MAJ Alex Ardussi served as advisor to the 5th Logistics Support Battalion (LSB) in the Prince Turki bin Abdul-Aziz Brigade of the Saudi Arabia National Guard (OPM-SANG) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia during 2007 and 2008. In this August 2009 interview, MAJ Ardussi discusses the role of OPM-SANG, the challenges of working with the Saudi Arabia National Guard and the Saudi military generally, and the importance of cultural awareness and training in this type of position. MAJ Ardussi concludes his interview with the observation, In the strategic sense, the reason OPM-SANG exists is to maintain a strong relationship with Saudi Arabia, and that's what our National Defense Strategy and our foreign policy is dictating. You don't want to just send anybody over there that's going to be a bad representative of our country and could possibly damage that relationship and embarrass the country. There are members of the royal family that are officers in the National Guard and the Ministry of Defense, and they are influential. If you damage the relationship somehow, it may not be catastrophic but it could be one of the thousand cuts that end up spoiling an important relationship for us."

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