One should take notice of the ongoing media narrative about Congressional lawmakers against the actions of the Saudi prince involving the Washington Post journalist…
The first noise was about cutting arms sale to the kingdom….
That has ceased….
The second noise was about halting support by this country for the Saudi/Yemen military action….
That has folding into halting the refueling of Saudi military aircraft ONLY….
The action now is for cutting support for the Yemen action in 90 days….
90 days is a long time…..
The US is going to continue to support the Saudi’s and keep exporting arms to the country….
No matter what the media and lawmakers grouse about?
The United States and its Allies NEED the Saudi’s strong and as a counter balance to Iran in the Middle East….
It IS THAT simple….
With the domestic marketplace increasingly budget-constrained, foreign arms sales represent an important growth sector for U.S. defense primes, their employees and elected officials.
Which is how on Nov. 28 the Senate voted 63-37 for an extraordinary rebuke of Saudi Arabia but the State Departmentconfirmed Saudi and U.S. officials signed letters of offer and acceptance of a potential $15 billion deal for Lockheed Martin’s Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system (pictured).
Expect the cognitive dissonance to continue, and revenue from major U.S. defense-related work for Saudi Arabia to stay safe.
“We think Congress ultimately will adopt some type of restrictions on Saudi weapons buys, either in the lame duck or fiscal 2020 bills,” Cowen and Co. analysts Cai von Rumohr and Roman Schweizer say in a Nov. 26 report. “But it would appear that these would be limited in duration and scope, and big-ticket buys of missile defense systems would not be impacted.
“Rather, the restrictions . . . look to be confined to restricting the Saudis’ ability to conduct offensive operations in Yemen,” they continue.
Sheila Kahyaoglu and Greg Konrad of Jefferies agree. “Congress appears mixed on repercussions, while the [Trump] administration is supportive of ongoing sales,” they noted in late October. Indeed, the whole question of how much financial pain would be felt by businesses and their employees “seems to be less of an issue in our view,” and for several reasons, they stated.
First, Washington disagrees over how much of a cudgel foreign military sales could be against recent Saudi transgressions. The sales themselves have not amounted to much yet, despite President Donald Trump’s initial $110 billion assertions last year.
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Citing U.S. government data, Byron Callan of Capital Alpha Partners observed that total U.S. defense exports to Saudi Arabia were $3 billion in 2017, up 21% from 2016. The largest increase was in a category covering tanks, artillery, rockets and missiles, which jumped from $581 million in 2016 to $1.4 billion in 2017….
Note….
Please note that as usual?
Donald Trump does NOT tell the truth about something….
Current Defense sales to the kingdom is estimated at $3 Billion…Nowhere near the $110 Billion figure Trump has been shopping around in the media….It’s NOT about the money….It IS about keeping the Saudi’s strong vs Iran and its influence in the region….