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Next door to Iraq is Saudi Arabia whose ruling bin Abdel-Aziz al-Saud family regularly spends an average of £50 million each summer on holidaying in Spain's southern megalopolis Marbella - for at least the last 10 years. They congregate en masse, some 250 of them plus their Thai, Malaysian and Indonesian retinue of servants, in this coastal resort. A cosy little arrangement with Spain's ruling family that is little short of a bakshish payment in exchange for keeping quiet about reciprocal terrorism arrangements which show Al-Qaeda to be no more than a BFEE mercenary outfit. Most recent IMF estimates show that the al-Sauds have invested over $3 billion in property and business in the area. Quite a foothold.
The head of the family King Fahd is aging, has terminal heart disease and presides over a corrupt and unconstitutional despotic tyranny which is ripe for a major coup d'etat as soon as he pops his clogs and heads for those 70 virgins in paradise that await his pleasure.
What better way for Shrub to shore up the moral argument on terrorism than having a handy presence next door in Iraq should "seperatist Muslim factions" suddenly decide to oust Fahd's estimated 3,000 princelings who might be feeling somewhat unemployable when their paterfamilias drops dead. Not to mention the 3,000,000 plus national Saudis who have never worked, relying on Fahd's patronage to support themselves and their dependents.
Saudi Arabia has vastly larger oil reserves than Iraq and has long been a BFEE target for political control. In an election year, some very cosy arrangements are being bankrolled to give Shrub the moral edge on the international front.
First Afghanistan, then Iraq. Watch that space next door...
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