The Fear of Saudi Competition

Submitted by B Shniper (United States), May 14, 2002 at 17:37

Saudi Arabia is trying to rival Western civilization, and if it starts to win, it should scare us. They lead in nothing - according to our measurements - they have relatively little money, little industry, little developement, little technology, little military, and little cooperation between themselves and the rest of their own allies (except in hatred of Israel and possibly America). So why does their power and influence and strength continue to grow even as their rivalry grows? Do they know something we in the West do not?

The muslim faith, and Wahabist adherents, are increasing faster than any other religion in terms of population. While fewer westerners live in the Middle East, and certainly fewer Jews than ever before in history, Muslim presence in Western countries increases quickly. Their message, which is anti-progress, is best reflected in their treatment of women, and their oppression of the population in general. Despite the UN Charter and direction of the West, we see things actually getting palpably worse for women's rights and human rights in general. This trend away from technology, social liberalism, and from what the West terms "progress" in general is frightening. Additionally although 30 years ago the Shah of Iran tried to bring light to Iran, and 60 years ago there were several pro-western proto-democracies, now there are no democratic prospects whatsoever unless the West will impose them. If these nations are left alone for a few years without Western prodding, the result is warlordism, followed by Islamic dictatorship and then militant Islamic revivalism as in Afghanistan.

Although the Muslim societies are not "progressing", they aren't "regressing" either. It almost appears that evolution is not quite so direction-oriented as the Western mindset likes to pretend it is. We can pretend that the progress in social, technological, and human rights of the West is universal, but it clearly is not necessarily the case in this rival. If the house of Saud fell, the West talks about an even more ruthless regime coming up. We should think of this as a warning, not that we should expect worse realistically, but that the fact the House of Saud (and Saddam Huessien and Arafat of Palestine) is putting out this "worse will follow" propaganda means that they don't mean to advance the same way the West has. They are not only threatening us with "worse" if these dictators fall, they are actively creating strong anti-western rivalries as their only potential replacements in order to threaten the West into not replacing them. And not coincidentally, this result creates a downward spiral for Westernization as worse and worse groups gain power and support by the corrupt dictatorships. The only reason not to replace Saddam was fear of his replacement, and the same goes for almost all of the Muslim nations, which prop themselves up by presenting a downward spiral view of what happens when they go. But they created the downward spirals themselves!

Thus Saudi Arabia has played off a key set of Western weaknesses: Fear of replacing intransigent regimes (despite overwhelming military power), fear of destroying "relationships" with evil regimes, illusory promises of "improvement" that turn out to be wholly false in exchange for aid, trade, and alliances, and destruction of alternatives through the creation of monsters to whom are pointed and said: "See what happens when you don't support us, the monsters take over!" I don't know if there's even a name for this parasitic strategy, but it sure looks effective.

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