Dear Reader,
The following piece was submitted for an essay competition run by "Harvard International Review" magazine. This year’s theme was “There is no Planet B.” Last Friday, this paper on the relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia received a silver medal, placing it among the top submissions worldwide. Considering this, I am re-publishing the article here for you to read.
Best,
Parakram Karnik
The historical relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia has been longstanding and strong yet can be a challenge to comprehend. The United States, a democratic defender of human rights, has often turned a blind eye to the many transgressions and anachronisms of the Saudi monarchy. Even as Saudi Arabia allegedly backed terrorist groups and dictated a highly conservative form of Islam as its official state religion, the United States continued its friendly stance. Saudi Arabia has also frequently undermined the interests of US allies using its oil-based influence. However, the United States has ostensibly overlooked these affronts due to its position that the al-Saud royal family remains the best bet to maintain a basic level of stability in the sensitive areas of the Middle East.
However, US Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, both Democrats, have shown a willingness to upend this status quo. From the revival of the Iran nuclear deal, to demanding accountability from the Saudis regarding the killing of dissident Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi consulate, to questioning Saudi Arabia’s role in the ongoing war in Yemen, the US-Saudi relationship has recently come under pressure. The policy of recent Democratic administrations appears to be less supportive of Saudi Arabia, which contrasts with the more open-ended partnership offered by President Donald Trump. While this has not paused US arms sales to Saudi Arabia, the change in the Democratic administrations’ view of the Gulf monarchy has created a frostier relationship between the two nations, particularly since Biden took office. Biden’s initial refusal to deal with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), the actual powerbroker of the country, was an early catalyst for the souring of the relationship, with MBS now refusing to engage with the Biden administration during the recent runup in oil prices.
A recent interview, famously, contains a quote from MBS where, when asked about what Biden misunderstood about him, he responded, “Simply, I do not care.” Many media outlets misinterpreted this to suggest that the Saudi leadership held a flippant attitude towards the United States. However, the quote taken in its full context clarifies that MBS does not fault Biden for looking out for American interests but posits that the Gulf monarchy does not need to factor Biden’s wishes into their own decisions because Biden has no obligation to look out for Saudi interests.
Many on both ends of the American political spectrum often believe that Saudi Arabia is a glorified client state whose leadership’s survival is entirely at the mercy of US policy. Neoconservatives expect the Saudi leadership to fall in line on issues like the Russia-Ukraine war, while progressives believe that the Saudi monarchy survives due to Western support and arms largess. This Western-centric line of reductionist thinking denies agency to the Saudis and leads to unrealistic expectations from the relationship, especially given that Saudi Arabia, not only occupies a vital piece of real estate in an important part of the world but is one of the largest suppliers of energy to the “Industrial West.”
An unintended yet wholly predictable consequence of this reductionist attitude has been MBS seeking alliances beyond the traditional. MBS’s modernization efforts and economic reforms have opened the door for partnerships with powerful countries like China. Saudi Arabia has reciprocated China’s overtures by defending China’s controversial treatment of its Uyghur minority and its Hong Kong security laws at the UN. Military cooperation between the two countries is also growing as US-Saudi arms sales come under scrutiny in Washington.
MBS has also not hesitated to use Saudi Arabia’s influential position within OPEC to defy the Biden administration’s requests to help moderate the rise in oil prices. As US demands came in starting from the third quarter of 2021 for the Saudis to use part of their unused capacity to slow the increase in petroleum prices, MBS has been consistent in his refusal to help, saying that American requests would harm the “balance and stability in the oil markets.” This is in stark contrast to Saudi compliance with similar requests from the Trump administration.
The recent Russia-Ukraine hostilities have only worsened the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia. As Europe sought to move off Russian hydrocarbons, America tried to assist by requesting their Gulf allies—Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar—to increase production and redirect supplies. While Qatar did cooperate, Saudi Arabia and the UAE declined to engage, forcing the Biden administration to make a humiliating outreach to Venezuela to increase global oil production. Furthermore, in response to aggressive US sanctions against Russia (which effectively sought to make it impossible for Russian financial institutions to use the US dollar), the Saudis contemplated working with China to conduct Saudi oil trades in Chinese yuan. While currently difficult to execute, the nascent possibility of Saudi Arabia making the switch away from the petrodollar should be of considerable concern to the United States, as much of the US’s power comes from the US dollar being the world’s international reserve currency.
This is currently one of the most tense points in the US-Saudi relationship since the cementing of ties in 1933. The United States has three possible ways to move forward from this low point. The first option is to re-adopt the Trump strategy of recognizing Saudi Arabia’s right to determine their sovereign decisions, even if they do not align with American interests. The United States would restore large-scale arms sales and lighten the conditions on usage. This option would benefit Saudi Arabia and would be seen as a concession from the American standpoint, though with recognition within DC about the benefits that this would bring to the United States. However, this would require the United States to refrain from commenting on Saudi Arabia’s human rights record, jeopardizing US claims to stand for those human rights on international forums.
Another idea is to further diversify America’s relations in the Middle East and OPEC through continued productive engagement with Iran and Venezuela. A new Iran nuclear deal could go a long way toward improving relations with the country. While following this path would implode the relationship with Saudi Arabia, a better relationship with Iran could replace the loss of this relationship and undermine Saudi Arabia’s international standing. Also, as mentioned earlier, the United States had sent emissaries to Venezuela in the early weeks of the Russia-Ukraine war, trying to reignite relations with the country and request them to increase their oil production. However, the lack of results from this initiative also highlights the limits of this strategy. Neither Iran nor Venezuela increased oil production after the recent US requests, indicating that even improved relations with the United States are unlikely to supersede these countries’ longstanding relationships with China and Russia.
The possibly most optimal solution would be to execute the “Green Transition” and significantly reduce the influence of oil in the 21st century. This would dramatically reduce the powers of authoritarian governments worldwide, whether they sit in Caracas, Moscow, Tehran, and even Riyadh. More importantly, this would help deter the possibly devastating implications of climate change, helping to preserve the livelihoods of millions around the world.
Since I wrote this essay in late May, events have moved considerably. As I had suggested as one of the options, the Biden Administration appears to have chosen a conciliatory path to mend the relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia. The motivation for the recent trip by President Biden to Riyadh may well have been related to the dynamics of the energy market, but human rights and, specifically, the Jamal Kashoggi issue were also at the forefront. Having said that, Crown Prince MBS used this visit to showcase his independence from traditional US-Saudi dynamics, and appears to have pushed back on helping with the energy crisis. Because of this, it seems fair to conclude that this bilateral meeting did little to alter the dynamics of this significantly strained relationship.