Saudi Crown Prince announces new draft laws to reform judicial institutions

[Morch]

3 hours ago, pacovl46 said:

Yeah, but comments how progressive he is and that he’s much better in that regard than others before him. While that might be the case it’s completely irrelevant because his evil actions trump everything good he ever did or will do in my book.

 

Ok. I'm not a purist, nor do I think that actions can be that neatly balanced, canceled out and so forth.

[Morch]

1 hour ago, placeholder said:

There were a lot more rational people as possible successors. Mohammed bin Nayef comes to mind.

"Prince Ahmed and MBN spent time as minister of the interior, a powerful position with oversight of troops and Saudi Arabia’s large intelligence service. MBN had close ties to U.S. intelligence and was respected for his knowledge of security and terror threats in the Middle East. But over the past few years, their standing in the royal family has diminished as King Salman consolidated power and installed his son Mohammed bin Salman —known as MBS—as crown prince and the kingdom’s day-to-day ruler."

https://www.wsj.com/articles/top-saudi-royal-family-members-detained-11583531033

As for what would have happened under a different ruler, who knows? I doubt that something as minor as Qatar's tweaking of the Saudis would have upset a more rational ruler all that much. Can't imagine MbN being so impulsive and irrational. It is not cheap or frivolous name calling to to call MbS a megalomaniac.

And ventures in Saudi Arabia were greatly affected by MbS well before the Khashoggi assassinaton.

 

How Mohammed bin Salman Turned Saudi Arabia Into an Investment Wasteland

Long before the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, even as credulous Western boosters were promoting Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as a reformer and a visionary, the smart money was moving out of Saudi Arabia...

From 2016 to 2017, foreign direct investment in Saudi Arabia plummeted by an astonishing 80 percent, from about $7.5 billion to about $1.4 billion, according to the U.N. Conference on Trade and Development. Net capital outflows were also way up—largely because wealthy Saudis were moving money abroad, noted Phillip Cornell, an expert in the Saudi economy at the Atlantic Council.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/10/26/how-mohammed-bin-salman-turned-saudi-arabia-into-an-investment-wasteland-khashoggi/

 

 

MbN? More experienced, for sure, better ties with the US too. Not a hothead. But on the other hand, a real ruthless enforcer of Saudi Arabia's internal security issues, and hawkish on the Yemen front. Don't think he had much of an impact on economic or foreign policy. He might have been a "safer" choice, but IMO, MbS's ascent was, in part, due to the Kingdom seen as needing reform and action, on both domestic and foreign issues. Not referring to how that panned out.

 

The issue(s) with Qatar were already there. You can doubt away, but this was just another episode in a two decade conflict. I seriously doubt any Saudi Arabia ruler would simply let it go, or try to negotiate over and over again. They have their own equivalent "face" issues, same as here, maybe worse.

 

With regard to Yemen, again, nothing to indicate MbN wouldn't have gone in as well. Maybe more cautiously, maybe with better leadership, but not less ruthlessly. And, he might have had way  more cooperation from the USA...

 

Read my post again, I said that it was the accumulated actions of MbS, rather than a specific one. There seem to be two related issue there - Saudi money going out, foreign investment not coming in. Add oil prices not being what they were, and the strain on the budget. A lot of this is on him, but not all.

 

The topic, though, is about domestic reforms, an area which by Saudi Arabia's standards, seem to be on the move, and in the right direction.