by Mohamad Kawas *
Summary:
During the past weeks, the United States has pushed its envoys to Saudi Arabia in a way that is almost shameful in the eyes of any American observer. It seemed that the United States was seeking to appease the Kingdom. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham visited the Kingdom in April. The man had exaggerated before in his hostility to Riyadh, issuing threats against it. He was preceded to Riyadh by CIA Director William Burns. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan visited the Kingdom in early May, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken visiting Saudi Arabia next June. America’s delegates have heard clear words in Riyadh over the past few weeks: We will not abandon our ambitious new ties with any economic or political power in the world.. Washington will have to respect new geostrategic wills resulting from the Saudi-Iranian agreement. On Iran, this is what the Americans heard in Riyadh: We will not abandon our relationship with Iran!
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History will one day write about whether Joe Biden’s administration in Washington stood behind this “absurdity” that hit all the long-standing American influence in the Middle East. All promises of lightness made by Biden (candidate for president in 2019) to turn Saudi Arabia into a “pariah state” collapsed. It seems that the Democratic administration is supported, even by its Republican opponents, and is striving with difficulty these days to repair the cracks in America’s historical relations with the Kingdom, relations that have rarely been weakened since the foundations of a summit that brought together King Abdulaziz and President Franklin Roosevelt aboard the battleship “USS”. Quincy” in the Bitter Lakes of the Suez Canal on February 14, 1945.
And “absurdity” is an American conclusion of the dangerous symptoms of what looks like a disintegration of American influence in the East. It is enough to compare the geostrategic maps of the region with what it was just a decade ago (so that we do not go back more than that) to conclude how many players have become either competitors to Washington’s influence or indifferent to its legendary prestige and traditional control over the region’s files. And “absurd futility” is for Iran and Saudi Arabia to end their structural dispute since 1979 in a way that shakes the foundations of the maps according to which Washington administrations draw alignments in the region. The complementary “absurdity” is for Riyadh to drop its veto over Damascus’ return to the Arab League, so that Syria will return despite the positions, statements, warnings, and advice of Washington and its allies.
Obama’s offenses
The Democratic administration under former President Barack Obama committed the sin of concluding the nuclear agreement with Iran in Vienna in 2015 without consulting the Arabs, especially Saudi Arabia and its allies. Indeed, at that time, Obama showed arrogance and disregard for the Gulf states, advising them to share influence in the region with the Iranians. In that advice, he almost said that they deserved it, and I gave them a period that distinguishes them and amplifies their strength. At the time, Biden was his deputy, and when “the king was in his hands,” he promised to return to the agreement, ignoring all the region’s reservations regarding other files that concern it more than the nuclear file that concerns Israel alone.
The US administration showed weakness in Washington’s dealings with its allies in the region. She is credited with convincing them that the United States is no longer a reliable roof that guarantees safety and security for allies. She is credited with liberating all capitals from their illusions and going irrevocably to discover the capitals of the world. Relations with China and Russia have become final and not seasonal, and ties with Beijing and Moscow have become strategic rather than casual tactics.
Riyadh changed the Middle East. Neither Israel nor the NATO system did that, nor did the “alliance without borders” between Russia and China. Washington committed the sin of the century, so the region rebelled and Saudi Arabia left the “Quincy Agreement” and every day began to show its ability to defend its interests and the interests of its allies first, dropping outdated rules in the relationship with the United States that arose 78 years ago.
Washington pleads
Over the past weeks, the United States has sent its envoys to Saudi Arabia in a way that would be almost shameful in the eyes of any American observer. It seemed that the United States was seeking to appease the kingdom and restore a “love story” that had been killed by stupidity and a lot of stupidity.
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham visited the kingdom in April. The man had been exaggerated before that in his hostility to Riyadh, making it easy to issue threats against it. After his meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, he announced the discovery of what he did not know about the kingdom’s “gardens”. He was preceded to Riyadh in the same month by CIA Director William Burns. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan visited the Kingdom in early May, with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visiting Saudi Arabia next June. All these visits come as the state of the kingdom says, “You arrived late, but you are welcome, we are all ears.”
It is not true that Sullivan came carrying the file of normalization with Israel. The information almost confirms that he did not, and the matter is not a priority for Biden and his team during the reign of Benjamin Netanyahu on the one hand, and his endeavor to get out of the “dilemma” of the crisis of relations with Riyadh on the other hand.
It is not true that the aspiration of Washington’s messengers aspires to stop the wheel of history and change paths that have been drawn, whether in what has been achieved of Chinese rapprochement with Saudi Arabia since Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to the Kingdom in December 2022 or what was planned by the Riyadh and Tehran agreement in Beijing on March 10, or Even what has become deeply rooted in the alliance of Russia and Saudi Arabia within the “OPEC Plus” group in the field of energy, especially since Riyadh’s response to Biden’s request on the eve of the midterm elections in November 2022 to raise oil exports and relax the markets (so that the Democrats can rest in those elections).
Over the past few weeks, US envoys have heard very clear words in Riyadh. We will not abandon our ambitious new ties with any economic or political power in the world to guarantee our interests and the interests of the region first. However, we are not about to abandon a historical alliance and long-standing friendship with the United States, even if the current administration shows an alarming reluctance to respect our concerns and abide by the rules and traditions of the alliance.
Washington will have to respond to Riyadh’s demands in matters of security, defense, and military industries, and to the Kingdom’s ambition to have a transparent nuclear program for civilian purposes.
Washington will have to respect new geostrategic wills resulting from the Saudi-Iranian agreement, including directing a (has become Arab) approach to zeroing in on inter-problem problems and embarking on making regional settlements that put an end to the almost endless futility within the countries of the region.
Washington will also have to be convinced that the world is changing, that the region is changing, and that Saudi Arabia’s decisions are made in Riyadh and do not benefit from any influences from the moods and agendas of the major powers.
History will one day write that Biden’s sins awakened in the region an awareness, maps, and beliefs that the United States had not known in the Middle East since the “Quincy” left the region’s waters, carrying Roosevelt to his country in the forties of the last century. That time is over, and it is becoming difficult for Washington diplomats to turn back the clock to that vanished time. The region went far in measuring distances with Washington, and perhaps it would not have done so if the occupant of the White House had been more shrewd and less talkative in overseeing its affairs.
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* Mohamad Kawas is a journalist, broadcaster, researcher & political commentator
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