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‘Araby the Blest' 267

gospel of expediency and appeasement preached by ARAMCO, along with its
meretricious corollary of a natural Saudi-American partnership, has con­
ditioned the thinking and moulded the attitude of rhe State Department for
years now. It has also spread, helped in no small measure by the State
Department’s own evangelistic efforts - and, to only a slightly lesser extent,
those of the Defence Department - to the United States Congress and the
American public at large. Between 1972 and 1976 official after official appeared

before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs
and International Relations Committees to testify to the stability of the Saudi
regime, the beneficent use it was making of its oil revenues, the rapid strides it
was making towards the social and economic betterment of its people, the
moderation it exercised in the councils of the Arab nations and the delibera­
tions of OPEC, its dedication to the ideals of the free world, its unrelenting
opposition to communism, its constructive role in international affairs, its
generosity to the less fortunate of the earth, its warm and protective concern for
the small Gulf states and its anxious solicitude for the maintenance of peace and
security in the Gulf- all of which was said to point not only to the vital necessity
but also to the eminent desirability of a close alliance between the United States
and Saudi Arabia. As a former United States ambassador to Saudi Arabia,
James E. Akins, put it in an article in the International Herald Tribune in
February 1978:

There is good reason to look forward to the development of a flourishing new relation­
ship between these two unique countries. The United States’ strength and technology
working together with Saudi energy [sc. oil] and capital can be of immense benefit, not
only to the two countries themselves, but to the world.

The State Department’s judgement of Saudi Arabia was endorsed by a parade
of non-governmental witnesses who appeared before the Congressional
committees in these years. Most of them came from the universities, from
research institutions or from the business world, and they appeared, with only
one or possibly two exceptions, to know little, if anything, about Saudi Arabia
and the Gulf. Instead, they based their submissions to the committees upon
their knowledge of the Middle East in general, or of the armaments industry,
or upon geo-political abstractions and theories of international relations. Even
here they offered little in the way of independent analysis and conclusions,
their statements and answers being shaped by their awareness of the prevailing
consensus of official opinion, to which (whatever the reasons that may have
moved them to do so) they were patently anxious to conform. A handful of
senators and congressmen expressed scepticism or uneasiness about the argu­
ments being offered in support of a more intimate relationship with Saudi
Arabia and the need for arms procurement on the scale being advocated. Most,
however, were prepared to accept them, along with the State Department’s
prognostications of an equitable and fruitful Saudi-American partnership.