.. anyone outside Western officialdom was free to tell the fuller truth: that Abdullah presided over one of the world’s most wicked nonpariah states, whose domestic policies are almost cartoonishly repressive and whose international influence has been strikingly malign. His dynasty is founded on gangsterish control over a precious natural resource, sustained by an unholy alliance with a most cruel interpretation of Islam and protected by the United States and its allies out of fear of worse alternatives if it fell.
.. Three consecutive presidents have tried to reshape the region so that alliances with despotic regimes will no longer seem so inevitable or necessary. And all of them have failed.
Monarch whose reign saw the spread of division, corruption and strife, and was saved only by ‘black gold’
Abdullah’s succession as Saudi Arabia’s sixth monarch resulted from his father King Abdulaziz ibn Saud’s strategy of marrying the daughters and widows of defeated enemies.
.. Abdullah continued the tradition of his father and included, among his 30 or so wives, daughters of the Shaalan of Aniza, al-Fayz of Bani Sakhr, and al-Jarba of the Shammar tribe.
.. Both Abdullah and the Americans knew that they were locked in an eternal marriage. After 9/11, the question was how to continue the relationship without antagonising the in-laws on both sides. The US administration occasionally espoused the rhetoric of democratisation to silence an American constituency increasingly critical of the kingdom’s radical interpretation of Islam and its record on human rights.
.. When he was prime minister, Tony Blair went even further, calling for a halt to the Serious Fraud Office investigation into al-Yamamah arms deal in 2007. British “national interests” required the covering up one of the most scandalous episodes in the history of arms dealing.
.. However, Abdullah was perhaps the first Saudi ruler to seek a new legitimacy, this time emanating from serving the people rather than simply applying divine law.