Stardate 20020425.1142

(On Screen via long range sensors): Prince Abdullah, the effective ruler of Saudi Arabia, is meeting with President Bush in Texas. He's not happy, to say the least, with the general direction that American policy has been going and he hopes to change it.

He will use more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger statements about how we're making mistakes and he will perhaps issue a few veiled threats. But he is playing a very weak hand, and I think he knows it. Prince Abdullah is a dog at an elephant dance and he's trying to avoid being trampled.

"It is a mistake to think that our people will not do what is necessary to survive," the person close to the crown prince said, "and if that means we move to the right of bin Laden, so be it; to the left of Qaddafi, so be it; or fly to Baghdad and embrace Saddam like a brother, so be it. It's damned lonely in our part of the world, and we can no longer defend our relationship to our people."

Diplomacy is built out of code words. In this case, it's important to understand that "our people" means that House of Saud. The Saud's hold on power is becoming perilously weak, and there is a distinct possibility of a revolution there. They've been holding on for the last twenty years primarily because western policies were being tailored to make it possible for them to do so.

But in the last few months, relations between the Sauds and the US have been cooling. Both sides have been denying it, but the signs are there. The Sauds refused to let the US use Saudi facilities during the Afghan campaign, and now the US has picked up its main headquarters which was in Saudi Arabia and has moved it into Qatar. There was one point last fall when the Sauds were considering asking the US to leave the country entirely, and then it was quickly hushed up. It's clear that we've been moving toward a confrontation for a long time.

Those familiar with the prince's "talking points" said he would deliver a blunt message that Mr. Bush is perceived to have endorsed — despite his protests to the contrary — Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's military incursion into the West Bank.

Abdullah believes Mr. Bush has lost credibility by failing to follow through on his demand two weeks ago that Mr. Sharon withdraw Israeli troops from the West Bank and end the sieges of Yasir Arafat's compound in Ramallah and of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

If those events occur and Mr. Bush makes a commitment "to go for peace" by convening an international conference, as his father did after the Persian Gulf war, to press for a final settlement and a Palestinian state, the Saudi view would change dramatically.

In other words, start putting pressure on Israel and force it to be "reasonable". It's not going to happen, because that decision isn't made in Washington. It's being made on the American street, and support for Israel is sky high among the American populace.

Saudi officials assert that American presidents since Richard M. Nixon have been willing to speak more forcefully to Israeli leaders than the current president when American interests were at stake.

That's true, but while it may be the case that putting pressure on Israel now would be in Saudi interests, it's not obvious that American interests are at stake. On the contrary, my opinion is that the recent conflict in Israel served American interests rather well.

Prince Abdullah will deliver his point of view, but it isn't going to make any difference because I believe that the Bush administration has already written off Saudi cooperation and no longer cares. But the Saudis are pulling out all the rhetorical stops, nonetheless:

"This is not a mistake or a policy gaffe," the person close to Abdullah said, referring to Mr. Bush's approach. "He made a strategic, conscious decision to go with Sharon, so your national interest is no longer our national interest; now we don't have joint national interests. What it means is that you go your way and we will go ours, economically, militarily and politically — and the antiterror coalition would collapse in the process."

He even used the mythical "antiterror coalition", even though it's been obvious to everyone that there is no such thing. This is no coalition war. It's an American war, where the US will cooperate with other nations when and only when the price of their cooperation is not too high and their cooperation doesn't have the effect of preventing the US from achieving its goals.

Saudi Arabia is looking at a pending American invasion of Iraq; they, above all, know just how likely this is and how effective it can be. Though there hasn't been a lot of publicity about it, an American buildup in the region is going quite well and we wouldn't be doing that if we didn't have plans there.

The Sauds are in a bind; they can't do what we ask of them. Zach says<