Goodspeed Analysis: Fearful of upheaval, Saudi Arabia rethinks friendship with the U.S.

Peter Goodspeed  Apr 15, 2011 – 9:51 PM ET

Tormented by the growing instability of the Arab Spring, Saudi Arabia feels under siege.
To the west, its strongest ally, former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak, has been unceremoniously deposed and detained; to the south, Yemen is imploding; in the east, Bahrain’s Shiite majority has risen in revolt, threatening to spread the contagion of revolution to the Saudi kingdom’s oil-rich eastern provinces; to the north, Syria is in open rebellion, Palestinians are demanding the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan become a constitutional monarchy and Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government is increasingly being influenced by Iran.
But it is Saudi Arabia’s strategic alliance with the United States that is feeling the real strain of turmoil and the ramifications of that upheaval could permanently alter the Middle East.
“Historically, in times of trouble, Saudi kings have depended on American presidents to guarantee their external security,” says Martin Indyk, vice-president of the Brookings Institution in Washington.
“But at this moment of crisis, [Saudi King] Abdullah views President [Barack] Obama as a threat to his internal security. He fears that in the event of a widespread revolt, Obama will demand that he leave office, just as he did to Mubarak, that other long-time friend of the United States.”
The revolutions now roiling the Arab world have produced divergent reactions in Washington and Riyadh.
Where the U.S. administration believes there is some democratic potential in the Arab protests, the Saudis sense only an ominous chill.
The ailing 87-year-old Saudi king fears the United States has naively sided with pro-democracy demonstrators against long-time friends. He is so upset by what he perceives as Washington’s abandonment of Mr. Mubarak in February, he has launched a more aggressive regional policy, independent of the U.S.
“No longer willing to be publicly associated with U.S. policies in the Holy Land, Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere that radicalize the region and menace the Kingdom’s own security, Saudi Arabia is actively attempting to reduce its historic dependence on America,” said Charles Freeman, a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Continued