I simply don’t understand - why are the Saudis buying all that military gear, if they never intend to USE it? Wouldn’t it be more efficient for them to give us cash, which we could funnel to the defense industry - acknowledge it as the welfare (corporate and otherwise) that it is. Change our national motto to “Mercs R Us!”
There’s this too: Iraq’s stability on the line as US, Iran tensions soar
You say “Iraq’s stability” like it’s a thing… :rolleyes:
The fact the USA produces a lot of oil doesn’t mean chaos in the Persian Gulf cannot affect the USA. Oil is fungible. If all the oil in the Middle East is blocked off by war, the price of oil will skyrocket. It doesn’t matter where it’s produced. the loss of Saudi oil would make American oil more valuable.
This doesn’t mean the USA should be involved in Saudi Arabia’s cruel little war; even if it threatens the world oil supply a little there are good reasons to stay out of it, not the least of which is that it’s horrifying to see the President of the United States on his knees before the dictator of a gross little kleptocracy that isn’t even a real country. I’m just making an economic point.
Don’t we have to get out of Yemen before we can stay out? IIRC, we’ve been helping the Saudis in Yemen for awhile, pre-dating Trump. And of course we lost a soldier there in the opening days of the Trump Administration. (I recall asking at the time: "Yemen? WTF are we doing in Yemen??)
And no, we shouldn’t even be giving any sort of support to the Saudis as long as they’re fighting this war. This war is a human rights disaster, and we shouldn’t be doing anything to fuel it.
Of course. I just wish people would acknowledge the cost (in addition to environmental costs) this adds to the price of “cheap” fossil fuels.
We do have alternatives, if only we would be willing to pay for them.
The Saudi Arabia attack is bad enough on its own but it’s more worrisome what it signifies.
That in the future, we could have small splinter groups or governments causing a huge amount of damage by way of drone warfare, and from what I’m reading there are not a lot of great defense options against a coordinated attack like this, it seems like a great way to fight a war of attrition, strategically targeting vital infrastructure or industry, or even just general terrorism.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could put the war costs associated with the oil industry into the actual cost of fuel rather than the current model of subsidization via income tax?
As of now, the only tried and true way of stopping these weapons is to find them before they’re launched and bomb them first.
I hope not. Western nations have spent crazy amounts of money on systems like Iron Dome, Patriot, Aegis, Phalanx, etc. to be able to counter aerial threats in-flight. I think ( / hope) the issue here is that the Saudis aren’t particularly competent users of the systems.
I’m with you on “gross little kleptocracy”, but SA is about as real as any other country. It was even built the old fashioned way - conquest. But its antecedents stretch back at least until the mid-18th century. Fucked up or not, it’s as a real as countries get and depending whether you want to parse the emirates of Diriyah, Nejd and Saudi Arabia as distinctly different states or not( I don’t really, they were all the same dynasty ), pre-dates Canada or the US.
Competency definitely might be( probably is )a factor, but it appears there are other problems. Including systems designed to counter ballistic missiles and manned aircraft not being terribly effective at dealing with drone-fired cruise missiles coming in at low altitude and from multiple vectors. It’s a bold new world.
Plus the Saudis had purportedly shifted some assets to the south to cover the Yemen border and I’ll also note that the effectiveness of the Patriot system in particular in real world conditions has been challenged in certain corners. The Saudis might not be great at using something that might not be that great to begin with. Especially for threats like these.
It’s not a black and white world. I agree that the Saudi regime is bad. But that doesn’t make their opponents the good guys. Bad as the Saudi regime is, the Iranian regime is worse. Letting Iran establish its influence in Arabia would make a bad situation significantly worse. And letting governments succeed with using terrorist attacks as means of advancing their foreign policy would be a really bad precedent.
Then it’s a good thing we still have that treaty with Iran, so we can use abandoning the treaty and restoring sanctions as leverage against this kind of misbehavior … oh, wait …
We have been “letting” the Saudis support terrorism for quite awhile. The precedent is already set.
The Iranians aren’t trying to “establish influence” in Arabia. Their ties to the Houthis are blown out of proportion by media attempting to provide rationale for disastrous US support of the Saudi war in Yemen.
Yes the protection of the oil industry should be shouldered by the oil industry companies. This includes protection of maritime trade routes. Unfortunately, many would unjustifiably be afraid of private corporations with military capabilities.
Why is the Iranian regime worse?
Here’s a 2016 Forbes article about how Saudi Arabia is worse than Iran.
I believe some may say Iran is worse because it opposes US interventionist policy instead of driving it or at least supporting it. Nationalists like John Bolton are on this side of the argument.
That isn’t what I said.
No. It’s an appropriate means of attaining what you said.