Yemen

The competition between the two principal Muslim powers in the Middle East – Iran and Saudi Arabia – is in one sense a continuation of the struggle between the Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam. Americans might fairly ask, “What does a 1,400-year-old Muslim civil war have to do with us?” The short answer is “everything” for one obvious and one not so obvious reason.

Over the next few days much will be written about West Wing power struggles, but in the end, being right about Taliban perfidy and being out of sync with President Trump’s laudable, but impractical goal of making peace with them, is undoubtedly what got John Bolton fired.

Candidate Trump appeared to understand Saudi Arabia. President Trump acts like other submissive royal retainers George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. Instead of campaigning to hand the Middle East over to the Saudi royals, the Trump administration should stand for America’s interests.

The U.S. is at war in Yemen. Special Forces are on the ground in Saudi Arabia, while Washington is providing Riyadh’s military with munitions, targeting assistance, and aerial refueling. All to bomb a nation whose people have done nothing against Americans.

Washington’s relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is embarrassing, counterproductive, and unnecessary. The Kingdom is as much foe as friend of American principles and interests. The U.S. should tell the Saudis that in the future it will deal with the Kingdom when convenient, without any pretense of friendship.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is promoting economic opportunity and social modernity, while seeking regional military hegemony. During the Cold War Washington’s close embrace of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia made a certain strategic sense. Today, a far more limited, arms-length relationship with what remains an intolerant and repressive power is needed.

January 12 is just over a week from today, but that’s plenty of time for the President to make a major policy statement in support of the Iranian people, and to put in motion the actions necessary to support them in their desire to rid themselves of the corrupt mullahs now stifling their liberty – and threatening our own national security.

If President Trump is serious about countering Iranian aggression and repairing the mess in the Middle East left by Obama and Bush, then steps must be taken across the region, otherwise Iran will assert political and economic dominance over the entire northern tier of the Middle East and become the Middle East’s Shi’ite superpower.

Whether the growing anti-Iran coalition in the Middle East will solidify into a real counterweight to a potentially nuclear armed Iran remains to be seen, but one thing is clear: The battle with Israel and Saudi Arabia on one side and Iran on the other is heating up.

Given Riyadh’s failure in the Syrian Civil War, its failure to discipline rebellious Qatar, and its stalemated war and human rights disaster in Yemen, Trump might take a hard second look at the Sunni monarchy that is the pillar of U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf.

Vast numbers of Sudanese immigrants are on welfare and Sudan is so violent that the U.S. Embassy requires U.S. government personnel in Sudan to use armored vehicles for all travel, yet the country was inexplicably taken off the travel ban list.

Although heralded as a “modernizer,” 31-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is the architect of Riyadh’s disastrous attack on Yemen. Prince Salman’s recklessness is likely to draw the U.S. more deeply into destabilizing regional conflicts.

Today's Supreme Court ruling means that the administration may impose a 90-day ban on travelers from Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and a 120-day ban on all refugees entering the United States, with certain exceptions noted by the court.

During the campaign President Donald Trump had at least one very sensible foreign policy belief: the U.S. should stay out of purposeless wars in the Middle East. Now his appointees are dragging us deeper into the Syrian conflict.

Why is President Trump doubling down on an unnecessary Middle Eastern war on behalf of an authoritarian regime guilty of promoting Islamic radicalism? Washington should not sacrifice U.S. interests to benefit the Saudi royals.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s first order of business at the State Department should be to eliminate the Fifth Column in his own building by showing the door to the signers of a letter criticizing President Trump’s Executive Order pausing travel from terrorist hotspots to the United States.

This is what winning looks like: "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts.”

Neither party establishment is prepared to advance a strategy for victory, neither party establishment is prepared to successfully “wage peace.” Only Donald Trump was prepared to say that endless war is not just political folly, but an indecent sacrifice of American lives and treasure.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia does not share values with America, democratic or other. Saudi Arabia is at best a slightly more civilized variant of the Islamic State.

At the Saudis’ behest Washington backs their misbegotten war in Yemen and remains formally committed to the overthrow of Syrian President Bashir al-Assad, the strongest force opposing the far more dangerous Islamic State. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia also underwrites extremist Islamic teaching in madrassas around the world.