Brian M Downing
In coming decades Saudi Arabia could be much more powerful than it is today. Its young ruler, Mohammad bin Salman, has ambitious plans for himself and his kingdom. Israel and the US are helping him, for now. Those three states may gravely weaken Iran in coming years. That would enhance Saudi prestige. The Sunni world may be more beholden than they are already. That includes states with respected armies such as Egypt, Jordan, and Pakistan.
The Saudi industrialization effort could work out in a decade or so. The kingdom may be be a center of manufacturing, investment banking, and arms production. The effort would integrate large portions of the Sunni world into a co-prosperity sphere with Riyadh at the center.
This will not sit well with Israel, any more than the rise of German industrial and military might did with Great Britain. Germany and Britain were longstanding allies who nonetheless later fought two ruinous wars against each other. Saudi Arabia and Israel have generally been enemies since the latter’s founding in 1948. Their recent alignment is of questionable provenance and endurance.
Saudi-Israeli cooperation against Iran may be a short break before a return to the status quo ante pacem. Washington and Jerusalem may be setting the stage for another Middle Eastern war, perhaps a large one. This time without guarantee of American support.
Sources of conflict
The ideological underpinning of the kingdom and its rulers is Wahabbism – an austere Sunni sect historically hostile to the West, modernity, and Israel, and determined to spread and dominate the Middle East and the rest of the Islamic world. Whatever the religiosity of the princes, they cannot ignore the creed’s principles or the expectations of true believers.
A yearning for restored unity and greatness simmers across Arab lands. Once the center of the world, politically, militarily, culturally, and scientifically, the region has been defeated, occupied, and humiliated by a succession of outsiders. Islamic armies ultimately won the Crusades, but in modern times they lost to European, Israeli, and American forces – often swiftly and embarrassingly. Nasser and Qaddafi promised to restore unity and greatness, but failed. ISIL and al Qaeda’s vision of glory has only limited appeal. Mohammad bin Salman may offer a more achievable vision of a Saudi Empire stretching from the Maghreb to the Persian Gulf.
Mohammad bin Salman’s legitimacy, at home and throughout the region, may one day rest in large part on defeating Iran. He will have brought victory to a region that’s seen very little of it. (The role of US and Israeli assistance will be minimized in Saudi narratives.) Faith and militarism will commingle and draw strength from one another.
Publics across the region will want more and they will look to Israel. An ambitious and ruthless king will not ignore them. Leaders of most Sunni states, including Saudi Arabia, have looked the other way as Israel expanded its power over the West Bank and Gaza. Israeli leaders repeatedly hint at bolder action on the Temple Mount to their Orthodox and nationalist base. Arab publics have not forgotten these issues. Their clerics call attention to them, Al Jazeera covers them extensively and is seen across the Middle East.
Many of these sentiments may be especially strong in the armies in the Saudi sphere, especially those of Egypt and Jordan. They’ve been defeated by Israel on more than one occasion and lost territory as well. Calls for vengeance may commingle with those for proving faith and restoring glory.
Saudi kings could increase their power prestige and standing with Arab publics and cast a shadow over Israel by developing nuclear weapons. Israel destroyed Iraqi reactors in 1981 and a Syrian one in 2007, and doggedly points to Iranian weapons programs. It will never allow Saudi Arabia to become a nuclear power.
Riyadh may find a way to become a nuclear power with a move similar to one done in Cuba in the early 60s. The Saudis underwrote Pakistan’s nuclear program and continue generous subsidies to its army and religious establishment. The latter’s Deobandi creed closely parallels Wahhabism in its anti-western and anti-Israel passions. The Saudis could one day convince Pakistan to position nuclear weapons inside the kingdom. It could be presented as defending the homeland of Islam. After all, Pakistani troops have been there for decades. It would nonetheless be an effort to intimidate Israel and augment Saudi power prestige.
© 2020 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to Susan Ganosellis.