Unpacking Trump's Saudi Speech

* Wahhabi Saudi Arabia is to become HQ for combatting the spread of... Wahhabism:

"Later today, we will make history again with the opening of a new Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology - located right here, in this central part of the Islamic World. This groundbreaking new center represents a clear declaration that Muslim-majority countries must take the lead in combating radicalization, and I want to express our gratitude to King Salman for this strong demonstration of leadership..." (Trump's speech to the Arab Islamic American Summit, Riyadh, 21/5/17)

* Ignoring the fact that Wahhabist Saudi Arabia spawned 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers, Trump cites...  "the atrocities of September 11th":

"With God's help, this summit will mark the beginning of the end for those who practice terror and spread its vile creed... But this future can only be achieved through defeating terrorism and the ideology that drives it. Few nations have been spared its violent reach. America has suffered repeated barbaric attacks - from the atrocities of September 11th..."

(After, of course, once blaming 9/11 on the Saudis.)

* Trump, borrowing from Netanyahu's script, illegitimately conflates national resistance movements such as Hezbollah and Hamas with globalist Islamist movements:

"The true toll of ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, and so many others, must be counted not only in the number of dead. It must also be counted in generations of vanished dreams."

* The leader of the country that has done the most to promote sectarianism in the Middle East tells assembled Arab leaders that:

"This is not a battle between different faiths, different sects, different civilizations."

(And this as the Saudi army is engaged in a military assault on the Saudi Shiite town of Awamia.)

* Trump takes square aim at the very forces - Iran, Syria and Hezbollah - who are fighting to roll back the Wahhabi/jihadi/takfiri terrorist gangs in Iraq and Syria:

"From Lebanon to Iraq to Yemen, Iran funds, arms, and trains terrorists, militias and other extremist groups that spread destruction and chaos across the region. For decades, Iran has fueled the fires of sectarian conflict and terror. It is a government that speaks openly of mass murder, vowing the destruction of Israel, death to America, and ruin for many leaders and nations in this room. Among Iran's most tragic and destabilizing interventions have been in Syria. Bolstered by Iran, Assad has committed unspeakable crimes..."

***

Saddam Hussein presciently told his CIA interrogators following his capture in December 2003 that:

"Wahhabism is going to spread in the Arab nation and probably faster than anyone expects. And the reason why is that people will view Wahhabism as an idea and a struggle... Iraq will be a battlefield for anyone who wants to carry arms against America. And now there is an actual battlefield for a face-to-face confrontation." (Debriefing the President: The Interrogation of Saddam Hussein, John Nixon, 2016, p 4)

His prophecy of an Arab world turned Wahhabi battlefield has, of course, stood the test of time.

The process began, of course, with Bush's war on Iraq in 2003, which saw the emergence, first of al-Qa'ida in Iraq (AQI), and then Islamic State (IS), both of whom have since spread into Syria.  But even someone as experienced as Saddam could hardly have imagined the US, post 9/11, both backing ('moderate') and battling ('extremist') Wahhabi gangs in Syria.*

Moreover, Trump's $US460 billion (110bn upfront/350bn over 10 years) sale of WMD to Wahhabi Saudi Arabia will not only enable it to further fuel existing Wahhabi fires in Iraq, Syria and Yemen, but light new ones in Iran and Lebanon.

And then there's Zionist Israel, now a de facto ally of the Saudi Wahhabis, and with an even greater stockpile of American WMD...

Stop the world, I want to get off.

[*FYI: "This chapter [12. Washington, terrorism & ISIS: the evidence] has presented sufficient evidence for us to safely draw these conclusions. First, Washington planned a bloody wave of regime change in its favour in the Middle East, getting allies such as the Saudis to use sectarian forces in the process of 'creative destruction'. Second, the US directly financed and armed a range of so-called 'moderate' terrorist groups against the sovereign state of Syria while its key allies the Saudis, Qatar, Israel and Turkey financed, armed and supported with arms and medical treatment every anti-Syrian armed group, whether 'moderate' or extreme. Third, 'jihadists' for Jabhat al Nusra and ISIS were actively recruited in many countries, indicating that the rise of those groups was not due to a simple anti-western 'Sunni' reaction within the region. Fourth, NATO member Turkey functioned as a 'free transit zone' for every type of terrorist group passing into Syria. Fifth, there is testimony from a significant number of senior Iraqi officials that US arms have been delivered directly to ISIS. Sixth, the ineffective, or at best selective, US 'war' against ISIS tends to corroborate the Iraqi and Syrian views that there is a controlling relationship. In sum we can conclude that the US has built a command relationship with all of the anti-Syrian terrorist groups, including al Nusra [and] ISIS, either directly or through its close regional allies, the Saudis, Qatar, Israel and Turkey. Washington has attempted to play a 'double game' in Syria and Iraq, using its old doctrine of 'plausible deniability' to maintain the fiction of a 'war on terrorism' for as long as is possible." (The Dirty War on Syria: Washington, Regime Change & Resistance, Tim Anderson, 2016, pp 251-52)]