Brokered by China no less. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023...n-agree-to-continue-efforts-to-establish-ties Can’t imagine the US is terribly thrilled about any of this.
Remember it's always bad when China does good things, because it probably did them in an authoritarian way. BUT AT WHAT COST https://twitter.com/slipknothooh/status/1433496026795630598
Two authoritarian, terrorism-sponsoring religious dictatorships having better relations with each other is ... probably not a great thing.
However it's almost certainly better than them fighting a proxy war with innocent deaths in the middle.
I bet there's loads of lefties that would have no trouble describing America using the same language. Tell that to the people that have died in their lengthy proxy war in Yemen.
Great news. Of course, it also speaks to the growing influence of China and on the Saudi's no longer following the rules. Not good for US hegemony.
So a couple things. First off, so far this just gets us back to 2016. So not a full rapprochement. Secondly this has kinda been in the works for a while. Crown Prince Bonesaw has gone all in on Trump/Putin/Xi and away from the Rules Based International Order. Lastly, I know @tafkats was being flippant about the Saudis being a religious dictatorship but the irony is that it is his secularism (lol) or at least pragmatism that is a major driver of his authoritarianism. He has come to the conclusion that keeping half his population illiterate, barefoot and pregnant and the other half only going to school until 9th grade and then to religious schooling is not a way to build a modern economy. And that the oil won’t last forever. He wants to be the savior of his country. The one that puts them on the right path. The founder of a modern Saudi Arabia. The Saudis, as in the House of Saud, owe their rule to the pact formed between Abd Al-Wahhab (founder of Wahhabism) and Muhammad bin Saud in the mid 1700s. The neo-fundamentalist Wahhabists would rule religiously and the Saudis politically/militarily. And it worked. Through faith and the sword they eventually conquered the majority of the Arabian peninsula. But now Crown Prince Bonesaw thinks the country has to move beyond Wahhabism. However that means literally removing the basis of state legitimacy used for the last three centuries and creating a new one on the fly. Keep in mind Saudi Arabia has no Constitution. Officially the Quran (as interpreted by Wahhabist doctrine) is from where all legitimacy flows. And he wants to overthrow that. Which won’t be easy. He has come to the conclusion that only with complete control can he push through this transition. So yeah. Kinda a weird situation. A brutal dictatorship to move his country away from Islamic Fundamentalism. No real good guys…
Not sure what the world has to gain if China, Iran, and the Saudis become more dominant powers in the world. Frankly, I can't even see how they'll be a good check on American overreach.
IMO it's likely to have the opposite effect. There's good reason why the US is focusing so much attention on the Chinese "threat". They fear losing dollar supremacy.
Not seeing how authoritarian countries are better at global things than countries with, admittedly very flawed institutions, like the US. Sure, as long as they're not the dominant superpowers on the planet, they have reasons to pretend to be nicer to some countries than we do. But if you think that they won't resort to shit as bad, if not worse, than what we have done, you're woefully naive. And you know what? When the dollar stops being the dominant currency in the world (which will happen sooner or later, so long as capitalism is a thing, and I don't see the Chinese, Iranians, or Saudis ditching that anytime soon) a whole lot of nations are going to regret it. Right now, companies can refuse Chinese demands because China doesn't have an economy as large as the US. When China (or possibly India, given the way Modi acts) becomes the largest global economy, that's not going to be as much of an option. Given that China's banned people from posting pics of Winne the Pooh on the web there (because it's often used to make fun of Xi), I can't imagine companies defying them on that when they're the largest economy on the planet. A whole lotta of things in the world are "standards" simply because it made more sense to adopt what the US was doing than to create separate production lines for the US and non-US production lines. China's economy will eventually dwarf ours by several times. When that happens, do you think companies will opt to pull out of China rather than install Chinese spyware on every device made in China, regardless of if it is intended for export or not?
Sigh. I wasn't indicating a preference for Chinese dominance. I'm saying that a more contested world order will lead to conflict, rather than checking "overreach". This event notwithstanding, of course. The world is complicated.
As to the rest, we'll see if it lasts. Iran clearly is facing severe internal pressures. This no doubt allows them to focus inward at a moment where their populace is in outright revolt, their economy is in shambles, and they face conflict with Israel over their nuclear program. This is not a good development for the people of Iran, especially the women. Saudi is trying to realign. But Wahhibism in Saudi Arabia isn't going away any time soon, and a single misstep could blow it all up again. The latest incarnation of this conflict was kicked off by a Shi'a religious scholar in Saudi Arabia being executed. And China is far more reliant on Middle Eastern oil than the US is now. So they have a specific interest in making sure there's peace in that area that doesn't blow over into the shipping lanes. China is Saudi Arabia's largest trading partner now. As to China playing peacemaker - great. They are perhaps the single nation in the world with the most to lose if globalism ends and the international order breaks down. The downside to that of course is they are virulently anti-democratic. And of course there's still the Taiwan issue. They have not let go of that idea, and we've seen what their promises mean when it comes to the people of Hong Kong. One potential upside - they are literally the only stakeholder that might be able to reign in Putin. If China turns on Russia, that's the endgame. But they are also gaining quite a bit in the realignment of Russia to them, and diplomatic clout while useful isn't as advantageous as cheap oil to them. The one thing that could disrupt that is if food production continues to be disrupted, as they are large scale food importers. While they don't get their food in that manner the food market is much like oil - if there's disruption in one place it impacts many others.
And speaking of China and US hegemony, Macron just had a DeGaulle moment where he said Europe needs to walk a third line between the poles of the US and China. He especially warned of France getting caught in a conflict with China over Taiwan if it continues to follow US foreign policy. Not sure where that is coming from honestly, as NATO doesn't exist in Asia and SEATO doesn't include France. There are no current expectations that France would help the US fight China to protect Taiwan. No doubt it's a moment of weakness on the French economy where Macron doesn't want to alienate China, and presumes that saying so won't interfere with it's relationship with the US. Words won't matter on that score, but we'll have to see what actions are taken, if any. Regardless, China is having a very good month. We'll see how their own financial issues and demographic problems impact them going forward.
LOL. You were whining about how people took your words when you wrote poorly. And this is not Peace in Yemen. This is possibly a deescalation of the intensity of the conflict. Both sides are still committed to fighting, and neither is a particularly good actor on this stage. This war goes back to similar structural problems that caused the Yemeni Civil War in 1962, though now with an added sectarian division between Sunni and Shi'ite. Back then it was the UK, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan backing the monarchy, and Egypt backing the rebels, including sending large numbers of troops who directly intervened. Those rebels were largely from the same group as the Houthis are now. South Yemen and North Yemen fought wars in 1978 and renewed it in 1979. It happened again in 1986. And even after unification in 1990, there was yet another war in 1996, again largely North vs South. And then again in 2006. And then again in 2016. As to the US policy on Yemen, it's changed at different times. Obama initially supported the Yemeni govt while calling for a restoration of the peace plan. However, the chaos lead to Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula setting up camps so the US was involved in aiding in destroying that group. Trump escalated US funding to the Yemeni govt and had strong ties to Saudi Arabia - and no doubt part of the $2 billion bribe he got from Saudi Arabia was due to this. Biden stopped all US sales of weapons that could be involved in the conflict, backed the UN peace proposal, and sent a mediator to try to end the bloodshed. There is no one US policy on this issue. Like you said - the world is complicated.
