And hopes that the EFSF's firepower could be increased to a trillion euros - the bare minimum deemed necessary - took a knock yesterday when its boss, Klaus Regling, said that the current turmoil in markets was limiting the EFSF's ability to raise what's needed from its current endowment of resources.
Outside of oil and gas projects and a few specific infrastructure projects (ports like Jebel Ali and airports like Dubai), far less real economic development has happened in the oil-rich parts of the Arab world than would be expected based on their great endowment of human and natural resources.
Martha Brill Alcott of the Carnegie Endowment says the Bush administration wants to show it is developing alternatives to Russian pipelines and energy resources.