U.S. Plans 20 Billion Arms Deal with Gulf Nations

[QueEx]

<font size="5"><center>America plans $20bn arms deals
for allies in the Gulf</font size>
<font size="4">Bush aims to counter Iran's growing influence
by arming its neighbours, despite Israeli concerns </font size></center>

The Guardian
Paul Harris in New York
Sunday July 29, 2007
The Observer


The Bush administration is expected to announce a massive series of arms deals in the Middle East tomorrow that are being seen as part of a diplomatic offensive against the growing influence of Iran in the volatile region.
The centrepiece of the deals is an agreement between the US and a group of Persian Gulf nations, including Saudi Arabia, that could eventually be worth at least $20bn, according to news reports. At the same time, 10-year military aid packages will be renewed with Israel and Egypt.

Countering Iran
The main thrust of the deal is the supply of advanced American weapons to long-term Arab allies in the Gulf. They include Saudi and five other Gulf states: the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman. All those countries have been jittery over the growing power of Iran and the possibility that Tehran is seeking to build a nuclear bomb. The supply of American arms to the countries not only gives them greater military power to counter Iran's but also cements them further as American allies.


Even over Israels Objections
In fact, so great is the White House's fear over Iran's intentions that the deal appears to ride roughshod over other American strategic concerns - such as Israeli fears over arming Arab countries and concern that Saudi Arabia has been supporting Sunni militants in Iraq. A senior Pentagon official said the deals were being made 'to deal with what has been a changing strategic threat from Iran and other forces'.

Strengthening Gulf Nations Air and Missile Defense
The deal will focus on improvements to the countries' air and missile defence systems. It will also upgrade their navies and air forces, giving them a greater strike capability. However, the weapons being sold are mostly defensive and will not boost the countries' offensive military capabilities. Some of the sales will also cover technology that can turn standard bombs into so-called 'precision-guided' bombs of the type that have become common with US forces.

The deal is the culmination of months of diplomacy. Details will be announced ahead of trips this week to the Middle East by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defence Secretary Robert Gates. Exact figures and types of weapons involved have not been finalised.


Deal Raises Strategic Questions for America
The deal raises various strategic questions for America. The first is how to placate traditional allies Israel and Egypt, both of which have their own concerns about arming Gulf states. The salve to those concerns appears to be to give them fresh military aid packages of their own. Israel, according to the New York Times, is going to get a $30.5bn package over the next 10 years. That figure is much higher than had originally been planned. Egypt too will get a new 10-year deal, worth an estimated $13bn.



Arms Race?
However, the huge flood of arms into the region is likely to cause serious concerns that Washington is supporting an arms race by sending hi-tech weapons to the rivals of Iran. Such a move will likely undermine diplomatic efforts in the region and spur Tehran even further in its quest for greater military power and the development of its nuclear programme. At the same time, others will criticise the White House for sending weapons to a region whose governments could easily collapse and thus leave American hardware in the hands of Islamic militants.

The flow of arms to Saudi Arabia is of particular concern. Not only are some Saudi factions suspected of being supporters of Sunni insurgents in neighbouring Iraq, there is also a fear that the Saudi royal family could one day fall prey to an Islamist revolution.

If that happens, the new weapons could end up being used by radicals against Western interests. Israeli officials and their supporters in Washington are reportedly lobbying against the Gulf deal but they have been overruled by an administration that has made countering Iranian interests its highest priority.


http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2137051,00.html

 

[QueEx]

<font size="5"><center>America Refurbishes its Gulf-Red Sea Defenses
against Iran Menace</font size></center>

DEBKA-Net-Weekly 298 Updated by DEBKAfile Analysts
July 28, 2007, 3:00 PM (GMT+02:00)

The US Secretaries of State and Defense are traveling together – unusually - next week for a mission weighty enough for the Bush administration to deploy a double-barreled top team.

Built around a massive $20 bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia, it involves a broad boost for US defenses against Iran by means of a three-line deployment strategy across the Persian Gulf and Middle East devised by Secretary Gates.

The system, according to DEBKAfile’s sources, has three powerful components or levels:

The Iraq Level: US forces remaining in Iraq after the withdrawal would redeploy to giant extraterritorial land and air bases located mainly in the central and northern regions.

The Gulf Level: The US would double in size the armies and air forces of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Oman, and augment its military facilities in the Gulf region by expansion and new bases.

The Red Sea Level: Jordan and Israel military strength would form the backbone of this line supplemented by new American bases.

On April 27, DEBKA-Net-Weekly 298 divulged the plan when it was still on the drawing board:

American military planners are in the throes of an unprecedented modernization and expansion project for the Gulf emirates’ air, missiles and air defense forces, DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military and intelligence sources report.

Its linchpins are the kingdom of Saudi Arabia and sultanate of Oman. At the end of the project, the Saudi air force will be the biggest in the Middle East, nearly the size of Israel’s, and equipped with the last word in avionics, electronic warfare systems and missiles.

The function assigned Saudi air fighters in the integrated US defense program is to take on the Iranian air force in an emergency, and prevent its antiquated, low-performance air force from providing support for Iranian naval forces and Iranian marines and saboteurs, should they attempt to seize territory in the Arab emirates.

Iran is known to command 600 bomber-fighters in operating condition.

They include outdated F-4E Phantom II, F5-E and F-14A Tomcats, French Mirage F-1EQ/BQ, Russian MIG-29, Mig-27, MIG-31 and Sukhoi Su-20, 22 and 25. Iran has produced two homemade models: Saeqeh-80 Owj and Azarakhsh. Iran’s most advanced fighting craft will be the Sukhoi Su-27 when it enters service in late 2008.

The Saudi air force, with 350 warplanes organized in 17 squadrons, is much smaller than Iran’s and not much more advanced. Its backbone of 134 Tornado aircraft includes 48 Tornado IDS. Seventy-two F-15S were added in the second half of the 1990s, joining 41 F-15C/D aircraft which served the Saudi Air Fore from the early 1990s.

Washington plans to double the Saudi combat air fleet, by selling the kingdom front-line fighters, including F-16 C and D and F-15 E - or even possibly the F-22 Raptor stealth plane, to which Israel is strongly opposed, although most Saudi Arabian operational aircraft are piloted by Western aviators, some American.

Another key element in Gates’ Level 2 for the Persian Gulf is the conversion of Camp Justice, the US air facility on the Omani island of Masirah, into the biggest American air base in the Persian Gulf and Middle East. An Arabian Sea island, 65 km long by 18 km wide, Masirah lies close to the Strait of Hormuz and the western coast of Iran.

A western military source in the Gulf also reports that a large increment of Marine forces is to be deployed permanently in Kuwait, which lies 130 km west of the nuclear reactor town of Bushehr on the southern Iranian coast.


DEBKAfile adds: Since April 18, when deputy secretary of state David Satterfield met King Abdullah in Riyadh and they went through the list of hardware on sale - marking down the king’s comments against each item - things have changed in US-Arabian relations; so too has the nature of the Iranian military menace hanging over Saudi Arabia, the Gulf and the Middle East.

These changes are marked in four aspects:

1. Washington and Riyadh are at odds on Iraq. In the beginning, the Americans approved of Saudi financial assistance to Iraqi insurgent groups to give them an incentive to pull away from al Qaeda. In recent weeks, however, the Saudis are equally active in undermining the Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, calling him an Iran’s agent. This has brought the oil kingdom in direct conflict with the Bush policy.

2. A similar conflict has developed on the Palestinian question. King Abdullah strongly disapproves of US-Israeli backing for the Fatah’s Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad and imposition of an economic boycott against Hamas to overturn its rule in Gaza. The Saudis strongly advocate Palestinian reconciliation, unification of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and acceptance of Hamas as a dominant factor in shaping Palestinian destiny.

3. As oil prices roar towards $80 - and the price of $100 not too far over the horizon - the Bush administration is increasingly critical of Abdullah’s refusal to raise sustained capacity production past its permanent 2.1 million barrels per day. If only Riyadh would relent, they say, world markets would be reassured and demand would cool.

4. Responding to the Bush administration’s Gulf plans for the Saudi air force and Bush’s plan to maintain a post-withdrawal military presence in Iraq, Russian president Vladimir Putin has stepped in with a move of his own: the sale of 250 long-range SU-30MKM fighter-bombers to Iran, as DEBKAfile revealed Friday, July 27.​

As acrimony heats up between Washington and Riyadh over key issues, Rice and Gates will have their work cut out next week to talk Saudi leaders round to buying the US Gulf strategy.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1295

 

[QueEx]

<font size="5"><center>Iran buys 250 long-distance Sukhoi
fighter-bombers, 20 fuel tankers, from Russia </font size></center>

DEBKAFile
July 27, 2007, 2:54 PM (GMT+02:00)


Tehran and the Russian Rosoboronexport arms group are about to sign a mammoth arms deal running into tens of billions of dollars for the sale to Tehran of 250 Su-30MKM warplanes and 20 IL-78 MKI fuel tankers. DEBKAfile’s military sources report Iran has stipulated delivery of the first aircraft before the end of 2007.

The transaction, Russia’s largest arms deal in 30 years, will endow Iran with a long-range aerial assault capability. The Sukhoi can sustain a four-and-a-half hour raid at its maximum range of 3,000 km against long-distance, marine and low-lying ground targets across the Persian Gulf and Middle East, including Israel and Lebanon.

The fuel tankers extends the Su-30MKM’s assault sustainability to 10 hours and its range to 8,000 km at altitudes of 11-13 km. The closest comparable plane in the West is the American F-15E fighter bomber. Iran’s acquisition of an exceptionally large fleet of the Russian fighter-bomber will elevate its air force to one of the two largest and most advanced in the region, alongside the Israeli Air Force.

Iranian air crews are already training on the new Sukhoi aircraft, ready to start flying them early next year with only a short delay after delivery. DEBKAfile’s sources report that Moscow is selling Tehran the same Sukhoi model as India received earlier this year. The Iranians leaned hard on New Delhi to let them have the Israeli avionics and electronics the Indian Air Force had installed in the Russian craft. India refused.

Russia began delivering the same craft in June to Malaysia, which also sought Israeli avionics without success. The Su-20MKM has won the nickname of “Islamic Version of Sukhoi.”

Its two-member crew shares the workload. The first pilot flies the aircraft, controls weapons and maneuvers the plane in a dogfight. The co-pilot employs BVR air-to-air and air-to-ground guided weapons in long-range engagements, sweeps the arena for enemy craft or missiles and performs as command-and-control in group missions.

Some of the plane’s systems are products of the French Thales Airborne Systems company. Moscow’s contract with Tehran for the sale of the Su-30MKM must therefore be cleared with Paris.

There is no decision in Jerusalem about asking Paris to withhold its consent to a deal which would substantially upgrade the long-range air assault capabilities of the Islamic Republic whose leaders want to wipe Israel off the map. However, President Nicolas Sarkozy is in mid-momentum of a diplomatic drive in the Arab and Muslim world and unlikely to be receptive to an Israeli approach. The only chance of aborting the Russian sale would be to route the approach through Washington.

http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=4449

 

[VegasGuy]

"The Bush administration is expected to announce a massive series of arms deals in the Middle East tomorrow that are being seen as part of a diplomatic offensive against the growing influence of Iran in the volatile region."

That would make the announcement happen yesterday. Did they in fact announce a 20 billion arms deal like the story said or did the writer blow it and I should weight it's credibility based on this prediction?

-VG

 

[QueEx]

<font size="5"><center>The Saudi arms deal: Why now?</font size></center>

Asia Times
By Dan Smith
Aug 8, 2007

The headline-grabber read: "US plans new arms sales to Gulf allies". Nothing startling there. For decades the United States has routinely sold or transferred weapons and ammunition, sent military teams abroad or brought foreign military personnel to the United States for training, and transferred technology that allowed "friendly" governments to produce almost state-of-the-art copies of US weapons.

What was a surprise were two details in the article's subheading. The main recipient of Uncle Sam's largesse was Saudi Arabia, and the value of the deal was said to be US$20 billion.

Saudi Arabia? Isn't that the country:

- from which came 15 of the 19 men responsible for the attack on the United States on September 11, 2001?

- that opposed the March 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and whose king, this March, called the invasion an "illegal occupation"?

- that told the United States to remove its troops and find some other country for the US Central Command's (CENTCOM) forward command post?

- whose border is so poorly monitored that 75% of all foreign fighters crossing into Iraq do so from Saudi territory, far more than from Syria?

- whose autocratic government either will not or cannot prevent its youth from going to Iraq - an estimated 40% of all foreigners fighting US troops and Iraqi government forces are Saudi nationals - where they become bomb makers, snipers, and suicide bombers?

- that nearly 60 years after the creation of the modern State of Israel still refuses to extend diplomatic recognition to that country?​

No matter how deft the White House "spin", there will be considerable congressional opposition to the sale. Previous Congresses have opposed sales of weapons to the Saudis on the grounds that the kingdom has never signed a peace agreement with Israel. This time, the opposition is fueled by the lack of sustained support from Riyadh for US aims in Iraq and in the "global war on terrorism".

Cost of oil
There is also the sense among some members of Congress that the Saudis have not acted to control the soaring costs of energy. In the run-up to the 2004 US elections, the Saudis allegedly promised they would increase production if necessary to preclude a price spike that might hurt the re-election prospects of the George W Bush-Dick Cheney ticket.

Once the US election was concluded, however, the Saudis did little if anything to curb higher prices - first to $40 and then to $50 per barrel - pleading market forces beyond their control. Coincidentally with the announcement of the proposed arms sale, the price of a barrel of oil hit $78. Yet there was only silence from the Saudis.

From the perspective of the hardliners in Bush's White House, the Saudis were undercutting every US goal in the Middle East, particularly the current president's vision of a democratic Iraq as the seedbed for transforming autocratic regimes to democracies.

How different from 1990-91, when president George H W Bush sent US troops to protect Saudi Arabia after Saddam Hussein seized Kuwait. In the first years after the 1991 Gulf War, the Pentagon willingly sold almost anything to the Saudis - with the stipulation, demanded by the Israelis, that Arab countries would not get equipment that technologically equaled the equipment provided Israel. Even so, based on these orders, the United States actually delivered $22.9 billion in weaponry to the Saudis in the period 1997-2004.

From Riyadh's perspective, however, it is George W Bush who is undercutting good governance in the Middle East, something more important yet more elusive than the type of government a country may have. Early 2006 was the turning point. As soon as it became clear that the Saudi-backed Hamas movement in the occupied Palestinian territories and not Fatah had won the January 2006 parliamentary election, the US and Israel - which regard Hamas as a terrorist organization - took steps to cut all financial, commercial and diplomatic contact with the incoming Palestinian government.

This set the Bush administration on a collision course with King Abdullah, who was pressuring Fatah and Hamas to overcome their past animosities and form a "unity government". By early this year, conditions were so dire that Hamas and Fatah agreed to the Saudi-sponsored "Mecca Accord" as the basis for a united government. The agreement intensified US and Israeli counteractions, and after three months fighting resumed between the factions.

Supporters of the Bush administration quickly saw Riyadh's effort to respect the election results as yet another instance in which Saudi Arabia was not pulling its weight in the "war on terror". In fact, Congress had already expressed its frustration about Riyadh's failure to be more actively engaged in furthering US (and therefore implicitly Saudi) objectives.

In fiscal years 2005 and 2006, Congress had directed that Saudi Arabia was not to receive any funds in the State Department's foreign-operations appropriation. But as usual, the legislation contained an escape clause: the ban against assistance became moot if the president certified that the Saudis were cooperating in the "war on terror". Much to the dismay of many in Congress, Bush so certified each year.

Timing
An unanswered question about the proposed arms deal is: Why now? Had the administration moved before November 2003, the announcement would have been seen in the region as an audacious - given the "success" of US-led coalitions in Afghanistan and Iraq - but credible recommitment by Washington to the then-25-year-old policy of diplomatic, economic, and military (conventional and nuclear) containment of Tehran's ambitions in the Persian Gulf by increasing Riyadh's military stance.

But looking at the Saudi record and Riyadh's increasing propensity to act in its own interests without coordinating with Washington, there is the suggestion that the Bush administration is suddenly wary of its "other" flank in the Persian Gulf - the one occupied by the Saudi-dominated six-member Gulf Cooperation Council. Militarily overcommitted in midsummer, the White House has only two cards to play: pump up fear of Iran acquiring enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear weapon, or bribe the regional allies.

For a few months the nuclear fear factor seemed to work, but Tehran seems to have become "reasonable" enough in its position to defuse tensions with most of the main actors in this dispute. This left the Bush administration with bribery, spiced with a touch of traditional Sunni-Shi'ite sectarianism that underpins relations between Riyadh and Tehran even when they cooperate (eg, the just-formed Iraq security subcommittee that will consider steps to reduce the influx of weapons and fighters into Iraq from Iran).

This also explains the visit last week by the US secretary of state and the secretary of defense to the region on an old-fashioned, bribe-them-first-then-twist-arms, whistle-stop campaign to make sure regional "allies" - this time including the Saudis - are in line behind US policy.

Inconvenient inconsistencies
But the multibillion-dollar arms deal has some inconsistencies that could cause the two secretaries problems. The most immediate one is the policy message represented by the sheer size of the arms deal.

Washington has been insisting that there is no military solution to the region's trauma. Yet it is proposing not only $20 billion in weapons to the Saudis but another $13 billion to Egypt and $30 billion to Israel - a total of $63 billion for weapons in a part of the world already awash in modern arms. And this total apparently doesn't include $40 million in guns, bullets, rockets, missiles, small-arms ammunition, night-vision goggles, and spare parts for the Lebanese Army this year and another $280 million for 2008. Nor does it include the $3 billion Iraq is spending on weapons and ammunition - all of which are contributing to the current mayhem in these two countries.

Nonetheless, since Israel has already said it will not oppose the sale, it is unlikely that Congress will vote to block it or even to amend it. As for the Pentagon, it hopes to save money through economy of scale for items produced for either the Saudis or Israelis. And of course US companies that build weapons and munitions are pleased at the prospect of new contracts and new profits.

The irony in this whole affair is that Bush started the Iraq war over weapons that never existed and that have not been used since 1945. Now his administration seems to think the way to end the war is to make sure that there are more weapons - ones that kill thousands every day. Go figure!

Dan Smith is a military-affairs analyst for Foreign Policy In Focus, a retired US Army colonel, and a senior fellow on military affairs at the Friends Committee on National Legislation. His blog is The Quakers' Colonel.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IH08Ak01.html

 

[BigUnc]

Damn bro thats alot of stuff to chew on.Your posts bring up alot of issues which can be approached at different angles. I'll comment a little later when I decide which way.

 

[QueEx]

Damn bro thats alot of stuff to chew on.Your posts bring up alot of issues which can be approached at different angles. I'll comment a little later when I decide which way.

Most of what I post here is intended to raise or contrast issues, for those interested in the issues/discussion. I don't necessarily endorse any of them.

QueEx

 

[BigUnc]

Most of what I post here is intended to raise or contrast issues, for those interested in the issues/discussion. I don't necessarily endorse any of them.

QueEx

Understand completely. I've played the Moderator/Facilitator role on occassion myself.


What I see here first and foremost is the U.S. administration clearly pre-positioning for a confrontation with Iran. This brings some clarity as to why it hasn't happened already,

(1) That Saudi Arabia isn't on board 100% and without them forget about confronting Iran.
(2) The internal problems of Saudi Arabia have not been settled nor as it seems improved upon by much. This means the royal family has only a tenuous grip on the country, could this be Venezuela part two?
(3) The Gulf States aren't militarily capable of withstanding a counter strike from Iran if the U.S. attacks.

Several other issues come to mind, suchas, with the lead time to get these weapons manufactured,transported, crews trained in their use, then field them in numbers to make them credible has to be 1 year to 18 months at a minimum. Bush has only 17 months left in office so whats up with that??........Leaving it for the next President???....or something else maybe???
The Saudi oil production issue is really interesting. The Saudi's have always said that they would increase production if any problems occured in the supply. now that they have been asked to increase production they refuse.Is it because the're playing geopolitical games with it....or is it they can't. There have been lots of reports,rumors and stories that Saudi oil fields are at peak production now, the Saudi's have denied it saying they have plenty, if the stories are true then peak oil has arrived.

OK thats it for now. i may have a fewother things to say on this subject later.


PEACE

 

[QueEx]

<font size="5"><center>Bush admin. tells Congress of arms sale to Saudis</font size><font size="4">
20 BILLION DOLLAR DEAL</font size></center>

Reuters
By Susan Cornwell
Mon Jan 14, 2008

WASHINGTON, Jan 14 (Reuters) - The Bush administration said on Monday it notified Congress of plans to sell Saudi Arabia bomb-guidance kits as part of a multibillion-dollar package of advanced arms to Gulf Arab states that officials see as countering growing Iranian military clout.

"The administration today initiated the formal 30-day congressional notification process for the proposed sale of 900 Joint Direct Attack Munitions, the acronym is JDAMs, to Saudi Arabia," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

The value of the JDAMs is about $120 million, he said. This is part of an overall package of arms proposed to be sold to Gulf states. The deals announced so far amount to about $11.5 billion, McCormack told reporters.

The bomb-guidance kits proposed to be sold to Saudi Arabia are built by Boeing Co (BA.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and turn unguided bombs into precision munitions with built-in satellite and motion-sensing navigation systems.

The announcement came as President George W. Bush was visiting Saudi Arabia. The president is on a Middle East tour in which he has warned that Iran threatens security around the world by backing militants, and urged his Gulf Arab allies to confront the danger.

Last year, when word of the planned sale of bomb-guidance kits to Saudi Arabia first leaked, a number of lawmakers vowed opposition out of concern that selling such advanced weaponry to Saudi Arabia could threaten Israel. They could introduce legislation to try to stop the sale during the 30-day review.

But it was unclear whether such legislation could advance in Congress.

Israel security sources said on Sunday the United States would provide the Jewish state better "smart bombs" than those it plans to sell Saudi Arabia under the regional defense plan. But McCormack declined to comment on this, and said any further arms sales would go through the "regular processes."

Asked about concerns among lawmakers on Capitol Hill that the JDAMs were a threat to Israel, McCormack said: "It is an issue that we have talked to the Saudi government about, we have talked to the Israeli government about and we have worked quite closely with the Hill on this."

"We have spent a lot of time ensuring that we abide by our commitments to a qualitative militative edge -- QME -- for Israel," he said.

Asked about criticism that Saudi Arabia has not done enough to fight terrorism, McCormack said their efforts had made "quantum leaps" over where they were several years ago.

"They have made great progress in fighting terrorism," he said. "That is not to say that there is not more to be done and we have to remain vigilant. We talk to them about that."

The parts of the arms package announced in December included advanced anti-missile systems to the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, with a potential combined value of some $10 billion. There were also two planned sales to Saudi Arabia involving bomb targeting pods and upgrades for AWACS surveillance aircraft, McCormack said. (Editing by Tim Dobbyn and Braden Reddall)

http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNewsAndPR/idUSN1442218920080114