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posted by martyb on Thursday May 18 2017, @11:01PM   Printer-friendly
from the artful-dealing dept.

Ahead of the US president's visit to Saudi Arabia, a series of multi-billion-dollar arms deals have been outlined. The previous US administration suspended some supplies because of human rights concerns.

Deutsche Welle

When President Trump arrives in Riyadh this week, he will lay out his vision for a new regional security architecture White House officials call an “Arab NATO,” to guide the fight against terrorism and push back against Iran. As a cornerstone of the plan, Trump will also announce one of the largest arms-sales deals in history.

Behind the scenes, the Trump administration and Saudi Arabia have been conducting extensive negotiations, led by White House senior adviser Jared Kushner and Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The discussions began shortly after the presidential election, when Mohammed, known in Washington as “MBS,” sent a delegation to meet with Kushner and other Trump officials at Trump Tower.

After years of disillusionment with the Obama administration, the Saudi leadership was eager to do business. “They were willing to make a bet on Trump and on America,” a senior White House official said.

[...] The most concrete part of the idea is a mammoth U.S. arms package for Saudi Arabia that Trump will also announce in Riyadh. Final details are still being worked out, but officials said the package will include between $98 billion and $128 billion in arms sales. Over 10 years, total sales could reach $350 billion.

The sales include huge upgrades for the Saudi army and navy to include Littoral Combat Ships, THAAD missile defense systems, armored personnel carriers, missiles, bombs and munitions, officials said. Some of the production and assembly could be located in Saudi Arabia, boosting MBS’s project to build a Saudi domestic defense industrial capability. But most of the items would be built by American defense contractors.

The Washington Post

Additional coverage:

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The UK Government Has Finally Admitted We're at War in Yemen
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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @04:00AM (8 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @04:00AM (#512005)

    10 Reasons to Make the Break with Saudi Arabia

    That place is right out of the 7th Century. [commondreams.org]

    1. Saudi Arabia is governed as an absolutist monarchy

    2. Criticizing the monarchy or defending human rights can bring down severe and cruel punishments

    3. Saudi Arabia has one of the highest execution rates in the world
    [The executions are usually carried out by public beheading.]

    4. Saudi women are second-class citizens. [...] gender segregation [...] a strict dress code. Women need the approval of a male guardian to marry, travel, enroll in a university, or obtain a passport and they're prohibited from driving. According to interpretations of Sharia law, daughters generally receive half the inheritance awarded to their brothers, and the testimony of one man is equal to that of two women.

    5. no freedom of [religion] [...] all Saudis are required by law to be Muslims.

    6. The Saudis export an extremist interpretation of Islam, Wahhabism

    7. The country is built and runs thanks to foreigner laborers, but the more than six million foreign workers have virtually no legal protections. Coming from poor countries, many are lured to the kingdom under false pretenses and forced to endure dangerous working and living conditions. Female migrants employed in Saudi homes as domestic workers report regular physical, sexual, and emotional abuse.

    8. The Saudis are funding terrorism worldwide.

    9. The Saudis have used their massive military apparatus to invade neighboring countries and quash democratic uprisings

    10. The Saudis backed a coup in Egypt that killed over 1,000 people and saw over 40,000 political dissidents thrown into squalid prisons

    http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/47070.htm# [informationclearinghouse.info]
    11. Saudi Arabia helps maintain the world’s destructive dependence on oil.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

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  • (Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday May 19 2017, @08:34AM (2 children)

    by GreatAuntAnesthesia (3275) on Friday May 19 2017, @08:34AM (#512083) Journal

    10 Reasons ...

    1.

    ...

    11.

    Speaking of intolerant religious authoritarians, I think I hear the Spanish Inquisition coming.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @07:20PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @07:20PM (#512311)

      Each link goes to a different page.
      Both are by Medea Benjamin.
      Each contains 10 items but they differ slightly in content.

      intolerant religious authoritarians

      I am certain that if you are spending time on your knees and/or casting your eyes skyward as if a magical man is up there, that is a waste of time.

      Those attempts to communicate with mythical beings is only demonstrating how foolish you are to accept children's fables as a basis for your life but, as long as you aren't using your nonsensical belief system to hurt others, then no harm, no foul.

      The story of the Nazararean doesn't include any examples of that character saying "Build gaudy giant monuments to me" yet "his followers" do that quite often.
      Now, there -are- passages in that scripture that have him quoted as instructing his followers to see to the earthly needs of other humans, yet a vast majority of those folks who profess to be his people don't do that.

      ...then there's the "Prosperity Gospel" types who completely distort the content of the scripture that they claim to be their founding principles.

      ...and many of the ragheads' practices aren't called out in their holy book; those are tribal paternalistic/misogynistic patterns established even before their prophet delivered his nonsense.
      Again, some folks have allowed themselves to get stuck in the 7th Century.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday May 19 2017, @10:30AM (2 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday May 19 2017, @10:30AM (#512110) Journal

    11. Saudi Arabia helps maintain the world’s destructive dependence on oil.

    Uhh? And how are they doing that?

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @07:46PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @07:46PM (#512329)

      Dumping. [google.com]
      They are keeping the price low by accelerating the rate of extraction and getting rid of a commodity that is rapidly losing its luster as renewables become ever more economical solutions to old problems.

      Venezuela's tanked economy is a result of this as well (in addition to that country's unwillingness to develop their agricultural and manufacturing base via worker-owned cooperatives).

      Maybe Medea's answer would be different from mine.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

      • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday May 19 2017, @08:17PM

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday May 19 2017, @08:17PM (#512358) Journal

        The single instance of dumping I remember is the 2015-2016 episode**. Are there others?

        ** (and for this one we may not have seen yet the end of it. It can still backfire big time - the Saudis didn't just dump but have also bought lotsa shale oil fields in US; these may transform into serious liabilities as the world is slowly weaning from oil).

        --
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @03:35PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @03:35PM (#512226)

    To get your "10 reasons" list down to 10 entries, just drop item #4 since that is just sensible policy.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @06:41PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 19 2017, @06:41PM (#512296)

      One assumes that this is your admission of having a small penis.
      Real men don't need to suppress someone else's human rights in order to seem superior.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]