Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Strange things have been afoot in the Kingdom of Saud recently.

First, there was the diplomatic row between them and Qatar
https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/06/17/533054129/qatars-crisis-with-saudi-arabia-and-gulf-neighbors-has-decades-long-roots

Second, there was the arrests of the Saudi princes
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/04/world/middleeast/saudi-arabia-waleed-bin-talal.html?_r=0

Now, there is the incident with the Lebanese Prime Minister
http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/04/middleeast/lebanese-prime-minister-saad-hariri-resigns/index.html

Edit: I also forgot about the blockade on Yemen....
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-missiles-yemen/saudi-led-forces-close-air-sea-and-land-access-to-yemen-idUSKBN1D60I8

Anyone like to clue a silly American like me in on what is going on here? I know Iran and Saudi Arabia are in a regioanl power play but what is going on now?

Also, there was someone who launched a missile at Riyadh, and the missile turned out to be made in Iran. Or I think I heard something like that.

What is going on is international struggles for influence and power, intimidating its neighbours and allies of enemies such as Lebanon (the PM that resigned seen as a threat to Shia power). The war in Yemen has been ongoing for a couple of years now, with SA having a vested interest in not letting the Shia rebels win. Its just that all these events have come together currently, possibly/likely driven by the new leadership consolidating its power internally and externally.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Also, there was someone who launched a missile at Riyadh, and the missile turned out to be made in Iran. Or I think I heard something like that.

The missile was fired by Houthi Shia rebels from Yemen. Rebels SA has been relentlessly and indiscriminately bombing. As its part of regional struggles with Iran its possible its an Iranian missile.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Also, there was someone who launched a missile at Riyadh, and the missile turned out to be made in Iran. Or I think I heard something like that.

The missile was fired by Houthi Shia rebels from Yemen. Rebels SA has been relentlessly and indiscriminately bombing. As its part of regional struggles with Iran its possible its an Iranian missile.

The missile was a Scud variant which was known to be in the Yemeni military arsenal prior to the blockade. If the Iranians did supply it was a while ago since the various Yemeni militaries have been supplied with SCUDs over the years (the country was split in two during the cold war). The Southerners got some from the Soviets/Chinese/lol? back in day and more recently in the 80s/90s? from the Russians. The northerners purchased some from the Iranians a few decades back so yeah it's certainly possible the rebels got ahold of some Made in Iran Scuds.

The missile firing is unrelated to the Saudi purges and was likely fired in retaliation for https://www.ksl.com/?nid=235&sid=46190320&title=saudi-led-coalition-airstrike-in-yemen-kills-26-people. The timing window required to ship it in from Iran, setup and fire at Riyadh is too tight to have the launch be related to the Lebanon or Saudi domestic shake up.

The Heir apparent is cleaning house. A mix of removing opposition from power, and taking steps to push his country forward.

A lots been going on in Saudi, definitely, but I'm cautiously optimistic that the crown prince is wanting to have the nation start being worthy of its roll of hegemonial power of the Middle East for a change.

This is going to be rather long...

In 2015, the Saudis got a new king, King Salman. With him came his very ambitious son Mohammad bin Salman.

The Saudis have a tradition of passing the kingship from brother to brother rather than father to son. This is part of the power sharing structure in the Kingdom since one branch of the royal family can't monopolize the throne. This system dates back to the first Saudi King, Ibn Saud and his many sons whose descendants form the branches Saudi royal family. The recent moves in Saudi Arabia, in particular the domestic purges of princes and clerics are part of power grab by the Salman branch to push the other branches aside, redefine the cleric-royal agreements and overturn the politics of the kingdom

King Salman named his nephew Muhammad bin Nayef from the Nayef branch as his successor and his son Mohammed was placed as Defense Minister and Deputy CP. So everything was hunkydory for about 3 months until Salman launched the intervention of Yemen (Operation Decisive Storm) as his brainchild to restore the Saudis favored leader the ousted Yemeni President Abdrabbuh Hadi. Starting impressively enough with a decent coaltion including the US, the war has degenerated into a quagmire and human rights mess.

Fast forward to July 2017. Deputy CP Salman has been promoting a program called Vision 2030 to modernize Saudi society and their economy as a response to the declining oil prices. He's even hired a multinational consulting firm from Chicago to handle it. This is the Saudi women driving and civil rights stuff you hear about in the news. After the US election win for Trump there is back and forth with the Salmans and Trump's go betweens (like Kushner) culminating in a visit to the Kingdom for the PotUS. Following these meetings the Qatar crisis begins, likely caused by Saudi concerns over the increasing closeness between Tehran and Doha (publicly it's over "terror funding"). This has been another failure causing the collapse of the GCC organization and Qatar moving closer to Iran and Turkey. Unexpectedly on the heels of the diplomatic breakdown is the removal of Crown Prince Nayef who is forced out of office under trumped up pain killer addiction claims and placed in house arrest.

Once Nayef and his family members are removed Deputy Crown Prince Salman is promoted to Crown Prince Salman and begins accelerating plans to lock his secession in. Which is where we're at now. CP Salman's policies are popular, even the foreign intervention ones, but people have soured on the lack of results. Saudis benefited from generous social programs and civil employment but the government spending has been cut in response to the dismal outlook for oil revenues and the surplus built over years of good times is being directed toward Salman's reform programs and military adventures. So we get the 2nd purge.

There are two key components of this purge last Sat.The first is the removal of Prince Mitieb Bin Abdullah son of the last king from the position of National Guard Commander. The Saudi National Guard is part of the 3 branches of their military and is roughly equivalent in strength to the Royal Army but more importantly not underneath the jurisdiction of Salman's Defense Ministry. The second notable part of the purge is the arrest of particularly wealthy Saudis including the richest Saud Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal and the 6th richest Saud Bakr bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's half brother. Their assets are being seized by state. The removal of Abdullah and the seizure of other princes' financial assets further consolidates power into the Salman branch.

The Lebanon thing is a whole another can of worms but is tied into the power struggle going on in the post ISIS middle east. Would be a whole nother write up.

 avantgarde wrote:
This is going to be rather long...

Thanks for that.

Also you need not apologise for long posts. In the past TLDR people used to read books like the rest of us.

 djones520 wrote:
The Heir apparent is cleaning house. A mix of removing opposition from power, and taking steps to push his country forward.

A lots been going on in Saudi, definitely, but I'm cautiously optimistic that the crown prince is wanting to have the nation start being worthy of its roll of hegemonial power of the Middle East for a change.

Salman Jr's domestic plans aren't terrible in fact they're quite good sounding. The NEOM city thing sounds plane crazy doe. But understand that Vision 2030 was drawn up by a US marketing team, so they're supposed to sound good to people in the US and Europe. Part of that is to entice western investment and workers to Saudi Arabia which is completely benign but the sinister side is to provide good PR so people overlook their adventures abroad.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
What is going on is international struggles for influence and power, intimidating its neighbours and allies of enemies such as Lebanon (the PM that resigned seen as a threat to Shia power).

The current/former (who can tell ) PM Saad al-Hariri is Sunni but not a threat to Hezbollah or Shias. Current Lebanese politics relies on a delicate arrangement where power is shared, the PM is Sunni, the President is Christian and the Head of Parliament is Shia. I think the Lebanese have little interest for internecine conflict forced on them from outside powers and al-Hariri was a compromise PM to keep the peace. The PM position has been sponsored by the Saudis and al-Hariris fortunes (his former company is called Saudi Oger) are inextricably tied to Saudi business and his family may be bankrupt possibly through Saudi influence, but that last part's just rumor.

Anyways there are various possible reasons why the Saudis decided to call al-Hariri to task but two stand out. The first is the Speaker of the Parliament Nabih Berri calling for parliamentary elections. Their current parliament has been in office since 2009, they keep voting to extend their 4 year terms, the election threatens to upset Saudi influence in Lebanon. The second is a Nov. 3rd meeting between PM al-Hariri and Ali Akbar Velayati, Velayati is a trusted advisor and errand boy for the Iranian Supreme Leader. In any case he was summoned to Riyadh under the pretense of a fake assassination attempt on his life and strong armed into resigning on Saudi tv. The exact goal here is unclear, perhaps they thought the Trump admin would sanction Hezbollah? Maybe they're trying to rile up sectarian tension in Lebanon? Currying favor for some sort of tripartite alliance between the US-Israel-Saudi Arabia?

Whatever the reason it doesn't seem to be going the way they expect. The Christian Lebanese President Aoun and al-Hariri's own party don't recognize the resignation and are considering al-Hariri's "protective custody" as an abduction and none of the major international players seem to be taking the Saudi side on this. Even got President Macron to come down from Olympus to scold the Saudis and flex his new foreign policy. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-41937439

French President Emmanuel Macron has paid an unscheduled visit to Saudi Arabia amid an escalating crisis between the kingdom and Lebanon... Ahead of his two-hour visit to Riyadh, Mr Macron said all Lebanese officials should live freely, "which means having a very demanding stance on those who could threaten any leader".

Interestingly enough Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian authority was also called in this week by the Sauds for talking with Iran. But they let him go with a pat on the head.

Good stuff Avantgarde! Thanks.

 djones520 wrote:
The Heir apparent is cleaning house. A mix of removing opposition from power, and taking steps to push his country forward.

A lots been going on in Saudi, definitely, but I'm cautiously optimistic that the crown prince is wanting to have the nation start being worthy of its roll of hegemonial power of the Middle East for a change.

Also shaking up some of the more corrupt leaders.

They facing a wake up call.
He jailed and siezed billions of dollers and assets in Saudi and globally.

(also as crown Prince they become national assets... Aka his. Tricky little hobbit there. Very good political gamesmanship)

 avantgarde wrote:
This is going to be rather long....

Thankyou. I knew of most of these events in isolation, but wasn't sure how they fit together. Thanks for linking all the pieces together for me.

It's not just declining oil prices that are the problem. They've had a population boom in the last few decades and their social support system probably would have been unsupportable even if oil prices stayed high. A decline in the the general standard of living would trigger widespread unrest unless the government is both seen to be doing something to improve and modernize the economy, and seen to ratchet back the extravagance of the royal family. It's hard to sell cutbacks to the populace when you literally live like a king. They have to manage their money much more carefully now, and clawing money back from royals who have been embezzling is a good place to start.



That's a population graph in 1000's. 4 million in 1960, 27 million in 2010.