The Washington Post : Opinion With oil production cut, the Saudis send a message to the U.S. By David Ignatius Columnist Follow April 4, 2023 at 5:59 p.m. EDT

 Opinion  With oil production cut, the Saudis send a message to the U.S.

By David Ignatius

Columnist

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April 4, 2023 at 5:59 p.m. EDT

Saudi Arabia’s coldly pragmatic decision this past weekend to cut oil production and raise prices sent a simple message: The United States doesn’t call the shots in the Persian Gulf or the oil market anymore. For better or worse, the era of American hegemony in the Middle East is over.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman pressed OPEC producers on Sunday to reduce production by about 1 million barrels a day, which boosted the price of crude oil by more than 6 percent to about $85 a barrel. For a Biden administration struggling to contain inflation and avoid recession, the Saudi-led price increase was as welcome as a poke in the eye.

Saudi Arabia is hedging its bets, and so is the United States. Neither country wants a break in relations, but leaders in both capitals feel disrespected. It’s not an easy or stable balance — especially for Israel, which wants better relations with Riyadh but depends absolutely on the reliability of U.S. power in the region.

But life goes on, even for a jilted superpower. The Biden administration’s “back channel” — CIA Director William J. Burns — visited the kingdom this week. He “discussed shared interests” with top Saudi officials and “reinforced our commitment to intelligence cooperation, especially in areas such as counterterrorism,” a U.S. official told me.

It is tempting to see the oil-production move by MBS, as the Saudi crown prince is known, as a pre-arraignment endorsement of former president Donald Trump. Certainly, he prefers Republicans, but he has been hedging his bets in the GOP, too. In February, MBS hosted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and a group of top GOP senators that included James E. Risch of Idaho and Tom Cotton of Arkansas. This week, the Saudis staged a lavish event in Miami hosted by Republican Mayor Francis X. Suarez, an ally of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Trump rival.

MBS is still loyal, in his way, to the former president who boasted to Bob Woodward, “I saved his ass” after the 2018 murder of Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi. MBS’s sovereign wealth fund has financed the LIV Golf tour that has showcased Trump’s resorts and has put more than $2 billion in an investment firm run by Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and former senior adviser.

But I’m guessing that, for MBS, Chinese President Xi Jinping is the new Trump — the big guy who indulges the Saudi leader’s ambitions as a regional powerhouse. When Xi visited Saudi Arabia in December, MBS organized a Gulf summit at which other countries joined in pledging cooperation on economic, energy and security issues.

MBS has told Saudi confidants that the United States remains the kingdom’s partner, but not its only partner. I am told that the crown prince explained to these insiders that while his predecessors would immediately grant U.S. requests, “I broke that because I want things in return.” MBS is still buying Boeing airplanes, for example, but he just received a reaffirmation of U.S. protection in Burns’s visit and a joint military exercise.

The Biden administration has taken the latest Saudi rebuff calmly, in contrast to its anger after the kingdom sharply cut production in October. Officials note that crude oil prices were at 15-month lows, below $80 a barrel for much of March, and that analysts were forecasting a further slide below $70. Facing that kind of price decline, the Saudis often cut production.

Biden administration officials are betting that prices will settle in the mid-80s, and that the overall economic effect will be limited. But if the market tightens and prices rise above $100 a barrel, it’s not clear what the administration could do about it. Biden is not a president for whom this Saudi leader is likely to do any favors.

Oil analysts argue that there is an upside. Prices had fallen to levels that discouraged spending for new production capacity. Modestly higher prices might encourage investment that “will be highly necessary when demand takes off” as the global economy revives, argues Andrew Gould, a former chief executive of Schlumberger and former board member of Saudi Aramco.

As MBS explores partnership with his new best friend, Xi, he’s becoming more assertive with such neighbors as the United Arab Emirates and Egypt. MBS told Saudi confidants last year that he had demanded concessions from both countries by the end of 2023. Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sisi traveled this week to Riyadh, in a visit that “affirmed mutual concern for promoting common cooperation,” a spokesman for the Egyptian president said. Tensions are said to remain with the UAE, but the Emiratis followed MBS’s lead on the oil-production cut.

For Israel, a headstrong MBS carries special risks. Israel has been seeking to normalize relations with the Saudis. But MBS just made a deal with Iran, Israel’s mortal enemy, in a diplomatic bargain brokered by China, the United States’ strongest rival. MBS wants it both ways: maintaining U.S. (and covert Israeli) protection while he ignores their interests. That won’t work.

The United States coddled a vulnerable Saudi Arabia for more than half a century because we needed its oil. Now, increasingly, we don’t. What we want is a Saudi Arabia that behaves like a responsible partner, even as it inevitably puts Saudi interests first.

Opinion by David Ignatius

David Ignatius writes a twice-a-week foreign affairs column for The Washington Post. His latest novel is “The Paladin.”  Twitter