[LINK] "Saudi Arabia adopts the Brezhnev doctrine"

[rfmcdonald]

The Saudi occupation of Bahrain is, as Noel notes, bad news. Also, more proof that Stratfor is wrong in interesting ways.

Stratfor declares “The GCC countries have made their countermove to Iran’s destabilization campaign and are doing so with apparent U.S. backing.” Reuters says differently. So does all the supporting evidence. Over the weekend, Defense Secretary Gates visited Bahrain. There he said, in no uncertain terms, that the United States wants the Khalifa family to accept a constitutional monarchy.

The problem is that the royal family is split. The King’s uncle, and Prime Minister since 1971, is the unofficial head of the hardliners. (He may have ordered the first attack on the Pearl Roundabout.) The Crown Prince is the leader of the liberal faction in the family, and he has been pro-active in apologizing for the deaths of protesters on national television and meeting with opposition groups throughout the crisis. The King is the moderate caught in the middle. That internal jockeying has made managing the protests more difficult.

This morning, however, the situation got infinitely worse. The Sunni deputy chairman of Bahrain’s Parliament, Abdel al-Mowada told Al Jazeera: “It is not a lack of security forces in Bahrain, it is a showing of solidarity among the GCC. I don’t know if they are going to be in the streets or save certain areas ... [but protesters] blocking the roads are no good for anyone, we should talk. The government is willing to get together and make the changes needed, but when the situation is like this, you cannot talk.” The GCC troops, then, are there to clear off the streets.

The opposition is less than thrilled. Wifaq described the arrival as a “blatant occupation” and the Bahrain Center for Human Rights declared, “This is an internal issue and we will consider it as an occupation.” It’s hard to overemphasize the power of the word “occupation” in Arab politics, given its ties to the Palestinian Territories and Iraq.

[. . . T]he Saudi decision just put two cornerstones of American policy in contradiction. The Saudi alliance has been a cornerstone of U.S. policy since 1931. The hosting of the Fifth Fleet in Bahrain has, since 1971, run a close second. The Naval presence, however, requires Bahrain to be stable, under whatever form of government. American policy in Bahrain has recently moved towards support for a full constitutional monarchy as the best way to preserve stability. But the creation of a constitutional monarchy conflicts with what Riyadh considers to be a core interest.

Intervention is a bad short term solution to a long term problem. Even under the rubric of the GCC, the arrival of foreign troops en masse is a profoundly bad idea. Bahraini politics have had a violent undercurrent for the past decade, and the citizenry is not going to take kindly to foreign forces clearing the streets. It raises the stakes between the King and the opposition, and may give the conflict a more overtly sectarian cast. It also adds to the pressures pushing the opposition towards republicanism. Moreover, the economy of Bahrain is going to take a serious hit with Saudi tanks in the streets, and given that it’s mostly financial services and petroleum refineries, it’s much more vulnerable to a collapse in foreign confidence than elsewhere. Third, the move is going to encourage Iran to get involved involved. The former has longstanding territorial disputes with Bahrain and may take the chance to take a swipe at those and claim responsibility for the Shia opposition (which is currently fiercely anti-Iranian).

Far from a clever countermove against a nefarious Iranian scheme, Riyadh has just made a touchy situation significantly worse. An optimistic view has the liberal forces in Bahrain using the breathing spell to create a constitutional democracy. Saudi fears of dominoes prove unfounded, and everyone relaxes. A pessimistic view has GCC troops shooting Shia in the streets. In that case, Iranian covert operations would in fact have a opening, and the United States would once again find itself trapped on the side of the villians. The Saudi coordination of several longstanding U.S. Gulf allies against US policy interests is going to require substantial finesse from Washington.