MbS: For better or for worse?
By James M. Dorsey
Embattled Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman could prove
to be not only a cat with nine lives but also one that makes even stranger
jumps.
King Salman’s announcement that Prince Mohammed was put in
charge of reorganizing Saudi intelligence at the same time that the
kingdom for the first time admitted that journalist Jamal Khashoggi had been
killed in its Istanbul consulate signalled that the crown prince’s wings were
not being clipped, at least not immediately and not publicly.
With little
prospect for a palace coup and a frail King Salman unlikely to
assume for any lengthy period full control of the levers of power, Prince
Mohammed, viewed by many as reckless
and impulsive, could emerge from the Khashoggi crisis, that has
severely tarnished the kingdom’s image and strained relations with the United
States and Western powers, even more defiant rather than chastened by
international condemnation of the journalist’s killing.
A pinned tweet by
Saud Al-Qahtani, the close associate of Prince Mohammed who this weekend
was among several fired senior official reads: “Some brothers blame me for what
they view as harshness. But everything has its time, and talk these days
requires such language.” That apparently was and could remain Prince Mohammed’s
motto.
Said former CIA official, Middle East expert and novelist
Graham E. Fuller in a bid to identify the logic of the madness: “As the
geopolitics of the world changes—particularly with the emergence of new power centres
like China, the return of Russia, the growing independence of Turkey, the
resistance of Iran to US domination in the Gulf, the waywardness of Israel, and
the greater role of India and many other smaller players—the emergence of a
more aggressive and adventuristic Saudi Arabia is not surprising.”
Prince Mohammed’s domestic status and mettle is likely to be
put to the test as the crisis unfolds with Turkey leaking further evidence of
what happened to Mr. Khashoggi or officially publishing whatever proof it has.
Turkish leaks or officially announced evidence would likely
cast further doubt on Saudi Arabia’s
assertion that Mr. Khashoggi died in a brawl in the consulate and
fuel US
Congressional and European
parliamentary calls for sanctions, possibly including an arms
embargo, against the kingdom.
In a sharp rebuke, US President Donald J. Trump responded to
Saudi Arabia’s widely criticized official version of what happened to Mr.
Khashoggi by saying that “obviously
there's been deception, and there's been lies.”.
A prominent Saudi commentator and close associate of Prince
Mohammed, Turki Aldakhil, warned in advance of the Saudi admission that the kingdom
would respond to Western sanctions by cosying up to Russia and China.
No doubt that could happen if Saudi Arabia is forced to seeks alternative to
shield itself against possible sanctions.
That, however, does not mean that Prince Mohammed could not
be brazen in his effort to engineer a situation in which the Trump
administration would have no choice but to fully reengage with the kingdom.
Despite pundits’ suggestion that Mr. Trump’s Saudi
Arabia-anchored Middle East strategy that appears focussed on isolating Iran,
crippling it economically with harsh sanctions, and potentially forcing a
change of regime is in
jeopardy because of the damage Prince Mohammed’s international reputation has
suffered, Iran could prove to be the crown prince’s window of
opportunity.
“The problem is that under MBS, Saudi Arabia has become an
unreliable strategic partner whose every move seems to help rather than hinder
Iran. Yemen intervention is both a humanitarian disaster and a low
cost/high gain opportunity for Iran,” tweeted former US Middle East
negotiator Martin Indyk, referring to Prince Mohammed by his initials.
Mr. “Trump needed to make clear he wouldn’t validate or
protect him from Congressional reaction unless he took responsibility. It’s too
late for that now. Therefore I fear he will neither step up or grow up, the crisis
will deepen and Iran will continue to reap the windfall,” Mr. Indyk
said in another tweet.
If that was likely an unintended consequence of Prince
Mohammed’s overly assertive policy and crude and ill-fated attempts to put his
stamp on the Middle East prior to the murder of Mr. Khashoggi, it may since in
a twisted manner serve his purpose.
To the degree that Prince Mohammed has had a thought-out grand
strategy since his ascendancy in 2015, it was to ensure US support and
Washington’s reengagement in what he saw as a common interest: projection of
Saudi power at the expense of Iran.
Speaking to The Economist in 2016, Prince Mohammed spelled
out his vision of the global balance of power and where he believed Saudi
interests lie. “The
United States must realise that they are the number one in the world and they
have to act like it,” the prince said.
In an indication that he was determined to ensure US
re-engagement in the Middle East, Prince Mohammed added: “We did not put enough
efforts in order to get our point across. We believe that this will change in
the future.”
Beyond the shared US-Saudi goal of clipping Iran’s wings,
Prince Mohammed catered to Mr. Trump’s priority of garnering economic advantage
for the United States and creating jobs. Mr. Trump’s assertion that he wants to
safeguard US$450 billion in deals with Saudi Arabia as he contemplates possible
punishment for the killing of Mr. Khashoggi is based on the crown prince’s
dangling of opportunity.
“When President Trump became president, we’ve changed our
armament strategy again for the next 10 years to put more than 60 percent with
the United States of America. That’s why we’ve
created the $400 billion in opportunities, armaments and investment
opportunities, and other trade opportunities. So this is a good
achievement for President Trump, for Saudi Arabia,” Prince Mohammed said days
after Mr. Khashoggi disappeared.
The crown prince drove the point home by transferring
US$100 million to the US, making good on a long standing promise to
support efforts to stabilize Syria, at the very moment that US Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo last week landed in Riyadh in a bid to defuse the Khashoggi
crisis.
A potential effort by Prince Mohammed to engineer a
situation in which stepped-up tensions with Iran supersede the fallout of the
Khashoggi crisis, particularly in the US, could be fuelled by changing
attitudes and tactics in Iran itself.
The shift is being driven by Iran’s need to evade
blacklisting by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an international
anti-money laundering and terrorism finance watchdog. Meeting the group’s
demands for enhanced
legislation and implementation is a pre-requisite for ensuring
continued European support for circumventing crippling US sanctions.
In recognition of that, Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei dropped his objection to adoption of the FATF-conform legislation.
If that were not worrisome enough for Prince Mohammed,
potential Iranian efforts to engage if not with the Trump administration with
those segments of the US political elite that are opposed to the president
could move the crown prince to significantly raise the stakes, try to thwart
Iranian efforts, and put the Khashoggi crisis behind him.
Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, head of parliament’s influential
national security and foreign policy commission, signalled
the potential shift in Iranian policy by suggesting that “there is a
new diplomatic atmosphere for de-escalation with America. There is room for
adopting the diplomacy of talk and lobbying by Iran with the current which
opposes Trump… The diplomatic channel with America should not be closed because
America is not just about Trump.”
Should he opt, to escalate Middle Eastern tensions, Prince
Mohammed could aggravate the war in Yemen, viewed by Saudi Arabia and the Trump
administration as a proxy war with Iran, or seek to provoke Iran by attempting
to stir unrest among its multiple ethnic minorities.
To succeed, Prince Mohammed would have to ensure that Iran
takes the bait. So far, Iran has sat back, gloating as the crown prince and the
kingdom are increasingly cornered by the Khashoggi crisis, not wanting to jeopardize
its potential outreach to Mr. Trump’s opponents as well as Europe.
That could change if Prince Mohammed decides to act on his
vow in 2017 that “we won’t wait for the battle to be in Saudi Arabia Instead, we
will work so that the battle is for them in Iran, not in Saudi Arabia.”
Dr.
James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International
Studies, co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture,
and co-host of the New Books in Middle Eastern Studies podcast.
James is the author of The Turbulent World
of Middle East Soccer blog, a book with the same title and a co-authored
volume, Comparative Political Transitions between Southeast Asia and
the Middle East and North Africa as well as Shifting
Sands, Essays on Sports and Politics in the Middle East and North Africa
and just published China
and the Middle East: Venturing into the Maelstrom
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