ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 shows how the domestic political situation in Saudi Arabia informed its foreign policy towards Egypt and Nasserism, with particular attention to the Saudi response to the Egyptian military intervention into Yemen in 1962. It provides an overview of Arab nationalism and how it informed Saudi Arabia’s construction of this threat as flexibly different from its own ideology. This, in turn, made for a mediated Saudi foreign policy response to Egypt’s intervention in Yemen, characterized by initial Saudi caution followed by increased aggression with growing US assurances of military support. Regional Arab and domestic Saudi politics provided the Saudi regime the opportunity to construct a counter-ideology in the form of pan-Islamism, which decreased Saudi proclivity for an aggressive response. Finally, the evolution of Saudi relations with Western partners shaped the second half of the conflict, a pattern that further illuminates contemporary Saudi foreign policy in the later stages of its current military role in Yemen.
