Lack of Notice Frustrates Gulf Nations 03/06 06:02

   The Trump administration is confronting mounting discontent from allies in 
the Persian Gulf who have complained they were not given adequate time to 
prepare for the torrent of Iranian drones and missiles bombarding their 
countries in retaliation for strikes launched by the U.S. and Israel.

   CAIRO (AP) -- The Trump administration is confronting mounting discontent 
from allies in the Persian Gulf who have complained they were not given 
adequate time to prepare for the torrent of Iranian drones and missiles 
bombarding their countries in retaliation for strikes launched by the U.S. and 
Israel.

   Officials from two Gulf countries said their governments were disappointed 
in the way the U.S. has handled the war, particularly the initial attack on 
Iran last Saturday. They said their countries were not given advance notice of 
the U.S.-Israeli attack and complained the U.S. had ignored their warnings that 
the war would have devastating consequences for the entire region.

   One of the officials said that Gulf countries were frustrated and even angry 
that the U.S. military has not defended them enough. He said there is belief in 
the region that the operation has focused on defending Israel and American 
troops, while leaving Gulf countries to protect themselves and said that his 
country's stock of interceptors was "rapidly depleting."

   Like others in this story, the Gulf officials spoke on condition of 
anonymity because they were discussing a confidential diplomatic matter.

   The governments of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain did not respond to 
requests for comment.

   White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said in response: "Iran's retaliatory 
ballistic missile attacks have decreased by 90% because Operation Epic Fury is 
crushing their ability to shoot these weapons or produce more. President Trump 
is in close contact with all of our regional partners, and the terrorist 
Iranian regime's attacks on its neighbors prove how imperative it was that 
President Trump eliminate this threat to our country and our allies."

   The Pentagon did not respond.

   Official reactions by the Gulf Arab countries have been muted, but public 
figures with close ties to their governments have been openly critical of the 
U.S., suggesting that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dragged 
President Donald Trump into a needless war.

   "This is Netanyahu's war," Prince Turki al-Faisal, the former Saudi 
intelligence chief, told CNN on Wednesday. "He somehow convinced the president 
(Trump) to support his views."

   Pentagon officials conceded this week in closed-door briefings with 
lawmakers they are struggling to stop waves of drones launched by Iran, leaving 
some U.S. targets in the Gulf region, including troops, vulnerable.

   The Gulf countries have emerged as valuable targets for Iran, well within 
the range of Iran's short-range missiles and filled with targets, including 
American troops, high-profile business and tourist locations and energy 
facilities, disrupting the world's flow of oil.

   Since the start of the war, Iran has fired at least 380 missiles and over 
1,480 drones targeting the five Arab Gulf countries, according to an AP tally 
based on official statements. At least 13 people have been killed in those 
countries, according to local officials.

   In addition, six U.S. soldiers were killed in Kuwait on Sunday when an 
Iranian drone strike hit an operations center in a civilian port, more than 10 
miles from the main Army base. The husband of one of the slain soldiers, who 
was part of a supply and logistics unit based in Iowa, said the operations 
center was a shipping container-style building and had no defenses.

   In briefings for members of Congress on Tuesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete 
Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told 
lawmakers that the U.S. will not be able to intercept many of the incoming 
UAVs, especially the Shaheds, according to three people familiar with the 
briefings.

   In one of the briefings, Caine and Hegseth did not offer any details when 
pressed by lawmakers why the U.S. did not seem prepared for Iran to launch 
waves of drones at U.S. targets in the region, according to one of the people.

   That person, a U.S. official who is familiar with the U.S. security posture 
in Gulf region, said that the U.S. did not have widespread capabilities 
throughout the Gulf region to effectively counter waves of the one-way drones 
coming to places outside conventional targets or bases outside of Iraq and 
Syria.

   Drone attacks this week at the embassy in Saudi Arabia caused a limited fire 
at the embassy in Riyadh, and another drone attack the United Arab Emirates 
sparked a small fire outside the U.S. consulate in Dubai.

   The U.S. and its allies in the Middle East on Thursday even sought help from 
Ukraine, which has expertise in countering Iran's Shahed drones, according to 
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. When asked about Zelenskyy's comments, 
Trump told Reuters on Thursday, "Certainly, I'll take, you know, any assistance 
from any country."

   Bader Mousa Al-Saif, a Kuwait-based analyst with Chatham House, said the 
U.S. appeared to have underestimated the risk to its Gulf Arab allies, 
believing American troops and Israel would be the primary targets of Iranian 
retaliation.

   "I don't think they saw that there would be as much exposure to the Gulf," 
he said, saying the lack of a plan to protect the Gulf countries "speaks to 
U.S. short-sightedness."

   The frustration in some of the Gulf nations is driven in part by the 
relative success that Israel has had knocking down drones and missiles compared 
to some of their neighbors, according to a person familiar with the sensitive 
diplomatic matter who was not authorized to comment publicly.

   Their air defense systems are hardly as robust as Israel's, but according to 
the person, U.S. officials have been somewhat perplexed that the Gulf countries 
are still not showing an appetite for delivering a counteroffensive by 
launching missiles at Iranian targets.

   Elliott Abrams, who served as a special representative for Iran and 
Venezuela at the end of Trump's first term, said that U.S. national security 
officials and their Gulf allies were aware that Iran had the capability to 
carry out significant strikes.

   "And the neighbors knew it and were afraid of it. But it was never clear 
that Iran would actually do it, because they have a lot to lose," Abrams said. 
"These attacks will leave long-term enmity, and if they keep up, the Gulf Arabs 
may start attacking Iran."

   Michael Ratney, a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, said that while 
the Gulf countries have an interest in seeing Iran weakened, they also have key 
concerns about the ongoing war -- including the economic damage and instability 
it is causing and its open-ended nature.

   Ratney, who is now a senior adviser in the Middle East program of the Center 
for Strategic and International Studies, said: "What comes next? The countries 
of the Gulf will have to bear the brunt of whatever that is."