Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
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The agreement to merge LIV Golf with the PGA Tour is part of a broader 360-degree projection of hard and soft power designed to make Saudi Arabia a key player in the region and a pivotal one abroad with ties to all comers large and small.
Formal normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia has been a longstanding U.S. goal. The questions, though, are how much that normalization is worth in today’s climate, what Washington should be prepared to pay for it, and what it should receive in return.
China’s brokering of the Iran-Saudi deal is emblematic of a regional realignment that no longer sees the United States as the only party in its calculations. It may be tough for the great power to accept and harder for it to readjust. But it may have no choice.
In today’s rising tensions and competition between the United States on one side and China and Russia on the other, not only will Saudi Arabia refuse to choose sides, but it’s also likely to move closer to Beijing and Moscow as its own interests warrant.
The days when U.S. presidents dealt with risk-averse Saudi kings dependent on the United States and wary of offending Washington have been over for some time now.
One of the reasons Biden travelled to the Middle East is to counter the perception – and reality – that America was stepping back from the region because of domestic preoccupations and a foreign policy focused on Russia and China.
Let’s give the Biden administration the benefit of the doubt. Having deprioritized the Middle East for 16 months, the weeds grew.
Saudi Arabia will not become a democracy soon. But the United States can still engage with the monarchy constructively to make some gains on human rights, defend against authoritarianism and promote regional integration.
Pressure has been growing within the Biden administration to mend fences with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The U.S.-Saudi relationship has always been transactional. And that's the way Biden should approach any reconciliation.