Uncle Sam & the Saudi Split

'The way it ended for King Faisal in 1975'
"... So once again the Saudis find themselves staring at a test of their tangled relationship with Washington. Is a U.S. veto of a Palestinian state worth jeopardizing the new security and military cooperation with Washington? However angry Saudi leaders are today, they have acknowledged again and again that when it comes to countering the threat from Iran, there is only "one game in town" -- namely, the military might of Uncle Sam. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has even suggested that the United States would be ready to establish a "defense umbrella" overt the Arab Gulf states to protect them against a nuclear-armed Iran.
Nonetheless, King Abdullah remains a man of high emotion and occasional spur-of-the-moment decisions, a character trait that could still produce an unexpected turn in the unsettled U.S.-Saudi relationship."