April 30, 2003

Osama bin Laden rose to prominence stoking Muslim anger over the American military presence in the land of Islam's holiest shrines. So yesterday's announcement that United States military forces will withdraw from Saudi Arabia fortifies the Saudi royal family against its most vociferous critics at home.

But that does not mean that the political crisis in Saudi Arabia's relationship with the United States is over — either for the royal highnesses in Riyadh or for the Bush administration, a number of experts say.

For many Saudis, the departure of American forces, except for a 400-member training mission that has been deployed since the Truman administration, raises the immediate concern of whether the withdrawal will be followed by political reforms.

Long promised and long deferred by a royal household that still runs the richest oil kingdom in the world like personal property, political reform is now judged by many princes, merchants, tribal leaders and Saudi military officials as essential to the survival of the government.

Crown Prince Abdullah, the 79-year-old day-to-day ruler, has styled himself as the leader who will drag the kingdom into political modernity, but many members of the royal household understand that it is the other way around: a restive population of young Saudis for whom there is little work, little wealth and no political participation is pressing relentlessly for change.

In the words of one senior prince who has participated in debates within the circle around Crown Prince Abdullah, "We are fighting for our lives, and we are going to do what is necessary to save our behinds."

In January, Crown Prince Abdullah conceptualized a plan to use the announced departure of American forces to then undertake a series of democratic elections for provincial assemblies, Saudi officials said. The goal would be to create a full democratic system of regional and national assemblies over six years.

For the Bush administration, the question will be about defending the status quo in Saudi Arabia if reforms do not materialize. After seeing America go to war to free Iraqis, ordinary Saudis will ask what the United States can do for them.

In Congress, some will ask whether Saudi Arabia can continue to serve as a linchpin of American policy in the Persian Gulf, while fundamentalism there continues to breed a fringe culture of jihad, or holy war, against America and the West.

Many Americans have turned against the ally they never understood very well to begin with. When President Reagan and King Fahd were spending billions to support the Afghan mujahedeen against Soviet invasion, the common interests of Americans and Saudis were clear.

But when some of those mujahedeen leaders spawned a virulently anti-American terrorist movement — with prominent Saudi leaders like Mr.bin Laden backed by Saudi financing, grass-roots support from Saudi mosques and some high-level Saudi political sympathies — the relationship foundered in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.

But the kingdom's critical role as the leading oil producer, its support for peace initiatives in the holy land and its intelligence cooperation against terror networks, some of which were spawned on its soil, has impelled the Bush administration to stick with its old ally, and to go along with yesterday's dismantling of the public image of military alliance.

"We do intend to maintain a continuing and healthy relationship with the Saudis," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday in Riyadh.

Some experts questioned how concrete the disengagement would be after more than a decade of military coordination that has integrated American technology and systems into the Saudi military establishment.

During the war on Iraq, Saudi officials engaged in some official dissembling. They stated that no offensive combat operations were launched or directed from the kingdom. Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal reinforced this position in numerous public statements.

But other Saudis said Prince Saud was under orders to prevaricate, giving the royal family deniability at home while burnishing its credentials as a crucial ally in Washington. In fact, American and Saudi officials said, United States Special Forces and attack aircraft were salted at bases throughout the kingdom, and their operations were directed from Prince Sultan Air Base.

There will always be a bit of a mirage to the relationship. The Saudis prefer it that way, and so does the Bush administration at times.

American forces have been part of the Saudi landscape since Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House. Before the era of ICBM's, among the first strategic forces deployed overseas to deter the Soviet Union were American bombers armed with nuclear weapons at Dhahran airfield on Saudi Arabia's eastern shore.

Richard N. Murphy, the former assistant secretary of state for the Middle East, said yesterday's announcement "speaks very well" for political sensitivities in the Pentagon, where many military officers would rather maintain the large American deployment in the kingdom, especially at the air command headquarters at Prince Sultan Air Base, south of Riyadh.

"Our presence has become more of a burden than a benefit," he said. "With Saddam gone and now that they have made their own peace with Iran, you can't make the case that we are needed there against some foreign aggression."

But the drawdown of American forces will not defuse the Arab anger still coursing through the Middle East over the clash between Israelis and Palestinians in the holy land.

President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain are promising to push forward on that front. But few Saudis believe that a determined effort will come during Mr. Bush's first term, and therefore are girding themselves for a period of real estrangement from Washington.