The Rise of Saudi Arabia • 247habis forced all Saudi Muslims to pray five times a day, going from house
to house to ensure compliance. Alcohol and tobacco were strictly forbid¬
den to Muslims, as were Western clothes, movies, music, dancing, and
even (for a while) radios and telephones.
Imagine the effect of Little America in Dhahran, where the foreign
Aramco employees lived in ranch-style houses with their wives (who wore
no veils), built stills in their back rooms, threw parties, did not pray five
times daily, and opened their clinic and hospital to Saudi Arabs, many of
whom had never seen a doctor before. How could God bless these alien
Christians more than the Muslims who feared and worshiped Him? Imag¬
ine what happened when Ibn Sa'ud's sons and grandsons went abroad on
diplomatic or educational missions. Palaces sprang up around Riyadh in
imitation of what the Saudis had seen in Paris, London, and Hollywood.
And camels gave way to Cadillacs, although it took time to train a cadre of
local mechanics to maintain and repair them.
Ibn Sa'ud was unprepared for the sudden wealth that oil brought to his
kingdom. Aging, lame, blind in one eye, he lived to see corruption and li¬
centiousness spread among his courtiers and even some of his sons,
wounding his conscience and affronting his morals. He did not understand
economics. When told that the rising price of food outstripped his subjects'
means, he ordered Aramco to double the wages it paid to Saudi employees,
only to see the inflation get worse. Politics also bewildered Ibn Sa'ud. He
was troubled by the divisions among his fellow Arab rulers during and after
World War II. He felt betrayed by the countries he had trusted, Britain and
the US, with their apparent support of Jewish colonization in Palestine.
When he met President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1945, Ibn Sa'ud asked him
why the Allies could not take away the Germans' homes and lands to house
the survivors of Hitler's atrocities, instead of taking away the land of inno¬
cent Arabs in Palestine. Roosevelt promised not to act on the Palestine
question (see Chapter 16) without consulting both Arabs and Jews. Six
weeks later he died, and the new president, Harry Truman, ignored Roo¬
sevelt's promise. But Ibn Sa'ud found it difficult to attack the Americans for
supporting Israel when their company was pumping his oil, filling his cof¬
fers, and building a railroad from Riyadh to the Persian Gulf. Besides, he
loathed Soviet communism more.
Ibn Sa'ud's Successors
Ibn Sa'ud died in 1953. The ablest of his sons was Faysal, but the princes
and the ulama agreed that the succession should go to the oldest surviving
son, Sa'ud, a weaker figure. Within a few years of his ascension Sa'ud had