh
Terrorism finance is a very complex subject which I'm only peripherally
knowledgeable about. I'm sure they know it's happening, but they're just not
able or willing to address it. Wahabism is a very strict and intolerant
ideology to start with, so preaching things we might consider unacceptable are
quite acceptable to them. The problem from their point of view is much smaller
than it is from ours.

However where the ideology being supported and promulgated does go beyond what
they would consider acceptable, they just don't have and are basically
incapable of the level of oversight and monitoring required to identify and
address it. That occurs to far down the funding and management chain for them
to be equipped to deal with it. So in reality their choices are switch off the
whole thing - billions of dollars in funding for education, health and
charitable causes across the Muslim world on which extensive programmes and
hundreds of thousands livelihoods depend - or live with the downside while
making ineffectual efforts to control it. From their point of view these
programmes are doing vastly more good than harm. It's just a matter of
relative priorities.

------
Simorgh
It's a bit unfair for the writer to describe a nation's ruling elite as a
'criminal organisation'. You could levy that accusation at every ruling elite,
of every country, of every era.

Nonetheless, the House of Saud funds 'schools' throughout Pakistan. These
schools are known for spreading an extremist and violent philosophy [1], which
clashes with the democratic and enlightened spirit of the educated-elite, at
least in Pakistan [2].

[1] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/pakistan-is-still-
tryin...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/pakistan-is-still-trying-to-
get-a-grip-on-its-madrassa-
problem/2015/12/16/e626a422-a248-11e5-9c4e-be37f66848bb_story.html)

[2]
[http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/27/murdere...](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/27/murdered-
karachi-free-speech-sabeen-mahmud)

~~~
sremani
Enlightened Elite in Pakistan? Pakistan is an Islamist garrison state that
needs funds from outside to prop it up. Saudis and Americans (40 Billion US
alone) are the only reason Pakistan is not economically bankrupt.

~~~
guftagu
don't watch so much Fox News. A vast majority of people in Pakistan are very
moderate. Much of the bad shit you see about extremists and all is from a
particular area of Pakistan in the north west near Afghanistan. Pakistan army
has cleared out most of the extremists from there and many operations are
being conducted as National Action Plan to curb terrorism and extremism.

~~~
eklavya
Really, you believe all that? You should google "Hafiz Saeed" sometime. That
is just one example of course and doesn't even start to sum it all up.

~~~
dang
> _Really, you believe all that?_

Please don't be uncivil.

~~~
eklavya
Sorry, this is really emotional topic for me. Many Indians die every year from
Pakistan sponsored terrorism.

