Jackonicko: one of the backbones of the professional militaries in the West has always been the blue collar origin, professional NCO. When it comes to aircraft or other equipment maintenance, that goes double.
The cultural and social questions I have never gotten a satisfactory answer to has been what motivation a young Saudi man has to become a good jet mechanic, or a good airframes mechanic? What expectations does he have about his future, either as a career aircraft mech or doing a hitch and then heading back into society to do ... what?
I am sure there are many decent mechanics in Saudi. When I was in a few other middle eastern places, I noted plenty of small fix it shops run by locals. But maybe those folks in the fix it shop families prefer to not serve under the colors.
As to the pilot corps, my experiences with Saudis goes back to 80's and the few princelings in our training programs in the USN. Not relevant to the year 2010, I don't think, though a couple of them were decent sticks.