AHC: Secular Arab Nationalist Saudi Arabia

kernals12

Banned
With a POD after 1950, have Saudi Arabia fall under the rule of a Secular Arab Nationalist government a la Nasser's Egypt. If it is plausible, what are the geopolitical implications?
 
I bet they'd try and establish a federation or some other attempt at unification with their fellow Arab nationalists in North Yemen/Yemen Arab Republic.
 

Ian_W

Banned
If you have a Nasserite Saudi government, and Aramco attempts to nationalise the Saudi oil industry as in OTL, then I think you'd get American intervention.
 
Even if elements of the Armed Forces sucessfully pulled off a coup, could a leftist, secular regime last for long in the Arabian Penninsula? This isn't Iraq, Syria or Egypt, where a large part of the population is secular, open to socialist ideas and cosmopolitan. I imagine tribal revolts by conservative Islamists and Royalists will spring up almost immediately (supported by Western Arms, of course, since the US, UK and France would all prefer Islamists over pro-Soviet secularists).

Could anyone imagine a left wing secularist mocking Islamists in this manner in Saudi Arabia? Even were he able to pull off a successfull coup?

 
Even if elements of the Armed Forces sucessfully pulled off a coup, could a leftist, secular regime last for long in the Arabian Penninsula? This isn't Iraq, Syria or Egypt, where a large part of the population is secular, open to socialist ideas and cosmopolitan. I imagine tribal revolts by conservative Islamists and Royalists will spring up almost immediately (supported by Western Arms, of course, since the US, UK and France would all prefer Islamists over pro-Soviet secularists).

I imagine such a movement would need to have to achieve some relationship with Islamists - even Nasser had al-Azhar. So, any "Nasserist" Saudi Arabia, say if the Free Prince movement arose, would need to achieve some sort of relationship with Islamism even moreso than in Egypt.

Could anyone imagine a left wing secularist mocking Islamists in this manner in Saudi Arabia? Even were he able to pull off a successfull coup?

In action, Nasser was far more conciliatory to Islamism. He was far from a Kemal.
 

kernals12

Banned
If you have a Nasserite Saudi government, and Aramco attempts to nationalise the Saudi oil industry as in OTL, then I think you'd get American intervention.
What type of intervention? A CIA staged coup or an invasion? With the US already mired in Vietnam, I don't think LBJ or Nixon would want to start another unpopular war.
 
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