Page 77 - Bloomberg Businessweek-October 29, 2018

◼ REMARKS Bloomberg Businessweek October 29, 2018

U.S. won’t. Washington has been sim- support for Kurdish militias in Syria or more, switching to buy arms from
ilarly absent from the main negotia- (Turkey regards them as terrorists); and Russia and China, and ending the shar-
tions on ending Syria’s seven-year-old an easing of pressure on Qatar.” Turkey ing of counterterrorism intelligence.
war, which are led by Iran, Russia, and has taken the side of the tiny gulf state in Neil Quilliam, a former U.K. diplomat
Turkey. Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah a bitter quarrel with Saudi Arabia, which now at Chatham House, a London-based
El-Sisi, who took power in a 2013 military accuses its neighbor of supporting the think tank, dismisses all that. “A whole-
coup, has diluted his country’s depen- Islamist Muslim Brotherhood. Erdogan sale swing from under the U.S. security
dence on the U.S., buying Russian arms. too has ties to the Brotherhood. umbrella would take years. It would be
In early October he signed a strategic On Oct. 24, at the Future Investment a huge undertaking,” he says, not least
partnership agreement with President Initiative conference in Riyadh—which because the wider Saudi royal family
Vladimir Putin in Moscow and accepted had suffered from no-shows because of would see such a move as a threat to the
$25 billion in loans to build nuclear the killing—Prince Mohammed finally family project and resist. Weaponizing
power plants. spoke. He condemned Khashoggi’s mur- the oil price to harm the U.S. would
Iran, meanwhile, is finding some der as a “heinous crime’’ and warned also penalize U.S. efforts to pressure
succor from America’s European allies, that efforts to drive a wedge between Iran by sanctioning its oil sales—a core
as well as from China and Russia, as it Saudi Arabia and Turkey would fail. Saudi interest. The kingdom’s military
resists U.S. economic pressure. None Tellingly, he had praise for Qatar, which, is heavily reliant on a sophisticated
has followed the U.S. in withdrawing “despite the differences we have, has a air force built around 170 U.S. F-15 and
from the 2015 nuclear deal that lifted great economy.” 150 European Tornado and Typhoon
economic sanctions on Iran in exchange The prince is still the most power- planes. Western sanctions that cut off
for restrictions on its nuclear fuel pro- ful personage in the kingdom, after his parts for maintenance would be crip-
gram. The other signatories are looking father, and has been cultivating friend- pling; the Saudi air campaign in its war in
at ways to get around the U.S. sanctions ships in other spheres of influence. Yemen could, for example, quickly stall.
scheduled to be reimposed in November. Saudi Arabia—which bought $3.4 bil- Ries, the former diplomat, argues
A Saudi move out of the U.S. orbit lion of U.S. weaponry last year, accord- that the region isn’t changing dramat-
would be seismic. Although still improb- ing to the Stockholm International Peace ically. Russia’s more visible military 15
able, it can’t be ruled out if demands Research Institute—has already reached role and influence in Syria since 2015,
for the resignation of Crown Prince out to Russia. It’s working more closely for example, has merely entrenched
Mohammed bin Salman were to esca- with Moscow in determining oil prices, the status quo. In 2011, Bashar al-Assad
late. In his speech, Erdogan—whose gov- and until recently was in talks to pur- was already in charge in Damascus, Iran
ernment itself has an abysmal record chase Russian S-400 missile defense sys- was his key regional backer, and Russia
on press freedom—turned up the heat tems. (Turkey is risking U.S. sanctions to had a naval base at the Syrian port of
on the Saudis by insisting the journal- buy the same weapon.) Tartus. “Ultimately, these relationships
ist’s death was planned in Riyadh. The Moscow appears to be betting on are based on interests,” he says. “Those
Turkish president, however, didn’t the prince. Two people familiar with interests haven’t materially changed.”
mention the prince by name or follow Kremlin thinking told Bloomberg News Still, if the squabbling between Saudi
through on his threat to lay bare all the that Russia expects him to survive the Arabia and Turkey continues, it will
facts of Khashoggi’s murder—facts that crisis. A Mideast specialist who’s a make it more difficult for Washington
ultimately will frame the responses close policy adviser to Kremlin officials to achieve objectives like the isolation
of Western governments. Hours later, says some among Moscow’s top ranks of Iran (page 16). The U.S. is still domi-
Trump, in one of his bursts of commen- believe he will outmaneuver opponents nant in the area—something Saudis and
tary on the case, declared to reporters, and push to take over from his father Turks concede—but Washington’s influ-
“The cover-up was the worst in the his- to rule directly in the next few months. ence depends on its management of
tory of cover-ups.” Also without naming Putin hasn’t been critical. “The fact that local ambitions. The geopolitical equa-
names, he said, “Whoever thought of a person has disappeared is of course tions may not be about to change, but
that idea I think is in big trouble.” terrible, but we need to understand what they’re always being recalculated: The
Many analysts believe Erdogan was happened,” he said. region is a multilevel chess game, every
seizing on the Khashoggi tragedy to The director of Al Arabiya Television move having an infinity of possible con-
stake out his primacy over the prince. News Network, Turki Al-Dakhil, recently sequences. Ries is convinced change will
Others said he might have been angling wrote an article in which he claimed be slow. “The Saudis have options just as
for a deal with the kingdom. Bloomberg Saudi officials were considering as many we have options,” he says. But the con-
Opinion’s Bobby Ghosh wrote: “It’s easy as 30 ways to strike back at Western stant test for any American president is
to see what Turkey could want from allies should they sanction the kingdom. dealing with the choices each country
Saudi Arabia: a cash injection to revive its Those countermeasures would include can make. <BW> �with Henry Meyer, Ilya
flagging economy; a withdrawal of Saudi driving up the price of oil to $200 a barrel Arkhipov, and Benjamin Harvey