In 1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud met aboard the USS Quincy in the Suez Canal and forged what would be the fundamental bargain underpinning the U.S. Saudi-Relationship for decades to come: the United States would exchange security cooperation for affordable and stable energy supplies from the Kingdom. And while many crises over the interceding decades have exposed the shallow roots of such a partnership, the October 5, 2022 decision by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)+, led by Saudi Arabia, to sharply cut the cartel’s planned oil production despite months of entreaties by the Biden Administration, has given new rise to serious questions about the efficacy of U.S. military support to the Kingdom and other Gulf allies, and the degree to which such investments create a return for U.S. interests.
The OPEC decision caps what has been an especially tumultuous period for U.S.-Gulf relations. The United States, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates have been worlds apart on a number of key regional issues, most especially the Saudi-led war in Yemen, where coalition airstrikes and blockades, using American-provided weaponry, have contributed to the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Similarly, Washington and the Gulf have been deeply at odds over human rights practices, Iran nuclear negotiations, political reform movements in the region, and, most recently, Russia’s war in Ukraine.
With the production cut spurring the Biden Administration to announce a new review of Washington’s partnership with Saudi Arabia, it’s worth considering the vast scale of U.S. arms transfers to the region’s OPEC members and what could be on the line if the White House elects to pursue a more hardline stance with it’s Arab Gulf Partners.
Historical U.S. Security Cooperation with the Arab Gulf
Since that 1945 meeting between the Red and Mediterranean seas, the U.S. arms relationship with Saudi Arabia and much of the Arab Gulf has grown substantially. Taken together, the three Arab Gulf states – Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates1For the purposes of this commentary, Arab Gulf countries included for analysis reflect countries with both a seat on OPEC+ and the Gulf Cooperation Council. – that enjoy OPEC+ seats have received a combined $234 billion2This piece draws its analysis from the FY2021 Defense Security Cooperation Agency’s Historical Sales Book. All figures drawn from elsewhere are duly cited. in U.S. government-to-government sales since FY1950, a figure that amounts to an astounding 25% of all U.S. foreign military sales during that time. These arms sales reflect significant military investments by all parties and are worth examining in greater detail, especially as some stakeholders are calling for a more significant rethink of these security cooperation partnerships in light of current events.
Saudi Arabia
Between FY1950 and FY2021, the United States government sold over $174 billion in defense articles and services to Saudi Arabia, making Riyadh by far the largest recipient of foreign military sales (government-to-government sales) of the past seven decades. By comparison, Israel, nominally Washington’s most important strategic partner in the region, received $49 billion in the same period, or less than 30% of what was sold to Riyadh. Indeed, the foreign military sales total for Saudi Arabia between FY1950 and FY2021 amount to more than the next three most significant recipients combined (Israel, Japan, and Taiwan).
United Arab Emirates
Between FY1950 and FY2021, foreign military sales to the UAE totaled $31 billion. Although just a fraction of what was sold to Saudi Arabia, the sum is still substantial, placing Abu Dhabi just $1.15 billion short of matching all U.S. government-to-government sales to the United Kingdom in the same period. Still, the UAE sits comfortably in the top 10 of the most significant recipients of foreign military sales of the past seven decades.
Kuwait
Between FY1950 and FY2021, the United States made more than $27 billion in foreign military sales to the small Gulf monarchy of Kuwait. For a country with a population of just 4.3 million and a military comprised of just 25 thousand personnel, the sum is a remarkable figure. By comparison, Germany, a country of 83 million, a NATO member, and boasting an armed force of 184 thousand has received $20 billion in foreign military sales during the same period.
Taken together, the total value of all arms sold to OPEC’s Arab Gulf members amounts to $234 billion between FY1950 and FY2021, more than half all $444 billion in government-to-government sales made to the Middle East since the second world war. And while there have been peaks and valleys in U.S. arms transfers to the region, the cumulative amount would place the “Near East” region (as classified by the State Department) as the largest market for U.S. foreign military sales since FY1950, more than twice that received by either the East Asia and the Pacific or Europe and Eurasia regions during that time.
Putting Arms Transfers into Context
While arms transfers and other military cooperation efforts have helped anchor the U.S. relationship with Gulf allies, they have also masked the persistent misalignment of interests and perspectives that has frequently characterized these partnerships. Over seven decades, the ebbs and flows of U.S. relations with the Gulf, and Saudi Arabia in particular, have been dramatic, as might be expected for partnerships so transactionally based. But from the diplomatic low of the 1973 OPEC oil embargo to the high of the 1991 U.S. intervention in Kuwait, arms have been treated as the key connective tissue of the partnerships, rather than an attendant feature of more deeply rooted alliances.
Accordingly, early Administration efforts to signal displeasure with Saudi and Emirati behavior reflect the inherent fragility of U.S. relations with the Gulf. Despite Administration campaign pledges and broad political backing for ending U.S. military support to Saudi Arabia, the Administration ultimately took a far more moderated approach. Among other measures, the U.S. suspended the sale of “offensive” weapons to Saudi Arabia, conducted a review of pending arms sales to Riyadh and Abu Dhabi, and insisted that President Biden’s engagements with the Kingdom will be directed at the King, and not his son and Crown Prince, who had directed the Yemen war effort and was purportedly behind the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
The steps reflected longstanding conventional beltway wisdom that too abrupt or forceful an approach would be counterproductive, unduly diminishing U.S. influence in the region and opening the doors for other external players – namely Russia and China – to backfill in America’s absence. The Administration insisted its enduring security support to the Kingdom and its partners, albeit with new limitations, would be instrumental in keeping U.S. perspectives front and center in the minds of Gulf leaders to help alleviate the very problems critics were concerned about. Indeed, the U.S. Special Envoy to Yemen, Tim Lenderking, went as far as to suggest that any further blockages of arms transfers to the Gulf imposed by Congress could undo a nascent ceasefire in Yemen and undercut a key pillar of the peace process.
But the October 5 OPEC+ decision to cut production despite the West’s efforts to secure Gulf cooperation in moderating the impact of Russia’s invasion on global energy supplies has shown the limits of both the Administration’s middling approach and of security cooperation in fostering influence among foreign partners, particularly when core interests are misaligned or when the imposition of conditions are so deeply qualified. In the immediate aftermath, the White House has announced a re-evaluation of the relationship, possibly signaling a more definitive or dramatic suspension of security cooperation with the region. President Biden himself has made clear that “there will be consequences” for the production cut. Even without White House actions, there is renewed momentum in Congress to limit or entirely suspend security cooperation with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf partners. Whatever the outcome, what is clear is that historically unparalleled levels of military cooperation between the United States and key Gulf allies like Saudi Arabia have fallen short of fostering alignment of the most pressing national security issue before the White House.
Notes
1
For the purposes of this commentary, Arab Gulf countries included for analysis reflect countries with both a seat on OPEC+ and the Gulf Cooperation Council.
2
This piece draws its analysis from the FY2021 Defense Security Cooperation Agency’s Historical Sales Book. All figures drawn from elsewhere are duly cited.
US Security Cooperation with Gulf OPEC States Amidst Energy Cuts
By Elias Yousif
In Conventional Arms
In 1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud met aboard the USS Quincy in the Suez Canal and forged what would be the fundamental bargain underpinning the U.S. Saudi-Relationship for decades to come: the United States would exchange security cooperation for affordable and stable energy supplies from the Kingdom. And while many crises over the interceding decades have exposed the shallow roots of such a partnership, the October 5, 2022 decision by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)+, led by Saudi Arabia, to sharply cut the cartel’s planned oil production despite months of entreaties by the Biden Administration, has given new rise to serious questions about the efficacy of U.S. military support to the Kingdom and other Gulf allies, and the degree to which such investments create a return for U.S. interests.
The OPEC decision caps what has been an especially tumultuous period for U.S.-Gulf relations. The United States, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates have been worlds apart on a number of key regional issues, most especially the Saudi-led war in Yemen, where coalition airstrikes and blockades, using American-provided weaponry, have contributed to the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Similarly, Washington and the Gulf have been deeply at odds over human rights practices, Iran nuclear negotiations, political reform movements in the region, and, most recently, Russia’s war in Ukraine.
With the production cut spurring the Biden Administration to announce a new review of Washington’s partnership with Saudi Arabia, it’s worth considering the vast scale of U.S. arms transfers to the region’s OPEC members and what could be on the line if the White House elects to pursue a more hardline stance with it’s Arab Gulf Partners.
Historical U.S. Security Cooperation with the Arab Gulf
Since that 1945 meeting between the Red and Mediterranean seas, the U.S. arms relationship with Saudi Arabia and much of the Arab Gulf has grown substantially. Taken together, the three Arab Gulf states – Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates1For the purposes of this commentary, Arab Gulf countries included for analysis reflect countries with both a seat on OPEC+ and the Gulf Cooperation Council. – that enjoy OPEC+ seats have received a combined $234 billion2This piece draws its analysis from the FY2021 Defense Security Cooperation Agency’s Historical Sales Book. All figures drawn from elsewhere are duly cited. in U.S. government-to-government sales since FY1950, a figure that amounts to an astounding 25% of all U.S. foreign military sales during that time. These arms sales reflect significant military investments by all parties and are worth examining in greater detail, especially as some stakeholders are calling for a more significant rethink of these security cooperation partnerships in light of current events.
Saudi Arabia
Between FY1950 and FY2021, the United States government sold over $174 billion in defense articles and services to Saudi Arabia, making Riyadh by far the largest recipient of foreign military sales (government-to-government sales) of the past seven decades. By comparison, Israel, nominally Washington’s most important strategic partner in the region, received $49 billion in the same period, or less than 30% of what was sold to Riyadh. Indeed, the foreign military sales total for Saudi Arabia between FY1950 and FY2021 amount to more than the next three most significant recipients combined (Israel, Japan, and Taiwan).
United Arab Emirates
Between FY1950 and FY2021, foreign military sales to the UAE totaled $31 billion. Although just a fraction of what was sold to Saudi Arabia, the sum is still substantial, placing Abu Dhabi just $1.15 billion short of matching all U.S. government-to-government sales to the United Kingdom in the same period. Still, the UAE sits comfortably in the top 10 of the most significant recipients of foreign military sales of the past seven decades.
Kuwait
Between FY1950 and FY2021, the United States made more than $27 billion in foreign military sales to the small Gulf monarchy of Kuwait. For a country with a population of just 4.3 million and a military comprised of just 25 thousand personnel, the sum is a remarkable figure. By comparison, Germany, a country of 83 million, a NATO member, and boasting an armed force of 184 thousand has received $20 billion in foreign military sales during the same period.
Taken together, the total value of all arms sold to OPEC’s Arab Gulf members amounts to $234 billion between FY1950 and FY2021, more than half all $444 billion in government-to-government sales made to the Middle East since the second world war. And while there have been peaks and valleys in U.S. arms transfers to the region, the cumulative amount would place the “Near East” region (as classified by the State Department) as the largest market for U.S. foreign military sales since FY1950, more than twice that received by either the East Asia and the Pacific or Europe and Eurasia regions during that time.
Putting Arms Transfers into Context
While arms transfers and other military cooperation efforts have helped anchor the U.S. relationship with Gulf allies, they have also masked the persistent misalignment of interests and perspectives that has frequently characterized these partnerships. Over seven decades, the ebbs and flows of U.S. relations with the Gulf, and Saudi Arabia in particular, have been dramatic, as might be expected for partnerships so transactionally based. But from the diplomatic low of the 1973 OPEC oil embargo to the high of the 1991 U.S. intervention in Kuwait, arms have been treated as the key connective tissue of the partnerships, rather than an attendant feature of more deeply rooted alliances.
Accordingly, early Administration efforts to signal displeasure with Saudi and Emirati behavior reflect the inherent fragility of U.S. relations with the Gulf. Despite Administration campaign pledges and broad political backing for ending U.S. military support to Saudi Arabia, the Administration ultimately took a far more moderated approach. Among other measures, the U.S. suspended the sale of “offensive” weapons to Saudi Arabia, conducted a review of pending arms sales to Riyadh and Abu Dhabi, and insisted that President Biden’s engagements with the Kingdom will be directed at the King, and not his son and Crown Prince, who had directed the Yemen war effort and was purportedly behind the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
The steps reflected longstanding conventional beltway wisdom that too abrupt or forceful an approach would be counterproductive, unduly diminishing U.S. influence in the region and opening the doors for other external players – namely Russia and China – to backfill in America’s absence. The Administration insisted its enduring security support to the Kingdom and its partners, albeit with new limitations, would be instrumental in keeping U.S. perspectives front and center in the minds of Gulf leaders to help alleviate the very problems critics were concerned about. Indeed, the U.S. Special Envoy to Yemen, Tim Lenderking, went as far as to suggest that any further blockages of arms transfers to the Gulf imposed by Congress could undo a nascent ceasefire in Yemen and undercut a key pillar of the peace process.
But the October 5 OPEC+ decision to cut production despite the West’s efforts to secure Gulf cooperation in moderating the impact of Russia’s invasion on global energy supplies has shown the limits of both the Administration’s middling approach and of security cooperation in fostering influence among foreign partners, particularly when core interests are misaligned or when the imposition of conditions are so deeply qualified. In the immediate aftermath, the White House has announced a re-evaluation of the relationship, possibly signaling a more definitive or dramatic suspension of security cooperation with the region. President Biden himself has made clear that “there will be consequences” for the production cut. Even without White House actions, there is renewed momentum in Congress to limit or entirely suspend security cooperation with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf partners. Whatever the outcome, what is clear is that historically unparalleled levels of military cooperation between the United States and key Gulf allies like Saudi Arabia have fallen short of fostering alignment of the most pressing national security issue before the White House.
Notes
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