Edited by Damian on 13/1/2015, 23:55:10
: I noticed that not long ago Prince Bandar
: bin Turqi
He is actually Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the son of the deceased former Crown Prince, Sultan bin Abdulaziz.
: the longtime Saudi ambassador to
: the USA and perhaps the most well-connected
: member of the dynasty in the west (he is so
: close to the Bush family that the younger
: President Bush has called him "Bandar
: Bush," but he has close friendship with
: all sorts of western movers and shakers) was
: made head of the National Security Council.
: Perhaps he may be moving into position to
: ascend the throne in the medium-term.
According to this article (below), he seems to have fallen out of favour with the Saudi elite and is no longer as trusted as he was by either them or the Americans. He no longer seems to be as much of a front runner as a potential future king.
At the moment, unless there is a major shake-up imminent in the leadership, I suspect the tradition of 'Buggins' Turn' amongst the surviving sons of the late King Abdulaziz will continue to operate as each of them patiently waits his turn to succeed the brother or half-brother before him. Only when they finally run out of brothers, will sons and nephews finally get their turn and how old will most of them be by then?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/16/prince-bandar-saudi-intelligence-syria
: In any case, it will be interesting to see
: whether such a regime can survive for long
: caught between the twin threats of
: terrorists who are even (slightly) more
: radically Islamist than the dynasty and the
: pressures of those who would like some form
: of liberalization.
The Saudi regime was founded on close cooperation with virtual religious fundamentalists (the Wahhabis) so their freedom to manoevure in favour of more liberalization will always be severely hampered so long as the Wahhabi religious establishment continues to wield the upper hand.
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