American journalist Bobby Ghosh questioned the reason for the arrival of the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, to a dead end in Washington, saying that “the dependence of the Saudi Prince on the White House made him at the mercy of the cruel methods of the American administration”.
In his article published by the US “Bloomberg” agency, Monday, the author reviewed one of the methods that the US President recently used to humiliate the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, as the latter received a threat from Trump to withdraw all American forces from the Kingdom, if not reduce its oil production.
This came during Trump’s call to Salman on April 2, which surprised the latter to the point that he asked his aides to leave the room, and no one from the entourage was present with him, when their master was intimidated and apparently asked to surrender, according to the same source.
Bin Salman would not have ignored the severe consequences for him and his family, and as Trump said in his well-known rude manner, according to the description of “Gosh,” the family would not have been “in power for two weeks had it not been for the American military support”.
“Trump told the Saudi crown prince in that call, that he would have chosen the option of hostility to Congress in the event his request was not met,” the author said.
After Trump’s threat, Republican Senator Bill Cassidy proposed a draft resolution to withdraw US forces from Saudi Arabia.
And it was not over the call – the American writer continues – less than 10 days before Saudi Arabia agreed with Russia to end the price war and start cutting production, and Trump got all the praise because he stopped the aggressive confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Russia.
And he added, “The American president, in his own way, avoided mentioning the harsh tactics he used to achieve his goal, perhaps because he did not want to embarrass Bin Salman”.
“The crown prince must now acknowledge the limitations of his unwise decision in building relations with the United States, an ally that the kingdom cannot do without,” he said.
Describing the state of bin Salman, Ghosh said: “The prince has become like an outcast, as a prominent member of the royal family, in a way that has not happened to a member of the family since the US-Saudi alliance 75 years ago”.
Prince Bin Salman recommended that it be necessary to realize “the limits of his reckless strategies” in his relations with the United States of America.
He pointed out that “the former rulers of Saudi Arabia were able to trust their friends in Congress to obtain forgiveness from the White House, but Prince bin Salman has a few friends in Washington, but he will not be able to use them in crises”.
The article stressed “Bloomberg” that “Prince bin Salman has become subject to constant attacks from all circles in Washington due to a number of issues, including the war in Yemen, the arrest of human rights activists, and the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi,” citing the description of the American Senator Lindsey Graham called him “unstable and unreliable”.
“Both parties in the US Congress support punitive measures against Riyadh on many issues, from restricting arms sales to Saudi Arabia to demanding justice for Khashoggi,” the article said.
The writer pointed out that the timing of the humiliation of bin Salman by the US president is inappropriate, especially since it came in conjunction with the double strike of the oil war and the coronary virus pandemic that severely damaged the Saudi economy and undermined the ambitious reform agenda at home.
He said: “The Saudi crown prince faced unexpected opposition to the idea of establishing a huge tourist city on the banks of the Red Sea,” stressing the need to exert a lot of effort and spending in order to save face, to get out of the Yemeni dilemma.
He added, “There is no hope for a personal victory for 2020 for Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is currently in a deplorable state,” saying, “The prince is stuck in the place that the American president wants”.
On March 6, the “OPEC +” group held a meeting in the Austrian capital Vienna, where the group was unable to take a decision on additional production cuts.
After the meeting, Riyadh and Moscow announced that they would increase their market share in the global oil market, by raising production as of April 2020, and thus began the price war between the two countries.
And with the outbreak of the price war, oil prices began to drop dramatically, as 48 Republicans in the US House of Representatives sent a message to Prince Muhammad bin Salman a week after President Trump called him, asking his country to stop harming the global crude oil markets and take measures to ensure stability.
The message showed that if the Saudi administration does not take the expected steps in the oil markets, the relations between Washington and Riyadh will be strained.
“This situation will undermine the economic and military relations between our two countries… The military presence of the United States in the Middle East guarantees economic prosperity and security for both countries,” the message said.
The message continued, “As members of Congress, we do not want this partnership to weaken, but if the Kingdom does not take the necessary steps to reverse the emerging energy crisis, we will encourage the US administration to consider an appropriate response”.
About the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul, who went to his country’s consulate on October 2, 2018, to conduct a marriage transaction, the American writer said: “During the period after the crime, information emerged about when, where and how did Khashoggi die?, but the issue of his body location It was not clear.
The American newspaper “Washington Post” has written that the CIA reached the conclusion that Prince Bin Salman ordered the killing of Khashoggi.
