There’s a conventional wisdom about the Saudi Arabia ought to be considered an enemy in the War on Terrorism. The facts that fifteen of the nineteen 9-11 hijackers were of Saudi origin, that Osama Bin Laden himself is a Saudi, and that much of the initial funding for al-Qaeda came from Saudi sources are pointed out with such considerable frequency as to make them clichés. Even this author has subscribed to this theory in the past, believing that the overthrow of the House of Saud would be the best course of action. Events, however, have given me pause.

Any fair observer can see that there’s been a marked change in Saudi behavior since September 11th. Though, in my opinion, the real swing has to be placed somewhere in the spring of 2002. The turning point seems to have come with the capture of Abu Zubaydah, a senior al-Qaeda official, in March of that year. Tricked into believing he was in the hands of Saudi interrogators, Zubaydah gave them contact information for a number of notable Saudis, including members of the Royal Family, along with at least one Pakistani General. Within a week, all three of the Princes named by Zubaydah were dead, all under suspicious conditions (one, aged 43, was said to have died of a heart attack, another died in a car crash and a third, 25, was claimed to have “died of thirst”). The Pakistani General died in a plane crash a few months later.

From this, I think, we begin to get a picture of exactly what happened. After his capture Zubaydah, believing himself in friendly territory, begins to talk. Within hours or days that information, with demonstrates high-level Saudi complicity in the September 11th attacks, makes its way on to President Bush. President Bush calls Prince Bandar (or some other high level Saudi) in to come see him. The resultant conversation is probably unpleasant, forceful, and emphatic. Thus are “Our Friends, the Saudis” transformed once more into our friends, the Saudis.

Whatever the President said, it must have put the fear of God into the Saudi Arabians. After all, in less than a week, they either killed three members of their own family or allowed the United States to do so and said nothing. Given that, after the bombing of the Khobar Towers the Saudis managed to stall the United States for years, the very speed of the action says something about the scale of the threat.

It’s silly to think that the senior levels of the House of Saud have some sort of ideological commitment to the spread of radical Wahhabism. What they have is a deep-seated and utterly unflappable belief in their own survival and continuance. While it is certainly true that some of their members do work to export Wahhabi ideology, this seems to be done more with the intent of exporting their growing ranks of home-grown nutjobs then with any evangelical deal. The commitment of the House of Saud is to its own power: nothing more, and nothing less. So long as they can retain their influence and wealth, they will do so and they will do so by whatever means necessary. In the pre-September 11th era that meant funding terror and paying protection money to al-Qaeda to keep it from mounting attacks inside the Kingdom. It made perfect sense to the Saudis, I suppose: after all, they weren’t capable of going after Bin Laden himself (even were they so inclined) without American support and the United States was distinctly uninterested in providing that kind of support. Then, when the winds began to blow differently, so did the House of Saud.

The proof is there, in plain sight. In the last year al-Qaeda has begun attacking Saudi Arabia, after more then a decade wherein they consciously refrained from doing so. The attacks are increasingly directed at the House of Saud in general, rather than foreign presence in the Kingdom. Surely it must be clear to the Saudi Royals by now that, absent American support, most of them would be swinging from lampposts inside of a fortnight.

There are two main anti-Saudi schools of thought in the West, one on the right and one on the left. The one on the left holds that the Saudi Arabians are the real villains of the War on Terrorism and that President Bush is ignoring them (or collaborating with them) for any of a number of nefarious reasons. Michael Moore’s upcoming propaganda film focuses largely on these supposed links.

On the right, a group of hawks holds a similar opinion, though the villains in their world are mostly Arabist State Department officials and the like. They, of course, actually have a practical proposal for dealing with the Saudis (whereas the left-wing school has none because, were they to gain power, they have no intention whatsoever to doing a damned thing to the House of Saud). Namely, they want to support the secession of the oil-rich (but sparsely-populated) sections of the country and then defend the break-away nation with American arms. This is an idea, in my opinion, which is admirable in theory but difficult in practice.

The main concern, of course, is that the population of Saudi Arabia, as befitting the keeps of Islam’s “holy” places are far more religious than the population with which we are dealing in Iraq. Whereas, when they are given the chance to vote, the Iraqis elect largely secular politicians I have very little doubt that, if there were to be a democratic election in Saudi Arabia, we’d soon find ourselves dealing with the “Islamic Republic of Arabia” on the other end of the line.

This is important because occupying (or “defending”) only a portion of the former Saudi Arabia therefore becomes much more difficult. Would it really be a good idea to create an American Oasis in the desert which would border onto a radical Islamist regime? You’d have daily clashes and, worse, the de-oiled Islamic Arabia would become a real breeding ground for the worst kinds of Islamists. The only other option would be to occupy all of the former Saudi Arabia, leaving the United States in effective control of both Mecca and Medina a situation which would, in short, be an absolute nightmare.

Therefore, action which undermines the stability of the Saudi regime ought to be undertaken only as a last resort. While, in the midst of an Islamist revolution, grabbing control of the oil-producing provinces and hoping for the best might be the best option available, it will merely be the best of the worst. Given that the Saudis seem to have turned our way in the fight against terror, acting against them now would be the height of foolishness.

Now, I know someone is going to bring up Saudi Arabia’s abominable record on human rights. I freely acknowledge that the Saudis are mostly sons of bitches but, for the moment, they’re our sons of bitches. I know that sentiment is out of fashion in virtually all quarters at the moment, but it’s a truism only because it’s true.

Let’s put things in perspective. Saudi Arabia isn’t Iraq. No one’s being fed into plastic shredders by the state, Olympic athletes aren’t being tortured for losing matches, and there aren’t any mass graves full of hundreds of thousands of people. There are countless examples of individual acts of brutality and thuggishness, some of them truly horrific (such as the schoolgirls forced back into a burning building because they were immodestly dressed due to their efforts to escape the fire). As repulsive as all this is, in my opinion, we must turn a blind eye to this for the time being. It’s quite clear to me that the Saudis, in the interest of their own self-preservation, are working to make the United States safer.

When the Saudis needed to support terror to protect themselves, they supported terror. When they needed to oppose terror to protect themselves, they did that as well. Their news today is filled with denunciations of the terrorists and terrorism. They’re on our side now and they’ll stay on our side so long as they’re scared of us. After all, if they mess up again, there’s nothing to stop us from putting every single one of the sons of bitches up against the wall.