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Gulf Allies Make Case to Defeat Iran 03/31 06:11
Gulf allies of the United States, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab
Emirates, are urging President Donald Trump to continue prosecuting the war
against Iran, arguing that Tehran hasn't been weakened enough by the monthlong
U.S.-led bombing campaign, according to U.S., Gulf and Israeli officials.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Gulf allies of the United States, led by Saudi Arabia and
the United Arab Emirates, are urging President Donald Trump to continue
prosecuting the war against Iran, arguing that Tehran hasn't been weakened
enough by the monthlong U.S.-led bombing campaign, according to U.S., Gulf and
Israeli officials.
After private grumbling at the start of the war that they were not given
adequate advance notice of the U.S.-Israeli attack and complaining the U.S. had
ignored their warnings that the war would have devastating consequences for the
entire region, some of the regional allies are making the case to the White
House that the moment offers a historic opportunity to cripple Tehran's
clerical rule once and for all.
Officials from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain have
conveyed in private conversations that they do not want the military operation
to end until there are significant changes in the Iranian leadership or there's
a dramatic shift in Iranian behavior, according to the officials, who were not
authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The push from the Gulf nations comes as Trump vacillates between claiming
that Iran's decimated leadership is ready to settle the conflict and
threatening to further escalate the war if a deal is not reached soon.
All the while, Trump is struggling to rally public support at home for a war
that's left more than 3,000 dead across the Mideast and is shaking the global
economy. Yet the U.S. leader is sounding increasingly confident that he has the
full support of his most important Mideast allies -- including some that were
hesitant about a new military campaign in the lead-up to the war.
"Saudi Arabia's fighting back hard. Qatar is fighting back. UAE is fighting
back. Kuwait's fighting back. Bahrain's fighting back," Trump told reporters on
Air Force One on Sunday evening as he made his way to Washington from his home
in Florida. "They're all fighting back."
The Gulf countries host U.S. forces and bases from which the U.S. has
launched strikes on Iran, but have not joined the offensive strikes.
Gulf allies support the war to varying degrees
While regional leaders are broadly supportive now of the U.S. efforts, one
Gulf diplomat described some division, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE leading
the calls for increasing military pressure on Tehran.
The UAE has emerged as perhaps the most hawkish of the Gulf countries and is
pushing hard for Trump to order a ground invasion, the diplomat said. Kuwait
and Bahrain also favor this option. The UAE, which has faced more than 2,300
missile and drone attacks from Iran, has only grown more irritated as the war
grinds on and the salvos threaten to tarnish its image as the safe, pristine
and monied hub for trade and tourism of the Mideast.
Oman and Qatar, which historically have played the role of intermediary
between the long economically isolated Iran and the West, have favored a
diplomatic solution.
The diplomat said Saudi Arabia has argued to the U.S. that ending the war
now won't produce a "good deal," one guaranteeing security for Iran's Arab
neighbors.
The Saudis say an eventual war settlement must neutralize Iran's nuclear
program, destroy its ballistic missile capabilities, end Tehran's support for
proxy groups, and also ensure that the Strait of Hormuz cannot be effectively
shutdown by the Islamic Republic in the future as it has during the conflict.
About 20% of the world's oil flowed through the waterway before the war.
Achieving those goals would require a sharp course correction by the
theocracy that has been in charge of the country since the 1979 Islamic
Revolution or its removal.
Senior Emirati officials, meanwhile, have become more pointed in their
rhetoric toward Iran.
"An Iranian regime that launches ballistic missiles at homes, weaponizes
global trade and supports proxies is no longer an acceptable feature of the
regional landscape," Noura Al Kaabi, a minister of state at the UAE's Foreign
Ministry, wrote in a column published Monday by the state-linked,
English-language newspaper The National. She added: "We want a guarantee that
this will never happen again."
The White House declined to comment for this story about the deliberations
with Gulf allies. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday underscored that
the U.S. and its Gulf Arab allies are in sync about Iran.
"They are religious zealots who can never be allowed to possess a nuclear
weapon because they have an apocalyptic vision of the future," Rubio said of
Iran in an appearance on ABC's "Good Morning America." "And all of their
neighbors know that, by the way, which is why all of their neighbors have been
supportive of the efforts we're conducting."
Saudi crown prince urges US not to let up
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom's de facto leader, has told
White House officials that a further defanging of Iran's military capabilities
and clerical leadership serves the long-term interest of the Gulf region and
beyond, according to a person who has been briefed on the conversations.
Still, the Saudis are sensitive to the fact that the longer the conflict
goes on the more opportunity Iran has to carry out strikes on the kingdom's
energy infrastructure, the heartbeat of its oil-rich economy.
A Saudi government official underscored that the kingdom ultimately wants to
see a political solution to the crisis, but its immediate focus remains
safeguarding its people and critical infrastructure.
Iran's foreign minister early Tuesday insisted Tehran's attacks on the Gulf
Arab states only target U.S. forces, even after assaults have hit civilian
targets.
"Iran respects the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and considers it a brotherly
nation," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on X, sharing a photo
purportedly showing damage to an American aircraft at a Saudi air base. "Our
operations are aimed at enemy aggressors who have no respect for Arabs or
Iranians, nor can provide any security. ... High time to eject U.S. forces."
Trump, in recent days, has sought to spotlight that most of the Gulf
countries have stood in lockstep with his administration as the U.S. prosecutes
the war, noting how they've coalesced in the thick of crisis as he criticizes
NATO allies for not joining the U.S. in the fight.
On Friday, he heaped praise on Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and
United Arab Emirates for showing "bravery" as the war has unfolded.
The president, speaking at an event in Miami sponsored by the Saudi
sovereign wealth fund, was particularly effusive about the Saudi crown prince,
hailing him as a "warrior" and a "fantastic man."
Trump also alluded to the fact that the Gulf countries were hesitant about
his and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to launch the war,
but have since rallied.
"They weren't thinking this was going to happen, nobody was," said Trump,
referring to Iran launching thousands of retaliatory salvos around the Gulf.
"And they turned against them and really became very powerfully aligned. And
they were with us, but they weren't with us very obliquely. They were with us."
Will Gulf allies join the fight?
Trump has yet to call on Gulf nations to take part in offensive operations.
One factor may be that the administration might have calculated that it's
not worth the complications that come with crowding the skies with additional
militaries beyond Israel.
Three American fighter jets were mistakenly downed by friendly Kuwaiti fire
in the first days of the conflict in the midst of an Iranian air assault. All
six crew members safely ejected from the F-15E Strike Eagles.
And six American service members were killed on March 12, when their KC-135
refueling aircraft crashed in western Iraq.
Another factor is that only UAE and Bahrain are among the Gulf states that
have formal diplomatic relations with Israel, adding a layer of complication to
their calculus, notes Yasmine Farouk, the Gulf and Arabian Peninsula project
director at the International Crisis Group
But Iran has warned it will attack its neighbors' critical infrastructure,
including desalination plants used to provide drinking water to the region, if
Trump follows through on his threat to strike Iran's power plants if it doesn't
open the Strait of Hormuz by April 6.
"The absence of a clear objective, the absence of the trust that the United
States is really going to go until the end and finish the jobs ... it's making
some of them reluctant," Farouk said. "But if there is a consequential or mass
casualty (event) in one of those countries, then it would be justified for them
to become a belligerent."
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