TRUMP IS OVER HIS HEAD IN DEALING WITH SAUDI ARABIA

… Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS)

The relationship between Saudi Arabia & Trump was due to all the Saudi purchases of Trump’s luxury branded properties.

The problems of Saudi Arabia have been known for years.

This is what happens when you start with an authoritarian leader of a new country that had 22 wives, which then gave the King of Saudi Arabia 45 sons.  Up to recently, the Crown of leadership was passed from one of the King's stronger sons to the next strong son.

But when it stopped going from the sons to the grandsons, this required the king to choose among a large rivaling set of Saudi individuals.  It was then the need to decide which on had the right: talent, interests, force and tact, and this was a much more challenging issue.

Those of us that have observed Saudi Arabia for years have been considering this problem for many years.  Now, with the murder of the Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, that was lured to the Saudi Consulate and murdered in Turkey, this tells us that generational succession is no longer a future problem, it is a present crisis.

Due to the ocean of oil beneath the sands of Saud’s kingdom, there’s no issue of the King’s grandchildren reverting back to the nomadic life from which the kingdom was built.  That was nearly a century ago.

But now, the risk is that the third generation which totally lacks the grandfather’s cunning, will it drag the kingdom into a spiral of treachery, backstabbing and recklessness? Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) has shown himself to be steeped in all three of these radical tendencies.

MBS, is the first of his generation to hold the power of the crown.  His father, King Salman, is 82 and partially disabled by Alzheimer’s disease.  MBS is a young tyrant in a very big hurry.  He pushed aside an older cousin last year, and even confined him to house arrest.  He also began jailing his rivals, he has tortured his critics, silenced his dissenters, and he created a humanitarian crisis of staggering levels in neighboring Yemen.  Khashoggi’s murder is totally in character for this individual.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, the House of Saud has never been known for being very liberal.  Quite the opposite.  The Saudi leaders have been totally iron-fisted at home and highly disruptive abroad.  They long ago made a devil’s bargain with their radicalized Wahhabism religion that lies as the root of the al-Qaeda terrorists, the Islamic State and the terrorist Taliban.  But even considering that, the sending of a team of 15 killers, that were allegedly packing a bone saw, which was allegedly used to rid them of a prominent US resident/reporter on Turkish soil.  Even for the Saudi’s, this is an act of alarming audacity.

When asked, one knowledgeable business executive that deals with the Saudi’s was asked whether this tells us MBS is either crazy or stupid.  His response: “Hmm, probably both.”

The leaders in Libya or Sudan are bad enough, but to have a bad one at the controls in Saudi Arabia is absolutely intolerable. This has been the United States’ strongest ally in the Muslim Middle East, and they have held this position since President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave his blessing to King Saud.

The point is that the kingdom does serve as a critical counterweight to Iran’s ambitions, and they are a reasonable custodian of the most sacred sites of Islam.

Thanks to the horrible process of oil fracking and the efficiency of today's oil technologies, the US does not need the Saudi oil like we used to. The most precious issue that the Saudis can offer the US today is to help with stability, in the heart of the world’s tinderbox.

Unfortunately, instead of stability, we get this mob-type leader, which is no doubt unsettling to the older King Salman, who is said to not be as feeble-minded as some suggest.  His only surviving full brother, Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz is a direct rival to MBS.  Both the king and his brother were raised in the cynical, no-nonsense of their generation of Saudi royals.  They must surely see that MBS has become bad for the family business.

Also, unfortunately, MBS now has friends in high places.  He has wormed his way into the hearts of the highly inexperienced and naive Trump administration.  After striking up a bromance with the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, MBS flattered Kushner’s self-image as a Mideast peace broker.  This Saudi strongman then scored a Trump Tower audience with the newly elected president, Jared Kushner and former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon.  All this, with no one with any knowledge of Saudi Arabia in Trump's group.

Was this relationship helped by all the Saudi purchases of luxury Trump-branded yachts and properties? Of course it was!  Trump is only impressed with money and flattery.  Special counsel Robert Mueller is even reported to be looking into that situation.

This much we know: It was due to this duping of the inexperienced Trump administration that inspired Trump’s first foreign travel.  Instead of doing what former presidents have done by visiting close friends and allies such as Great Britain or Germany, Trump’s first foreign trip as the president was a lavish trip to Riyadh.  During this trip, MBS blew so much smoke and flattery of the president, he nearly floated home.  This is the same Trump who trusts Russian President Vladimir Putin and loves Kim Jong Un of North Korea, he has now clambered aboard the authoritarian MBS Express.

For that one moment, all was lovely.  To impress the president that he was being very progressive, MBS allowed the kingdom to permit movie theaters to open and he allowed women to drive.  MBS then spoke of diversifying his economy and purging Islam of radicals.

We now see what’s behind all the facade.

Obviously, Trump is not the first president to bet on the wrong foreign leader.

But what he should do is use the United States’ considerable influence to steer the older king toward a different leader succession plan.  Khashoggi’s murder was a flagrant insult to the United States and to the president personally.  To go groveling as he is for believing the bogus stories of Khashoggi’s death, this totally weakens Trump and shows him to be a real patsy.  It also weakens the United States, and it makes Saudi Arabia a true powder keg in the middle east.

This is just another example showing that Trump is way over his head in his "acting" as the US President.

Copyright G.Ater  2018