Trump supports:
What do you think Donald Trump will do about Saudi Arabia? You all say Trump is brave, high energy, a strong leader, but will he stand up to the world's biggest financiers of terrorism? The country that economically blackmails the United States?
It's a non-country run by a non-monarchy set up by the British, and is one of the most toxic and backward things in the world. I don't know if we've come to the point of having to repartition the entire Middle East or not, but I think it's clearly time for us to renegotiate our relationships there in the same way that it's time to renegotiate NATO.
>>75253471
Trump's targeted them already in his rhetoric, and even insulted a saudi prince on twitter.
He's been pushing for the release of the classified 911 report pages too, which almost certainly implicate the saudis.
>>75253603
I definitely agree.
A bit irrelevant to your post but I have another point. I know this board hates Muslims more often then not but here me out.
Imagine you are a devout but moderate Muslim. Doesn't matter where you live, you have the money to go on your pilgrimage to Mecca. But you don't want to stay in the ugly, giant hotels shitting up Islam's holiest site, and you do not want to contribute to the GDP of such an evil country. What do you do?
How much Islamic extremism is Saudi Arabia responsible for, and how much just comes naturally? Because it seems Muslims are largely unwilling to stand up to the Saud family. Do they all more or less think Saudi Arabia is an okay country?
>>75254130
I really don't know enough Muslims to gauge how they think about it.
I also don't know the ins and outs of every sect and variant. I couldn't tell you the difference between Wahhabism and Salifism for instance, but I could tell you that they seem to be the pick of the litter for extremism.
Perhaps it's not unlike the Muslim Brotherhood which was originally formed by British Intelligence in the early 1900s by specifically selecting a political group (Wafd party) that would refuse to recognize the legitimacy of any surrounding state power and thereby could be used to lever power away from any surrounding power that got too big to control directly. Typical colonial divide and conquer tactic.
>>75253471
I believe that he's going to put on the friendly farce in public. Good business is good business after all, no need to shit in the punchbowl after all.
That being said, behind the scenes I think he's going to try and fuck with them using the same subterfuge they used for 9/11. Backchannel fuckery and whatnot
>>75253471
KSA is trumps mortal enemy
>>75254680
>I couldn't tell you the difference between Wahhabism and Salifism
I could if you like. I'm no expert but my grandmother is a member of a Sufi order and I've been to one of their dhikr circles.
Growing up in Canada I have met many Muslims. Most seem to be at least passively supportive Sharia law, but not all. Definitely not Sufis. My grandmother and her Muslim friends refuse to go to Mecca for example, because they despise Saudi Arabia. But I can tell you this: Sufis are a small minority. I did meet one Sunni Muslim studying in Canada, he told me about how people think of the government. There is significant liberalism in Saudi Arabia, it's just repressed. They spray-paint Che Guevara on walls and consider him a hero, he said. They want a secular regime.
I think the only reason Saudi Arabia exists is because the U.S. has not stood up to them, and because Muslims are mostly very apathetic in terms of politics. A few like my grandma's friends are liberal, they are probable outnumbered by extremist Salafist and Wahabi types, but the majority just don't care.
If we got rid of the Saudis I really doubt the Islamic world would be in political unrest like when a picture of Mohammed is drawn. We would just need to make sure they all hang high, and that all their oil money is seized and used for education in a new secular Arabia, ensuring no rich Saudis escape to nearby countries and continue to fund terrorism.
>>75255584
Forgot to mention the Sunni I met was Saudi Arabian of course
>>75255584
I don't really see it as my place to tell other countries how to run themselves. I would prefer to come to some arrangement where the US does not interfere so directly with the internal affairs of foreign countries. But I can say that I think it's high time to reconsider whether or not Saudi Arabia is still a strategic ally.
I personally don't really care who believes what exactly when it comes to religion, and that's supposed to be a significant part of what makes the US the US. What's worrisome is a forced and seemingly unnecessary large scale demographic shift being forced on us by our societal engineers ("masters of the universe" as they have been known to call themselves.) That invariably will change what we are as a nation, and so we who are the nation in the first place should be asking ourselves more carefully what kind of a change we do or do not want.
>>75256417
If Sharia law works for them, good. Problem is they aggressively spread that ideology by illegal means and the U.S. lets them get away with it.
>>75255056
>daddy's money
well well well, look who's talking
He doesn't need to do anything about Saudi Arabia. The current oil prices are killing them already. He coukd lower the price of oil a fair bit which would speed up their collapse.
He could open up more of the federal lands for oil drilling, that would lower the price of oil another $10-$20 while reducing the financial strain on american oil companies. Shale oil is more expensive than the stuff in Alaska and off the coast of California. Pushing through the pipeline from the Bakken shale fields would reduce their cost a bit - bakken oil is currently being moved by rail, but Warren Buffet owns the rails there, and he's a big democrat donor, whereas the big pipeline so it's been stifled "for the environment".
>>75256836
Well, the US is a place where groups of people are mainly left to police themselves. So I would hope that the people most in touch with illegal or toxic things would be the first to speak up and reject them.
It's really win-win for people who would rather live here than somewhere else and who aren't troublemakers.
>>75255584
Well if you look at the history of the Saudi royal family, you'd understand that a good portion of their politics are tied up in the clerics. Back when they first came to power the Wahabbis essentially supported them and gave them what would be the equivalent of the church approving the new king's right to rule. If they ever tried (and believe me they have) to move away from the more hardline rhetoric, the Wahabbis and the Salafis have threatened to create a civil war because they still control the hearts and minds of the average Saudi in the mosques and madrassas.
