That oil wealth bought them about half a century of prosperity and it’s clear they’ve blown it-—camel humping and in-breeding is not a way to advance a society. And this is Prince Bandar yet shooting his mouth off. Remember he was the long time US Ambassador from SA, US educated, buttoned down, with absolutely no excuses for not knowing a better way to run a kingdom. The ungrateful SOB is going to get his throat cut along with all 5,000 of his sisters, brothers, mothers, uncles, and everyone else who has shared a camel. I’ve studied these dirt bagz since I was in high school and wrote a paper on Aramco-—in 1958-— probably the best description of Aramco yet written (?).
I only hope They are serious about cutting ties. We’ve given them privileges they never deserved, access they never deserved (think mosques) , let them get away with abductions of US children, the list is a long one.
The real bottom line for them is that they see our oil/gas production as cutting them out of the market. They were happy getting a $buck fifty a barrel for their oil back in the 1960’s. Then they got greedy. Before they are done they might be back to paying a $1.50 to get someone to haul off their crude if they don’t maintain stability. Otherwise the oil is worthless. Everything else is sniveling. Whining about Bahrain is the crack in the Arabian door. As soon as the rebel types realize our F-18’s aren’t going to show up you can expect the Soddy peninsula to light up.
Remember that’s all Bin Laden wanted was for us to quit defending the Soddies so he could cut their throats himself. We could have gotten out in 1993 and saved the World Trade Center.