RIYADH/JEDDAH, 10 November 2006 — Saudis and expatriates in the Kingdom yesterday welcomed Donald Rumsfeld quitting his post as US defense secretary but were skeptical whether the resignation would seriously affect US foreign policy in the Middle East.
The comments show that many people feel that the US voters have rejected not only the Pentagon’s aggressive military policies but also its extreme methods that include the desecration of the Holy Qur’an in order to extract confessions from terrorist suspects.
Turki Al-Hamad, a Saudi intellectual and political analyst, said the US foreign policy would not change much regardless of whether Republicans or Democrats are in power, especially since the Americans are already involved in Iraq. The only change that is likely to take place is going to be in the way the Iraq war is now handled, he added. But Jaafar Al-Shayeb, a member of the Qatif Municipal Council, said the Democrat win would definitely make a difference to US foreign policy in the Middle East. He added that the first change was Rumsfeld’s resignation since he played a key role in the Iraq war.
Samar Fatany, a Jeddah-based radio journalist, said she hoped Rumsfeld’s successor, William Gates, would not repeat the mistake of his predecessor.
“The congressional elections have shown that there is a need for a new initiative on the part of the Bush administration in its strategy vis-à-vis Iraq. It should learn to respect its allies in the region and also Arab public opinion,” she said.
Pointing out that Rumsfeld’s resignation was “a preplanned maneuver” to soothe American public opinion over Iraq, Clinton Cossette, a Canadian journalist who works for the Metropolitan Press, said it was a step in the right direction. However, he believed that there would not be any drastic change in US policy in Iraq.
Victor Maleh, an Arab expatriate based in Riyadh, said Rumsfeld was responsible for the unmaking of Iraq as a state. Maleh said Rumsfeld has done great damage to the image of the US by following aggressive policies in Iraq and turning a blind eye to extreme methods, such as torturing terror suspects, hurting their sensitivities, and humiliating them in every conceivable manner.
Meanwhile, Asian nations saw a more flexible US on North Korea but fretted on trade.
Malaysia’s prime minister said the election results had sent an “important message” that Bush must change his policies on Iraq and the Middle East. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told reporters that he had expected the Republican Party to lose to the Democrats in Tuesday’s elections.
China called for a “constructive role” by the new Democratic-led Congress where Nancy Pelosi, an outspoken critic of Beijing’s human rights record, is set to be the House speaker. Australia and Japan, two of the closest US allies in the region, both said the Democrats’ upset on the back of anger over Iraq would not change their own domestically unpopular support for Bush on the war.
But Japan’s defense chief, Fumio Kyuma, hinted he was happy to see the departure of his US counterpart Donald Rumsfeld, an architect of the Iraq war and a hate figure for the Democrats. “I was a bit worried that he was too bullish on the conditions in Iraq,” Kyuma told reporters.
In Australia, Prime Minister John Howard pledged that his country’s military would stay put in Iraq but acknowledged that Bush faced voter discontent.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu called the US election an internal affair but said Congress should play a “constructive role.”
In Indonesia, Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda voiced worries about the economic policies of the Democrats, who are known to be more protective about US labor rights than Bush’s Republican Party.
