Saudi Military Modernization from the British Withdrawal from "East of Suez" to the October War

At the beginning of the 1970s, Saudi Arabia still lacked many of the elements it needed for military modernization. The F-5A purchase was a stopgap in developing a modem air force. The reforms within the armed forces following the unrest in 1969-1970, and Saudi Arabia's arrangements with the Corps of Engineers, represented only limited progress in readying Saudi Arabia to absorb modem military equipment. Yet the country could not wait. The pressures that had begun to change Saudi Arabia's strategic situation gathered steady momentum throughout the early 1970s.