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In some ways, I can't blame the Saudis for being hyper-sensitive about their Shia population giving their current geo-political position; but executing people isn't going to help the situation at all. None of these clowns think about the human and social costs that their asinine sectarian/regional squabble creates.
I doubt the Iranians and Saudis will come to direct blows as they simply don't have the ability to effectively wage a conventional war on each other. The Saudis won't be comfortable with their geo-political position until Iran's proxies in Syria and particularity Yemen are defeated (mitigated political power for Shiites in Iraq would be a bonus), yet they aren't quite doing the best job in bringing about this outcome. I'd say that perhaps a more open and obvious hostility and escalated tension might lead to a broader and deeper diplomatic breakthrough, but I wouldn't bet 2 cents on it.
The US has a continuing 1972 agreement to provide military protection to Saudi Arabia in return for them propping up the US dollar on the world market by selling their oil only for US dollars.
This is the most important reason the US has been backing Saudi Arabia, and US presidents have been kissing their butts since 1972. It's a very important reason, petrodollars. As the largest oil producer the Saudi's hold some valuable cards with concern to the US economy. If, at any point they decide to stop trading oil in US dollars, a host of other OPEC countries will follow suit and the value of the dollar will crash to about one third of it's value. The market would be flooded with dollars and get dumped back here.
The Saudi's don't want to devalue the dollars they are holding, as they hold a lot of US currency, but if they could offload those dollars quickly before everyone followed suit, they would get the most value out of those inflated dollars, and could then carry on selling their oil in other world currencies, such as Russian Rubles, Chinese Yuan.....whatever, and not lose nearly as much as the US would in that process. What the Saudi's can do to the US is very dangerous, and they could pull the plug anytime on the petrodollar. I hope Trump realizes this when he becomes president. I'm sure the economists put every new president thru Saudi School as soon as they take office. I don't know what can be done to change those cards the Saudi's hold.
So we pretty much have to back Saudi Arabia weather we like it or not, kinda sucks.
I wonder why we don't destroy the Saudis and simply take the oil and sell it ourselves. After all there aren't that many Saudis and I'll bet the ayatollahs of Iran would be glad to operate the Holy places for us.
No it wouldn't. Russia can't even afford a full-blown war in Syria. Why would it help Iran? Their interests in Syria are different. Russia just wants to maintain its military base and stop total anarchy; it doesn't necessarily care about Assad. Iran does.
Israel probably wouldn't help all out. They would destroy Iran's nuke sites and take out Hezbollah and Hamas, but that's probably it. They'd like to see both countries wipe themselves out.
Iran may have a bigger population, but it's armed forces are very weak. Why else do you think they have proxies do all their fighting for them? They couldn't even beat Hussein's Iraq, a smaller country. Population isn't everything. Also, Iran's weapons are far worse, and Saudi Arabia could merely muster up millions of the world's Sunni (mostly Arab) to come to their aid in an invasion of Iran.
Don't forget history--it was the Arabs who crushed (and ruined) Persia in the past.
Anyone siding with Saudi Arabia over Iran has some issues they need to work out.
Iran is not the Shi'ite equivalent of Saudi Arabia as the prime Sunni power. Fanatical groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda don't exist in the Shi'ite community. Iranian-backed Shi'ite groups in the Middle East like Hezbollah may hate the US, but they make a clear distinction between hating our government and hating our people, and they only hate our government because of our imperialism and because we back Israel without hesitation. Groups like Hezbollah also enjoy good relations with secular and Christian parties, their number one ally in Lebanon is the biggest Christian party in parliament. Whatever political differences you have with such groups, they are not barbarians. Meanwhile, Sunni groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda are monsters, beheading people on sight. The thing is, these monsters are no different than the ruling family in Saudi Arabia. Wahabism is wahabism. The Saudi family gets a pass for behaving with and promoting an ideology that we hate ISIS for.
You may hate Iran for hating us (and they hate us because of what we did in 1953, and also because our sanctions starved so many of them), but Iran has the same interest as us in seeing terrorists like ISIS and al-Qaeda wiped out. In fact, they are doing more to eliminate them than we are.
By the way, in a war between Iran and Saudi Arabia, all Iran would have to do is bomb the Saudi's oil sights to finish them. Combine that with the fact that Iran's population is nearly three times Saudi's, and the fact that the Saudi military are cowards who can't fight worth a damn (how's that campaign in Yemen going?) despite how much money they have, and you have a swift Iranian victory. The real question is whether Iran's allies could whether the storm when Israel comes for them, which the Saudis will inevitably push for.
If you truly believe this, then you're a damned fool.
They hate us because we are not Muslims. They are no different than the Sunnis. Iran is the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism. Just because they are killing ISIS doesn't make them our friends.
This is the most important reason the US has been backing Saudi Arabia, and US presidents have been kissing their butts since 1972. It's a very important reason, petrodollars. As the largest oil producer the Saudi's hold some valuable cards with concern to the US economy. If, at any point they decide to stop trading oil in US dollars, a host of other OPEC countries will follow suit and the value of the dollar will crash to about one third of it's value. The market would be flooded with dollars and get dumped back here.
The Saudi's don't want to devalue the dollars they are holding, as they hold a lot of US currency, but if they could offload those dollars quickly before everyone followed suit, they would get the most value out of those inflated dollars, and could then carry on selling their oil in other world currencies, such as Russian Rubles, Chinese Yuan.....whatever, and not lose nearly as much as the US would in that process. What the Saudi's can do to the US is very dangerous, and they could pull the plug anytime on the petrodollar. I hope Trump realizes this when he becomes president. I'm sure the economists put every new president thru Saudi School as soon as they take office. I don't know what can be done to change those cards the Saudi's hold.
So we pretty much have to back Saudi Arabia weather we like it or not, kinda sucks.
IF your info's right: I'd make MORE sense for the US to occupy Saudi and ban Sharia "law", at gunpoint. Too; FORCE those lazy young Saudi dudes to do their own manual labor, it'd make men out of them real quick IMHO.
Sorry for the rough words here; CDF, my respect for the Arab Muslim world is all but gone. Especially after what happened in Paris in 2015.
I was talking with a Persian the other evening. He now lives in the US. He fought for us during the Iraq war. When I asked him what his nationality was he said Persian. When I asked if that was the same as Iranian he vehemently stated he was Persian and Persia did not include ANY of the Arab (remarkable string of derogatory expletives in at least two languages) sections of Iran let alone the (expletives deleted) Arabs infesting the rest of the Middle East.
I was talking with a Persian the other evening. He now lives in the US. He fought for us during the Iraq war. When I asked him what his nationality was he said Persian. When I asked if that was the same as Iranian he vehemently stated he was Persian and Persia did not include ANY of the Arab (remarkable string of derogatory expletives in at least two languages) sections of Iran let alone the (expletives deleted) Arabs infesting the rest of the Middle East.
This was a most revealing conversation.
That's sad because not all Arabs; even Muslims, are ghetto trash.
I was stating this Persian's opinion and although I agree with most of it I do not think ALL Arabs are a waste of space and air.
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