Kerry Jets to Riyadh to Kiss the Ring of the King

As Secretary of State John Kerry prepares to pay fealty to Saudi ruler King Abdullah with a trip to Riyadh next week, the Israelis have apparently indulged in one of their periodic missile attacks on Syria, this one coming Wednesday night against a Syrian Arab Army base outside Latakia; the reason being given is the familiar one, a shipment of Russian missiles bound for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The Syrian government has met its deadline to dismantle its chemical weapons production facilities. Anne Barnard reports in "Syria Destroys Chemical Sites, Inspectors Say":

Syria’s ability to produce chemical weapons has been destroyed and its remaining toxic armaments secured, weapons inspectors said Thursday, as President Bashar al-Assad has offered unexpectedly robust cooperation, at least so far, with a Russian-United States accord to dismantle his arsenal. 

Elimination of Mr. Assad’s manufacturing ability is the most significant milestone yet in a process that still faces a monumental task: destroying the government’s 1,290 tons of declared chemical weapons in the midst of a bloody civil war that has killed well over 100,000 people and carved up control of the country.

So we're left with the status quo ante Ghouta: a Syrian civil war that is no longer a civil war but a Saudi-funded and inspired jihad against a secular state that has much more support domestically than any of its opponents. Kerry's meeting with King Abdullah looms large for the fate of peace talks in Geneva. It seems to me that the United States is no longer committed to Geneva II. Back in September when Obama was facing a revolt by his party there was a sense that the administration wanted nothing more to do with war games in the Middle East and that it was prepared to shift the paradigm. Out of this came Obama's one-on-one contact with newly-elected Iranian president Rouhani, and ever since we've been dealing with the Saudi and to a lesser extent the Israeli reaction. This is from Rick Gladstone's story, "Kerry to Visit Saudi Arabia to Smooth Relations":

The Saudis are known to have been upset by President Obama’s telephone call with President Hassan Rouhani of Iran on Sept. 27, the first direct contact between an American and Iranian president since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The call was one of a number of signs that the United States and Iran want to settle the longstanding dispute over Iran’s nuclear energy program. Saudi Arabia considers Iran its strategic rival in the Middle East.

Last week the Moon of Alabama blog raised an important issue: "Syria: After CW Removal, Obama May Again Go For Regime Change." While I don't think Obama will mess with any Tomahawk cruise missile attacks launched from U.S. carriers in the Mediterannean Sea, this doesn't mean that Kerry and King Abdullah won't agree to scuttle Geneva II and then reinvest in the covert war along the Jordanian border.

Iraq is connected of course. Al-Maliki's meeting with Senators Menendez and Corker who lead the Foreign Relation Committee did not go well. Menendez and Corker serve the interests of Israel and House of Saud. The Obama administration's decision on whether to supply the military hardware -- drones, Apache helicopters, Hellfire missiles -- al-Maliki wants to deal with the efflorescence of ISIS in western Iraq should illuminate the way forward on Syria and Iran.