White
Elephants : Bush's
Middle East Arms Deals
By Uri Avnery
07 August, 2007
Gush
Shalom
The
King of Siam knew how to deal with domestic opponents: he would present
them with a white elephant.
White elephants are rare
in nature, and therefore sacred. Being sacred, they may not be put to
work. But even a sacred elephant does eat, and eat a lot. Enough to
turn a rich man into a pauper.
My late friend, General Matti
Peled, one time Quartermaster General of the army, pointed out the similarity
between this elephant and many of our gifts from the President of the
United States.
According to the stipulations
of the grant, most of it must be spent in the United States. Let's assume
that Israel needs Merkava tanks, made in Israel. Or anti-missile systems,
also made in Israel. Instead of acquiring these in Israel, the Israeli
army buys American airplanes, which it does not need.
A state-of-the-art military
airplane is an immensely expensive object. True, we get it for nothing.
But like the white elephant, the airplane is very costly to maintain.
It needs pilots, whose training costs a fortune. It needs airfields.
All these expenses add up to much more than the price of the airplane
itself.
But which army can refuse
such a wonderful present?
THE MIDDLE EAST is now being
invaded by a herd of white elephants.
This week it became known
that President Bush is about to supply Saudi Arabia with huge quantities
of the most advanced weapons. The price tag is 20 billion (20,000,000,000)
dollars.
Ostensibly, the arms are
needed to strengthen Saudi Arabia against the Great Satan: Iran. In
Saudi eyes, this is now the great danger.
How did this happen? For
centuries, Iraq served as a wall between Shiite Persian Iran and the
Sunni Arab Middle East. When President Bush toppled the Sunni regime
in Iraq, the whole region was opened up to the Shiite power. In Iraq
itself, a Shiite government was installed, and Shiite militias roam
at will. The Shiite Hizbullah is growing in power in Lebanon, and Iran
is extending its long arm to all the Shiites in the region.
Allah, in his infinite wisdom,
has seen to it that almost all the huge Middle East oil reserves are
located in Shiite areas: in Iran, in the South of Iraq and the Shiite
areas of Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf principalities. If these
reserves slip away from US control, it will cause a drastic change in
the balance of power, not only in the region but in the entire world.
Therefore, the strengthening
of Saudi Arabia - ruled by conservative Sunnis - makes a lot of sense
from the American point of view. However, the arms deal is quite irrelevant
to this.
The Saudis do not need weapons.
They have an instrument that is much more effective than any number
of airplanes and tanks: an inexhaustible supply of dollars. They use
it to finance friends, buy influence and bribe leaders.
On the other side, Saudi
Arabia is unable to maintain the weapons that are flowing to it. It
does not have enough pilots for the airplanes it is buying, nor crews
for the tanks. The new weaponry will collect sand in the desert, like
all the expensive weapons it has bought in the past.
So what is the sense in buying more weapons to the tune of 20 billions?
Well, the Saudis are selling
oil to the Americans for dollars. A lot of oil, a lot of dollars. The
United States, with a huge gap in its balance of trade, cannot afford
to lose these billions. So, in order to make it possible for the US
to carry this burden, the Saudis must give back at least a part of the
money. How? Quite simple: they buy American arms that they don't need.
This is a merry-go-round
that benefits all. Especially the Saudi princes. Saudi Arabia is blessed
with a great abundance of these - some 9000 (nine thousand) princes,
all belonging to the House of Saud. A prince has a lot of wives, a wife
has a lot of offspring. Some of them are arms dealers, who automatically
receive fat commissions from the arms billions. (It is easy to work
it out: a mere one percent of 20 billions amounts to 200 million. And
they would laugh at a commission of one percent.)
The princes have, therefore,
a vested interest in this convenient arrangement.
THIS IS where Israel enters
the picture.
Every arms deal made by the
White House needs the assent of Congress. In Congress, the "friends
of Israel" - the Jewish and the Evangelist lobbies - rule supreme.
Any senator or congressman can forget about being reelected if he offends
one of these lobbies.
When Israel raises its voice
against an arms deal with Saudi Arabia, the White House has a problem.
The more so since there is a certain logic to the Israeli objection:
the Saudi airbase in Tabuk is but a few minutes flying time from the
Israeli port of Eilat.
What to do? Easy: give us
a present of weapons, in order to maintain "the balance of power"
and our "qualitative superiority over all the Arab armies combined".
So, together with the 20
billion deal with the Saudis, President Bush decreed that the American
yearly grant of military assistance to Israel should be raised from
2.4 billion to 3 billion. This means that in the coming ten years, Israel
will receive arms to the value of 30 billion dollars.
Apart from the small part
of the grant that Israel is allowed to spend elsewhere, this huge sum
must be spent in the United States. From the economic point of view,
the gift to Israel is really an immense boost to the American arms industry.
It will enrich the arms producers, who are so dear to Bush's heart.
It will also show the American public how their wise president creates
a lot of nice new jobs for them.THAT, OF course, is not the end of the
story.
It would be unacceptable
to "strengthen" the rulers of Saudi Arabia in such an impressive
way, without giving something to the other kings, presidents and emirs
who cooperate with the Americans. Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf emirs expect
their share, too.
The new arms deals will,
therefore, amount to 40, 50 and God knows how many more billions of
dollars.
That's not bad for the arms
producers, who helped Bush get elected and continue to support him.
Not bad for the arms merchants, the princes and all the others who profit,
the corrupt regimes that rule the Middle East (and, in this respect
at least, Israel has succeeded in becoming an integral part of the region.)ALL
THIS could be amusing, were it not for the dark side of these circular
deals.
When I was a child, I was
taught that one of the most despicable human types is the arms merchant.
He is quite different from all other kinds of trader, because his merchandise
is death. His riches are drenched with blood.
The title "arms merchant"
was, at that time, a stinging insult, one of the worst. A person would
not introduce himself as such any more than he would admit to being
a hired killer.
Times have changed. The arms
dealer is now a respectable person. He can be a celebrity, an object
of adulation for the gutter press, a friend of politicians, a generous
host of members of the government.
Weapons have their own life.
They strive to realize their potential. Their mission is to kill. A
general whose arsenals are full tends to fantasize about "war this
summer" or "war this winter".
The killing potential of
weapons is getting "better" all the time, and their producers
need testing grounds. Some days ago, one of our generals revealed on
television that under an American-Israeli agreement, the Israeli army
is obliged to report to the American military establishment on the effectiveness
of all kinds of arms. For example: the accuracy of "smart"
bombs and the performance of airplanes, missiles, drones, tanks and
all the other instruments of destruction in our wars.
Every "targeted killing"
in Gaza or use of fragmentation bombs in Lebanon serves also as a test.
The leveling of a neighborhood in Beirut, the death of women and children
as "collateral damage", the ongoing amputation of limbs by
fragmentation bombs in South Lebanon - all these are statistical facts
that are important for American arms manufacturers to know, so they
can improve their merchandise.
A deal is a deal, and goods
are goods.
IN THE same week that these
huge arms deals were announced, Ehud Olmert spoke about a dialogue (unlimited
in time) about the (nonbinding) principles for a final status agreement.
Condoleezza was again buzzing around the region's capitals, smiling
and talking, embracing and talking.
Saudi Arabia is hinting that
perhaps-perhaps it may be ready to sit with Israel at the table of the
"peace meeting" that may take place in the autumn. This is
also intended to make it easier for Congress (meaning: the pro-Israeli
lobby) to confirm the arms deal.
Bush's people have announced
for the umpteenth time that a "window of opportunity" is now
open. (Not a "gate of opportunity", not a "door of opportunity"
but a window. As if windows were for walking through rather then looking
through.)
All this activity somehow
reminds me of another story about the white elephant:
An American billionaire had
set his mind on acquiring a white elephant, in order to impress his
peers. But it is strictly forbidden to export white elephants from Thailand,
because they are so rare.
A shrewd operator promised
to get him a white elephant, and even told him how he would go about
it: he would paint the elephant gray before smuggling him out.
And indeed, at the promised time a crate arrived, and out walked a gray
elephant. When the gray paint was scrubbed off, a white elephant was
revealed. But with a bit more scrubbing, the white paint also came off,
and underneath - the elephant was gray.
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