http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/03/wirq03.xml&site=5&page=0

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/03/wirq03.xml&site=5&page=0: "By Philip Sherwell in New York, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 11:51pm GMT 02/12/2006

The gulf's two military powers, Sunni-Muslim Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran, are lining up behind their warring religious brethren in Iraq in a potentially explosive showdown, as expectations grow in both countries that America is preparing a pull-out of its troops.

A pool of blood and a damaged vehicle after a bomb blast in Baghdad

The Saudis are understood to be considering providing Sunni military leaders with funding, logistical support and even arms, as Iran already does for Shia militia in Iraq.

The strategy — outlined in an article last week by Nawaf Obaid, a senior security adviser to the kingdom's government — risks spiralling into a proxy war between Saudi and Iranian-backed factions in the next development in Iraq's vicious sectarian conflict.

Saudi Arabia, America's closest ally in the Arab world, is considering backing anti-US insurgents because it is so alarmed that Sunnis in Iraq will be left to their fate — military and political — at the hands of the Shia majority.

However, a Saudi government spokesman said yesterday that Mr Obaid's view 'does not reflect the kingdom's policy, which uphold the security, unity and stability of Iraq with all its sects.'
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President George Bush sent vice-president Dick Cheney to Riyadh last weekend after the Saudis demanded high-level talks about their concerns. They told him Iran was trying to establish itself as the dominant regional power through its influence in Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

Saudi fears were strengthened as it emerged that some senior US intelligence officials are urging the Bush administration to abandon stalled attempts to reach a compromise with Sunni dissidents and adopt a controversial 'pick a winner' strategy instead, giving priority to Shia and Kurd political factions.

The proposal is also known as the '80 per cent solution' since the Sunnis, who ruled the country under Saddam Hussein, comprise just 20 per cent of Iraq's 26 million population. It has been put forward as part of a crash White House review of Iraq strategy. Its backers claim that ambitious attempts to woo anti-US Sunni insurgents have failed, and now risk alienating Shia leaders as well, leaving the US without strong political allies in Iraq."