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| Daily News Brief October 22, 2013 |
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Top of the Agenda: Saudi-U.S. Rift Seen Over Syria Policy
Prince
Bandar bin Sultan, Saudi Arabia's intelligence chief, told European
diplomats the kingdom will scale back its cooperation with the United
States to arm Syrian rebels and work instead with allies such as France and Jordan in an effort to topple the Assad regime (Gulf News). Secretary of State John Kerry met in Paris with his Saudi counterpart, Prince Saud al-Faisal, to calm tensions in the long-standing alliance and advocated the advantages of membership in the UN Security Council, which Riyadh spurned after being elected to a seat last week (Reuters). The United States reportedly cancelled delivery of drones to Turkey, highlighting another rift in U.S. relations with a Middle Eastern ally (JPost).
Analysis
"The
main driver for the Saudis in this is rolling back Iranian influence.
Most people see this in a sectarian light: the Saudis are Sunni, the
Iranians are Shia, Bashar al-Assad is a Shia. But I think that for the
top levels of the Saudi decision-making structure, the sectarian issue
is not nearly as central as the pure balance of power logic," says Gregory Gause in a CFR Interview.
"As
we saw from the debate here in late August/early September, there's not
a lot of enthusiasm about the United States getting directly involved
in Syria. So there is no agreement at all with Turkey on this major issue," says Senior Fellow Steven Cook in a CFR Interview.
"Has Turkey, a member of Nato for 61 years, parted company with the west? It is a question Turkey's allies have begun to face. Three issues have converged to create the doubt:
Ankara's decision to buy a Chinese missile defense system; its alleged
ambivalence towards al-Qaeda affiliated fighters in Syria; and, most
recently, allegations that Turkey betrayed Iranians spying for Israel to
Tehran," writes Daniel Dombey in the Financial Times.
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