How Donald Trump Should Deal With Saudi Arabia | Opinion

On Jan. 23, his second full day in office after being sworn in as the 47th president, Donald Trump picked up the phone and dialed his first foreign leader. The honor didn’t go to the leader of a formal U.S. treaty ally like Canada or the United Kingdom, but rather to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). This wasn’t a surprise given the relationship the two men conjured up. In his first term, Trump jetted to Saudi Arabia for his first overseas trip. The visit was a precursor to what would turn out to be a blossoming U.S.-Saudi relationship over the next four years. Trump showered the Saudis with billions of dollars in military equipment; continued to assist the Saudi-led military campaign against the Houthis in Yemen; joined Riyadh’s economic embargo against Qatar; and defended MBS when the U.S. intelligence community assessed that he was responsible for the October 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Trump and MBS are prepared to pick up where they left off. The two view each other as force multipliers for their respective agendas. Trump looks at the Saudi crown prince and sees a high net-worth individual who could throw a gargantuan amount of petrodollars into the American economy. In Trump, MBS spots a transactional businessman who couldn’t care less about high-browed concepts like the rules-based international order.

Both men are also nationalists to the core. MBS can relate to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” mantra because he is following the same playbook in the kingdom. MBS wants to make his country stronger and wealthier than ever before, best exemplified by his Vision 2030 economic campaign to diversify Saudi Arabia from an oil-pumping machine into a center of banking, finance, and sports.

Trump would be wise to remember this as he interacts with MBS. Saudi officials may highlight their strategic relationship with Washington as mutually-beneficial, but the kingdom won’t be doing the United States any favors. And the concessions the Saudis do make will almost certainly be paired with demands.

Trump is likely pleased with Riyadh’s stated commitment to invest $600 billion into the U.S. economy over the next four years. But what seems like a benevolent act smells a lot like a transparent bribe to purchase more U.S. defense investment. For nearly two years, Riyadh has been negotiating with U.S. officials on an upgrade to the U.S.-Saudi defense relationship. The original concept was to provide the kingdom with a U.S. security guarantee in the form of a treaty, largely as a reward for the Saudis normalizing diplomatic relations with Israel. While the war in Gaza has diminished the prospects of the Saudis normalizing ties with Israel anytime soon, they are still intent on bringing the United States closer militarily.

Saudi Arabia has good reason to keep Washington in its camp. Although Iran is unmistakably weaker today courtesy of Israel’s military operations against Hamas and Hezbollah as well as Bashar al-Assad‘s fall, the Saudis can’t discount the Iranians as powerless. Iran retains proxies in Yemen and Iraq, maintains a formidable missile capability, and is improving upon a nuclear program that MBS’ late uncle, King Abdullah, wanted the United States to destroy nearly two decades ago. Despite a years-long ceasefire with the Houthis, the Yemeni militia group isn’t going to disappear and might resume fighting against the Saudi-backed Yemeni government if peace talks remain stalled. The United States is the big, warm security blanket the Saudis would like to use during chilly times.

Yet what’s good for the Saudis isn’t necessarily good for the Americans. What exactly would Washington get for offering Riyadh a security guarantee? This is precisely the question Trump, who believes the American people have been taken advantage of by other countries for decades, should be asking.

Once he does, one hopes Trump starts to recognize the security arrangement MBS desires as a very bad deal—not because Saudi Arabia should be shunned but rather because Saudi Arabia needs the United States a lot more than the United States needs Saudi Arabia. The U.S. foreign policy intelligentsia will argue the opposite, that as a major swing producer of crude oil, Washington can’t afford to walk away and leave the Arabian Peninsula to China. But those claims would be misplaced, overlooking the fact that China’s Xi Jinping appears more interested in staying on good terms with everybody in the Middle East instead of doubling down on a single partnership that could upset his capacity to be a neutral broker.

And how valuable is Saudi Arabia to the United States, really? Surely it holds some value—the kingdom holds more than 21 percent of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (OPEC) proven oil reserves. But despite MBS’ attempts to transform the Saudi economy, oil still accounts for 63 percent of his country’s revenue. Trump doesn’t have to worry about Riyadh throttling down production over a long period of time because the Saudis need the money.

Donald Trump gave his Saudi pal a bit of a pass during his first term. He shouldn’t make the same mistake in his second.

Daniel R. DePetris is a fellow at Defense Priorities and a syndicated foreign affairs columnist at the Chicago Tribune.

The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.