Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Biden snub is a ‘warning’

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES – President Joe Biden’s press secretary this week sent a striking message to Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Jen Psaki said at a press conference, using diplomatic language, that the US-Saudi relationship – especially the one with the kingdom’s crown prince – was being downgraded.

“Regarding Saudi Arabia, I would say that we made it clear from the start that we were going to recalibrate our relations with Saudi Arabia,” Psaki said from the White House on Tuesday.

On whether Biden would speak with the Crown Prince, she replied, “Part of it comes down to peer-to-peer engagement. The president’s counterpart is King Salman, and hopefully in due course. , he would. have a conversation with him. I don’t have a timeline on this. “

The quotes immediately caught the attention of regional analysts and foreign policy experts, as well as likely Gulf rulers, as a blatant snub of the 35-year-old Saudi heir to the monarchy and arguably the most powerful of the region.

“Well, I think what Jen said, actually, I know what she said was that the president would engage with his counterpart, and that his counterpart is the king,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said Wednesday.

Price added that Secretary of State Antony Blinken will similarly engage with his counterpart, Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud.

“President Biden has said that we will look at this entire relationship to make sure it advances interests, is respectable and respects the values ​​we bring to this partnership,” Price said.

“We know of course that Saudi Arabia is an important partner on many different fronts. Counterterrorism in matters of regional security are just two of them,” he added.

“The snub to MBS represents a warning to Saudi Arabia,” wrote Torbjorn Soltvedt, senior MENA analyst at Verisk Maplecroft, in an email Wednesday, referring to the crown prince by his initials. “This will be seen as a disapproval of the leadership of MBS which has been characterized by unpredictable decision making and a much less consultative approach than in the past.”

And the administration’s apparent intention to sideline the crown prince represents a dramatic departure from Trump’s White House, which made Saudi Arabia the former president’s first overseas visit, signed major arms deals with the kingdom in defiance of congressional opposition and refrained from criticizing the kingdom. on its human rights violations.

This shouldn’t come as a huge surprise, since Biden promised a tougher line on the oil-rich Islamic monarchy early on. In a primary debate in early 2020, Biden pledged to make Saudi Arabia “the outcast that it is.”

“It’s not a surprising move, but it’s bold, and it will hurt,” Michael Stephens, analyst at the Institute for Research on Foreign Policy, told CNBC. “There is no doubt that Psaki’s comments were aimed at the crown prince, even though he is for all intents and purposes the man responsible for the kingdom.”

A number of scandals and crises coming to the kingdom since the crown prince came to power have drawn condemnation not only from Democrats, but Republicans as well.

According to a former Obama administration official, speaking anonymously due to professional constraints, “The Saudis in Washington are in the worst position they have ever been. This has just been covered up by the White House of Trump. “

The Saudi government did not respond to CNBC’s requests for comment.

Already, Biden has paused a major arms sale to the kingdom and other Gulf allies signed under the Trump administration, and he has mandated an end to U.S. support for the Saudi-led war in the Yemen, which created what the UN calls the world’s worst man-made humanitarian crisis.

And the kingdom has faced an international conviction for the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi by state agents. US intelligence has linked the death to the crown prince, which Riyadh strongly denies.

“With the ongoing war in Yemen, the crackdown on prominent members of the country’s political and economic elite in 2017, the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, and the oil price war last year, the blunt questions do not not lacking for the Biden administration, take umbrage, ”Soltvedt wrote.

But how realistic is Team Biden’s goal of bypassing the Crown Prince – who is also Minister of Defense, next to the throne and made the bulk of the kingdom’s major decisions?

According to Ali Shihabi, a Saudi analyst close to the kingdom’s royal court, this is not at all realistic.

“They can’t do anything if they don’t deal with MBS,” Shihabi told Politico. “The king works, but he’s very old. He’s the chairman of the board. He’s not involved in day-to-day issues. Eventually, they’ll want to speak directly to MBS.”

King Salman, reigning monarch since 2015, is now 85 years old.

Verisk’s Soltvedt agrees. “King Salman is the head of state and ultimately holds the levers of power. But it is MBS who exercises direct control over the kingdom’s most important portfolios and institutions,” he wrote. “A change in Washington’s approach to its relations with the Saudi leadership will not change that.”

While the Biden administration is expected to give the Gulf states lower priority than its predecessor, they still remain the United States’ major arms customers and regional counterterrorism partners, as well as oil suppliers – although less and less within a year for the latter. .

So while Biden’s team signals a change, it won’t be a breakdown in relations, many foreign policy experts believe.

“I think the most important thing to realize is that over the years, US policy towards Saudi Arabia has been relatively consistent regardless of which party is in power,” said Tarek Fadlallah, CEO Middle East of Nomura.

“There will be a slightly different tone between this White House and the last White House,” Fadlallah said. “But I don’t think that will have consequences in terms of policy towards the region or policy towards Saudi Arabia.”

– CNBC Amanda Macias contributed to this report from Washington.