Cold Blooded Politics
Click the bloody hand to enlarge the image.
It looks like Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman knew about the Kashoggi murder. The CIA says he ordered it. But President Trump says, “Maybe he did and maybe he didn’t.”
Trump has MBS’s back because the Saudis buy a lot of stuff from us. He bragged that he did “$450 billion in commercial deals” on his trip to Saudi Arabia.
Cold Blooded Politics
WSJ editors think Trump is crass. But they also thinks the Saudis are important allies in a “dangerous war against Middle Eastern terror supported by the mullahs in Iran.” The editorial page calls it “Trump’s Crude Realpolitik.”
And the barbaric murder of a journalist is crude. But not as crude as 3,000 murders on 9/11. Columnist Holman Jenkins claims the 15 Saudi hijackers may have had the support of members of the royal family:
If Saudi royals crave an airing of this dirty laundry, they know what to do: Keep MBS in power. Undoubtably among the interested would be the 9/11 families who managed to win, over President Obama’s veto, sweeping bipartisan support for their lawsuit to hold the Saudi government accountable for the murder of their loved ones on 9/11.
If the Saudis think President Trump can (or wants to ) protect MBS against all that would follow, they should think again.
Update 11/28: The Washington Post’s David Ignatius says there’s a power struggle going on within the royal family. And he has an interesting story about captive family member Turki bin Abdullah and “his closest adviser, Saudi businessman Tarek Obaid.” Obaid is hiding out in Switzerland and may have barely escaped the same fate as Kashoggi. Obaid says, “There was clear abuse of power by incompetent thugs, but I don’t believe that the crown prince’s instructions were for these events to play out as they did.”
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