US policy with an ally like the Saudis till 2016

[Dayuhan]

Second, the energy driving transnational terrorism is, IMO, primarily coming from a large number of long suppressed nationalist insurgencies that AQ and others tap into to leverage in support of their own agendas of power and control.

I'm aware of that opinion, but I'm not convinced that it's fully supportable. AQ has tried to tap into internal resentment. They've also tried, much more successfully, to tap into a widespread and rather generic Muslim resentment toward the west - Bernard Lewis calls it "aggressive self-pity" - and specific anger toward foreign intervention in Muslim lands. Of these, the latter two have been the successful narratives. AQ and its precursor organizations have always drawn their greatest support when they were rallying support against foreign intrusion in the land of the faithful. By contrast, AQ efforts to rally revolution against leaders they dislike have generally gone nowhere: they've achieved strong support from small minorities but never won the populaces and never won anything remotely resembling a critical mass of support. When AQ rallies the faithful to attack the infidel, the cheers ring out, the money flows, and the recruits come running. When they bring the fight home, they don't get much. That doesn't mean people in these countries love their governments, but it suggests that they don't see AQ as a viable domestic alternative, and they certainly don't see AQ as their champion against their own governments.

The belief that foreign fighters travel to combat zones in an effort to free their own countries remains unsupported. Foreign fighters flowed from all the same places to fight the Soviets, and foreign fighters come from many places where governments get no support from the US. "Expel the infidel from the land of the faithful" was a powerful narrative during the crusades, and it remains so today.

On the subject of perceptions, I'd have to agree with Ken: we don't know what they are. I'd add that when we try to assess perceptions we have a powerful tendency to impose our own ideas about what perceptions ought to be, and when we listen we tend to assign the highest priority to the voices we agree with. As in most countries, there's a wide range of variance in perceptions in Saudi Arabia, and many of them are conflicted, contradictory, and vary according to circumstances. Trying to reduce to "oppressed populace struggling for democracy" is simply an imposition of our own values. It ain't that simple by a long shot, and as with most things we don't understand, we're best off staying out of it.

What small, reasonable changes could the US make on our end to help mitigate these perceptions?

Realistically, not much. No matter what our intentions, anything we do will be perceived as an attempt to advance our own interests and gain control of the oil.

what small, reasonable changes could the Saudis make (beyond the enhanced bribes and security efforts being employed now in response to fears driven by Arab Spring)?

Probably a lot, but that's completely outside our control. We have little or no influence there: for an example, how much attention was paid to our prescriptions re Bahrain?

But still, if we allow the percept to persist that the Saudi Royals are protected against internal and external challengers by a US insurance policy there will be those who will seek to get us to break that commitment of support.

We will not break our commitment to protect the Saudis against external aggression... and breaking it wouldn't gain us any points with the Saudi populace anyway. No matter what they think of the royals, they don't want to be ruled by Iraqis or Iranians.

We can't break a commitment to protect the Saudis from internal challengers, because no such commitment exists. It isn't needed, and it's never been asked for. The Saudis don't need or ask for our help or permission to oppress their populace. If there is a perception that we are giving help or permission - and whether or not that perception exists remains an open question - we have to accept that it's an inaccurate perception, and we can't change it by changing the policy. We can't stop doing something we aren't doing in the first place.

I think much of what we need to do can be done by simply going on record that it is a new era:

1. That we do not care who presides over Saudi Arabia and that we are willing to continue to work with whomever that might be, regardless of how they came to rise to power. But we won't protect that new group either, so they better be snapped in with the people or they will likely soon suffer the same fate at their hands.

2. That we do not care what form of government the Saudi people self-determine.

3. That while we will not act to protect the current or future regime from internal change, we will act to prevent external challenge.

4. That while we will not act to protect the current or future regime from internal change, we reserve the right to act decisively to preserve infrastructure deemed vital to our own national survival and to hold the same in trust until such time as such threatening disputes are resolved (So figure out a way to work this out without forcing our hand to step in).

How is that a new era? Doesn't seem all that different... and I suspect that the prevailing reaction from the Saudi populace would be along the lines of "piss off and mind your own business".

Silly to claim that we don't care who runs Saudi Arabia, though. We do care, and everybody knows it. We have to lie on occasion but we should avoid the really obvious ones.

Meanwhile I think some backroom discussions with the Royals are long overdue. They can listen or not, its their heads. Simple changes, such as putting a little more "justice" into the justice system; or either getting the Royals closer to Islam or acting to bifurcate the "keeper of Islam" role from the Royal job description, would both go a long way toward greater stability.

Some concepts that have worked well elsewhere that might be worth considering are:

1. A parliamentary system similar to Britain's, with the Royals stepping into a similar role.

2. A creation of a "Vatican City" approach to Mecca/Medina to free the KSA to evolve without the friction of having those sites holy to all Muslims within their borders.

Ouch. To repeat a point previously made: Ttying to initiate, direct, or control political change in other countries... for me that's kind of a reverse Nike slogan: just don't do it.

What you suggest is, no matter how we sugar coat it, an effort to initiate, direct, and control political change in another country.

You might also want to consider that just because we take something up in the back room doesn't mean it stays there. How long do you think that would stay secret? Do you really want Al Jazeera, Wikileaks, and the rest of the world press trumpeting a "secret" US attempt to tell the Saudis to change their system of government and give them instructions on their relations with Islam and the holy sites?

Granted that past interventions have caused a lot of problems, but we aren't going to change that with more blundering well-intentioned intervention. The answer to bad intervention isn't good intervention, it's less intervention. The perceptions left from the past exist; we can't counter or change them overnight. If we mind our own business, though, those perceptions will gradually change.

PS [edit}. Americans often forget (if they ever knew) that in much of the world, even people who loathe their own governments deeply resent criticism of those governments by foreigners, especially Americans. Even when the Americans are repeating the same points as local critics, it's not perceived as support, it's perceived as self-serving intrusion and as disrespect for the nation and the culture. Again, subtlety is required, and that's not something we do well.