Clemons in the FT:"The Obama administration’s $60bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia is already being touted a domestic “jobs generator” for Americans. Instead, it should be seen as a strategically savvy deal – and one at the heart of a changed US strategy in the Middle East that seeks to confront Iran through proxies and allies.
By pushing helicopters and fighters to the Saudis, the US is stealing the scene from Iran, and removing the perception that it is the only rising power in the region. Given global concerns about Iran’s nuclear course, along with doubts about US power in the Middle East and fear about Israel striking Iran on its own, President Barack Obama and King Abdullah have raised the ante in a high stakes effort to create a new, stable balance of power.
It might seem unlikely that a raft of sophisticated arms under Saudi control really can stabilise the neighbourhood and change both the calculations of Iran’s nuclear protagonists and Israel’s hawks. Critics will say the move will quickly backfire and ignite a new regional arms race. But, oddly, both of these scenarios can be simultaneously true. What is important is that the US sale is an attempt by Mr Obama’s team to bolster the capacity of one of Iran’s natural regional rivals, without encouraging either a regional war or Israeli bomb-dropping.
Having capacity is not the same as using it. This move, while provocative in the eyes of some analysts, will actually help deflate calls for imminent attacks on Iran’s nuclear capacity.
The risks for the Saudis, the Middle East and Mr Obama, however, is actually that this 10-year arms-building programme begins to drive not only Iran’s strategic paranoia – which is already high given John Bolton and his fellow travellers’ incessant calls for regime change – but a greater appetite for arms acquisition across the entire region. This could happen. But while new Saudi military capacity can help change the decisions of Iran’s mullahs today, this weaponry may also generate fear in Israel or other nations in the region tomorrow. Don’t forget that Israel has not accepted King Abdullah’s much-offered Arab Peace Initiative normalising relations between Israel and most of the world’s Arab and Muslim-dominant nations in exchange for a Palestinian state along 1967 borders as well as other conditions. The Saudis and Israelis are still on opposite sides.
True, the chances of achieving equilibrium with one big favour to Saudi Arabia today is highly unlikely. But Mr Obama’s moves remains strategically astute in the near term. More importantly, it could begin to chart a new approach in which the US can work as an offshore balance in regions around the world, helping to nudge military and economic favours between competitors without a massive US invasion force."
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