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2005-06-08 Arabia

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Posted by Steve 2005-06-08 08:56|| || Front Page|| [11132 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Apparently, the only thing "made in Saudi Arabia" is the easily exportable, mobile, suicide/homicide bomber. I guess word is getting out as well just where the bombers are coming from, and "senior Saudi preacher" is trying to reverse the negative PR spin that has resulted.

Posted by an dalusian dog">an dalusian dog 2005-06-08 09:39|| 2005-06-08 09:39|| Front Page Top

#2 He warned that Saudis who go to Iraq might face the same fate as those who went to Afghanistan and were rounded up by U.S. forces, though some had nothing to do with the Taliban or the al-Qaida network.

I do expect that there's a large group of dress-up Jihadis who just want to be photographed in the Land-O-2-Rivers-&-1-Landfill who then change their mind and head home with fine memories of being fierce fighters of foreign fracases.

Posted by Shipman 2005-06-08 09:44|| 2005-06-08 09:44|| Front Page Top

#3 How's this for a half-baked theory?

Encouraging suicide bombers is a means of keeping the population down.

According to the CIA World Factbook entry on Saudi Arabia, there are over 26 million people living there, which includes over 5.5 million non-nationals. The birth rate is a bit over 29 per 1000, the death rate is 2.62 per 1000. Net Migration is -3.85/1000 (about 100,000 annually).

"A burgeoning population, aquifer depletion, and an economy largely dependent on petroleum output and prices are all ongoing governmental concerns."

Running out of water?

Posted by eLarson 2005-06-08 10:23|| http://larsonian.blogspot.com]">[http://larsonian.blogspot.com] 2005-06-08 10:23|| Front Page Top

#4 Exporting revolutionary excess male yuts? Bet that's part of it eL.

Posted by Shipman 2005-06-08 11:08|| 2005-06-08 11:08|| Front Page Top

#5 eLarson---a colleague of mine who spent time in Saudi sez that the aquifer static level has been going down 30 ft a year. Being that the water in the aquifer was basically a Pleistocene savings account, I would say that the reverse osmosis method of desalinating sea water is their only long-term solution to fresh water.

It seems to me that the Saudi royals are sucking up all the wealth and that the just-plain-Joes of the population are getting the short end of the stick. Then you have all the clerics preaching Jihad, hate the Jews and Christians, and young men with nothing to do sign up for martyrdom. If these guys ever get hit with the cluebat, they could turn on the royals and the clerics, but given the lack of rationalitiy in SA, I doubt it in the short term.

.com, what is your take on it?

Posted by Alaska Paul">Alaska Paul 2005-06-08 11:14|| 2005-06-08 11:14|| Front Page Top

#6 I've always thought this was smart on Saudi's part. They can just let thier idiot's and extremist wander into Iraq to fight the best military in the world, and probally die. Then they don't have to deal with them.

Posted by plainslow 2005-06-08 11:52|| 2005-06-08 11:52|| Front Page Top

#7 Hey Al-Aksa Paul, have you heard this one? Saudi Royals may also have booby trapped their oilfields, wells etc with dirty bombs so that should they be invaded, they blow up all the infrastructure and make the oil wells so radioactive they can't be used for at least a generation.

Pipes had it on his mail-out and website.

The ultimate deterrent to prospective invaders.

Posted by anon1 2005-06-08 12:39|| 2005-06-08 12:39|| Front Page Top

#8 It's pretty clear that the Holy Man isn't against jihad or"insurgency" at all - he's just saying, in English (if translated accurately and not "cleaned up" by al-Yom) that going to Iraq is a bad idea cuz the "insurgency" is going swell and they'd prolly get nabbed by the US.

Wonder what he said in the original Arabic. Exactly.

AP - This info dates to '92, but AFAIK it's still accurate. The first pass out of the desalination plants is what they serve up in the public water system in the Dhahran - Khobar - Dammam area, I'll wager it's the same most everywhere. It is still brine. Only useful for washing and toilets, actually.

After a second pass or treatment, it is called "sweet water", but it's not up to bottled water standards. Prolly about what we get here in Sin City from the public supply. In Khobar, the Govt had a single public facility where this 2nd pass water was available free - you just had to bring your own containers. Of course, once it had cooled down to say 85 or so, mebbe 10:00 or 11:00 PM, the place was swamped. I only went once to try it out because it was still almost undrinkable and the "hygeine" practiced by the Saudis at (and on) the spigots (there were many - maybe 50 of them) was less than desirable, lol.

Everyone who has the coins buys bottled. Period. As for the water table, here's a decent article on the subject - and your info matches up well. Check out the section titled: Trends in water resources management for the scoop looking forward. It confirms what I recalled - the first pass output from a standard desalination plant is still brine. Working in their favor is that they have the petro products to fuel secondary treatment plants (think distilled water) at the lowest price on the planet. Everything else is working against them, essentially.

anon1 - That was on RB almost a month ago:
Saudi oil fields set with 'radioactive bombs'

Posted by .com 2005-06-08 13:28|| 2005-06-08 13:28|| Front Page Top

#9 .com-
Did you ever go to the caves outside of Riyadh on the way to Al-Kharj? We used to go spelunking in there (always took the new guys) and on one occasion met a very friendly Saudi gentleman (who, FWIW, was the ONLY Saudi civilian I shook hands with in 6 months there) who told us that when he was a child(late 50s), the caves had water in them that could be seen from the entrance. When I was there (95), the nearest water was in some isolated pools nearly one thousand feet deep.

Mike

Posted by Mike Kozlowski 2005-06-08 18:51|| 2005-06-08 18:51|| Front Page Top

#10 Mike - I wish. The only place outside of the Eastern Province I got to see was Khafji - on my first tour - but we did get to see lots in the province, camel markets, the Thursday market in Qatif, etc. The Aramcons I worked with took a lot of time to go exploring in the Empty Quarter, but I didn't have a 4WD vehicle to join in the fun on my second tour.

Sounds like there was some strong evidence of the table drop. Did you check that link in my prev comment? It goes into how much water is making it back into the aquifer annually. The proverbial drop in the bucket relative to the extraction.

Posted by .com 2005-06-08 22:12|| 2005-06-08 22:12|| Front Page Top

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