Are the Saudis working on getting the bomb? StrategyPage takes a look:
According to India Daily, Pakistan’s President Musharraf has entered into secret agreement with the Saudis to deliver the nukes. The publication speculated that the battered Musharraf wished to gain unconditional support of the Saudis in exchange of handing over the nuke blueprints. The U.S. was unable to help Musharraf maintain power in the Pakistani elections. The new president, Asif Ali Zardari, knows the river of American dollars will eventually dry up. Pakistan needs the money; the Saudis have oil money and they want the nukes. The Saudis are not interested in acquiring nuclear weapons manufacturing capability or weapons-grade material. The Saudis love to go shopping. They can shell out unlimited petrodollars to purchase anything they want. They want to acquire the actual weapons for missile warhead delivery.
What are indications that the Saudis have a nuclear weapons program in progress? Saudi Arabia has constructed a site for the deployment of long-range missiles in the Al Sulial desert 500 kilometers south of Riyadh. The “missile city” complex contains missile silos, factories and residential housing areas for hundreds of site workers. Satellite photos reveal two missile bases and a complex of 33 buildings, eight of them capable of storing Chinese CSS-2 medium (MRBM) and intermediate range (IRBM) ballistic missiles, which have a range of between 2,500 and 4,000 kilometers. The missile, 24 meters long, is capable of carrying a two ton non-conventional warhead. It seems unlikely that the Saudis would acquire nuclear- capable intermediate and medium range missiles with the intent to merely arm them with conventional warheads.
If true, this is part of the price we’re paying for not disabling the Iranian nuclear program. Absent an Iranian nuclear weapons program, the Saudis have no need for their own. The Desert Kingdom could have started working on nukes most any time in the last 30 or 40 years — yet they seem to have chosen to just as the Iranian Bomb comes closer to fruition, which the US has done little or nothing to stop.
And if the price of oil drops low enough that Saudi Arabia becomes unstable? Well, let’s not think about that. And why should we? It’s clear our previous president and our brand new one, haven’t troubled themselves.
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12 Comments
1. rbj:Gulp.
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:40 pm 2. J.T. Wenting:there is another country the Saudis don’t like in the region, and that country already has nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them.
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:50 pm 3. McGehee:That country is of course Israel.
And with missiles with that kind of range the Saudis can hit pretty much the entire middle east, parts of Africa, and possibly even parts of southeastern Europe and central Asia.
Anyone could have said (and I did, years ago) that we and Israel were nowhere near being alone in not wanting Iran to have the bomb.
A Persian Gulf nuclear arms race? I blame 0bama.
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:59 pm 4. steveegg:I guess the odds of the Middle East going up in a mushroom cloud by Election Day 2012 just increased. Even if Iran and Saudi Arabia manage to have their common enemy eliminated without nukes, there’s no way that luck is going to hold up in the next massive Sunni-Shi’ite war.
Jan 20, 2009 - 4:07 pm 5. jon:Wanting nuclear weapons isn’t something that just suddenly happens. Anyone who can get away with it either wants them, is trying to get them, has friends who have them based nearby, can’t afford them, doesn’t feel any rush to get some, or has pretty much made a decision not to get them (the long list of nations in this final category: Japan, which has had some rethinking following North Korea’s acquisition of nukes.)
I honestly wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Switzerland has some Russian nukes, Denmark has a few, or that the Burmese junta has come close to getting some. Saudi Arabia may still have as much bad blood with Iran as we do (just look up the activities of Iranians in 1979 Mecca if you want to see some tiny portion of the reason why,) but I think their desire to go nuclear may have as much to do with those nations’ desire to modernize their power grids (and keep selling as much as possible of their oil in a world where it will most likely go up in value exponentially) as it may be semi-defensive belligerence.
Jan 20, 2009 - 5:13 pm 6. jaymaster:Good for the Saudis.
I just wish they aspired to American nukes instead of Paki.
Jan 20, 2009 - 9:09 pm 7. doc:@5: Good Lord, why would Switzerland need Russian nukes? Whose engineering would you rather trust, the Russians or the Swiss? I’ve seen reports that Switzerland is non-nuclear only in the sense that it would take them 20 minutes to bolt the pieces together.
Jan 21, 2009 - 5:18 am 8. Carl:Great reference in the title! Doesn’t surprise me that Stephen would draw on Tom Lehrer now and then.
Jan 21, 2009 - 7:24 am 9. Susan:Dang! Was hoping I’d be first to catch the Lehrer reference. Here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRLON3ddZIw
Jan 21, 2009 - 12:24 pm 10. Susan:(I meant to add) Yes, Lehrer is dated, but still decidedly timely. And entertaining.
Jan 21, 2009 - 12:25 pm 11. jon:@7: The Swiss probably got/would get some Russian nukes because they were available, they were the cheapest, they were the easiest to dismantle, and to keep the Finns from getting any. Who the hell knows why, really? I was speculating out loud, still am, but still doubt that I was far from the mark while still guessing out of my ass. I honestly believe that most of the nuclear club doesn’t want to test their nukes and announce their membership because they’ve figured out the formulas and seen what works and really don’t want the attention. In some ways that’s a scary thought, while in other ways it’s like getting paranoid because many of my fellow Americans are armed in public. There’s stability and there’s sanity, and the nuts (be they nations or my fellow citizens) have proven their quality and are generally kept under watch.
Jan 21, 2009 - 5:05 pm 12. ScoopThis.Org » Is Saudi Arabia buying nuclear weapons from Pakistan?:[...] Tip: Vodka Pundit (No Ratings Yet)SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Is Saudi Arabia buying nuclear weapons from [...]
Jan 22, 2009 - 4:43 amSorry, comments for this entry are closed at this time.