Posted on 04/29/2023 2:03:55 PM PDT by fireman15
Historians will mark the low point of Pax Americana in the Middle East by several rather brutal humiliations that American prestige has undergone under President Joe Biden’s presidency. Examples would include having phone call requests by the US president declined by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in March last year and mass media pictures of the impersonal fist-bump between Joe Biden and de facto ruler and Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammed Bin Salman (or “MBS” as he is familiarly called) in July.
The US president had come to Riyadh with a begging bowl but failed to convince the Saudis to rescue the US gasoline market from high prices by opening the Arab oil tap in time for the mid-term US elections. This was after the President Biden had promised to make the Kingdom a “pariah” during his 2020 election campaign in response to the killing of Adnan Khashoggi.
With the decline of US dominance in Middle East security affairs, a spate of intra-regional diplomatic moves towards peace seems to have broken out. This might sound ironic to observers of American diplomacy and military power in the region. But an assertive Saudi foreign policy under its Crown Prince and the vastly altered circumstances caused by Western sanctions on Russia’s oil and gas exports saw Riyadh distance itself from Washington.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
"The Russian economy is now slated by the IMF’s latest economic outlook to outperform Britain and Germany this year. Russia posted a record current account surplus of $227 billion in 2022, up 86% from 2021. Russia replaced revenues lost from its oil and gas exports to Europe with a pivot to China, India, UAE, Turkey and other countries not participating in the Western-led sanctions (i.e. the rest of the world outside the “collective West”). Its oil export levels have not seen any significant reduction. Last week, Reuters reported that oil loadings from Russia's western ports in April rose to the highest since 2019. Though sold at discounted prices, Russian oil and gas exports to markets in the “Global South” have enjoyed relatively high international commodity prices even if below the peaks immediately after the Ukraine invasion."
Not only that, but one has to wonder just how much influence the oil barons and weapon merchants had over US policy towards the Middle East.
The Afghanistan withdrawal disaster cost us
We have a long tradition of schitzo foreign policy whenever the Democrats have been in control. It is all about what the money guys who support them want. The best interests of US citizens or even our allies, let alone the poor souls that live in the regions that have been targeted have no weight at all.
“Blood In The Streets” put the end of Pax Americana in 1973 (first oil embargo)
We’ve lost any moral high ground since the “Fortified” election to lecture any other nation about “Democracy”.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.