Joe Biden’s landing in Saudi Arabia has already been compared to humbling oneself to the desert kingdom. The main issue on the media’s mind was whether the U.S. president would suffice with a fist bump with Mohammed bin Salman or actually hug the crown prince, whom American intelligence holds directly responsible for the murder of journalist (and U.S. resident) Jamal Khashoggi.
Biden, forced to adorn his trip with a high-minded excuse, made sure to repeat that Saudi oil wouldn't be at the heart of his talks with the kingdom’s leaders, or with Arab leaders meeting in Jeddah for a summit. The declared goal is to establish a mechanism for facing threats in the region; that is, Iran.
But it's no great gamble to assume that if Americans didn't have to shell out over $5 per gallon of gasoline due to the war in Ukraine, Biden wouldn't have been in a hurry to fly to a country he called a "pariah" during his election campaign.
Three years ago, the United States announced that it had become a net exporter of petroleum products, but this didn’t stop pundits from stating that America's independence from Arab oil let Donald Trump disengage from the Middle East. Washington freed itself from the Saudi grip, one analyst wrote, attributing Trump’s Mideast peace plan, recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and recognition of Israel's Golan annexation to the fact that he no longer feared an Arab oil embargo.
But this energy independence also had a price. In 2020, Saudi Arabia and Russia battled over oil prices. Russia increased production and thus lowered global oil prices in a bid to harm the viability of producing fuel from shale, which buoyed America's energy independence. The Saudis quickly followed suit to keep their old clients, and the world enjoyed fuel at rock-bottom prices. The U.S. oil industry demanded that Trump stem the profit hemorrhage.
Donald Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at a G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, in 2019.Credit: Bandar Algaloud/Saudi Royal Court/Reuters
On April 2, 2020, Trump, the closest American friend Mohammed bin Salman ever had, picked up the phone and gave the crown prince an ultimatum: Reduce oil production or I won’t be able to stop Congress from passing laws forcing me to withdraw troops from the kingdom. When Trump was asked to respond to this Reuters scoop, he simply muttered that he didn't have to tell the crown prince, who took the hint. A few days later the Saudis cut production, as did the Russians.
Two years later, the Americans can still revel in their energy independence, but they've learned that this doesn't let them conduct global policy as befitting a superpower. The U.S. and European sanctions on Russia, one of the two priorities of Biden's foreign policy, are taking a toll on everyday Americans and Europeans.
Washington once again needs Arab oil and gas, and the “pariah” kingdom, whose de facto ruler hasn't had a direct conversation with Biden yet, may be his administration’s lifeboat. This time, the White House isn't giving the Saudis an ultimatum.
Human rights? The Khashoggi murder? Democratization? All these have been shoved deep in the drawer. Europeans and Americans need to be assuaged, with the latter going to the polls in the midterm elections in four months.
The question isn't whether the Saudis will want to help but whether they can. Saudi Arabia isn't a gas exporter, and the amount of petroleum it can add to the global market is up for debate. Saudi Aramco claims that it can produce over 12 million barrels of crude per day, around a million and a half over its current production.
The Saudis have large reserves of oil stored in the Netherlands, Egypt and Japan, and also at five secret locations in the kingdom; this haul is available for around three months. It also helps when the Saudis have to halt production due to maintenance; these strategic reserves were also used when Yemen's Houthi rebels attacked Aramco facilities.
But even if Aramco can't instantly replace Russian oil in Europe, the very declaration of increased production may ease the panic regarding prices. It's worth remembering that in other circumstances the U.S. president could have sufficed with a phone call and forgone the Jeddah heat, currently reaching 37 degrees Celsius (99 Fahrenheit). Luckily, Biden will be staying on the breezy coast, not in Riyadh, where temperatures reached 42 Celsius (107 Fahrenheit) on Wednesday.
To Biden, a Saudi commitment to increase production will be seen as an important achievement, and not just because of the oil. Such a declaration means getting the Saudis on board with the United States and Europe against Russia. Until around two years ago, this was an obvious truth, a cornerstone of a decades-long alliance between Washington and Riyadh.
But the rift between Biden and Prince Mohammed has triggered economic cooperation between Saudi Arabia and Russia. Saudi plans to buy Russian arms and Riyadh’s refusal to join the sanctions against Russia following the invasion of Ukraine have brought the two countries closer than ever.
This doesn't mean that Saudi Arabia intends to exchange its alliance with Washington for one with Moscow, but the U.S.-Saudi relationship has been “recalibrated,” as Biden has put it. Calibration, it turns out, may boomerang on the calibrator.
Meanwhile, cracks are appearing in the view that Iran is an immediate global threat. Biden may have declared that Tehran won't obtain nuclear weapons on his watch, but the dispute between the United States and Israel remains over when Iran can be defined as a nuclear threshold state. When Iran enriches uranium to 90 percent? Or just 20 percent or 60 percent?
It's not only the United States that disputes the Israeli reading; European countries do too. Their opinion is critical, because if Washington ever decides that the time has come for a military option, it will want a broad belt of European support.
Meanwhile, the U.S. administration hasn't specified a date beyond which it will cease diplomatic efforts and move on to “other means.” In this Biden can find a partner in Riyadh, which has held five rounds of talks with Tehran on restoring the diplomatic relations severed in 2016, and in the United Arab Emirates, which has signed a series of deals with Iran.
These deals don't allay the fears that Iran stokes in the Gulf, but there's a big difference between a willingness to deploy an anti-missile system to counter an Iranian attack and a willingness to take part in a military campaign that will unleash a devastating war. If Saudi Arabia lets Israeli planes fly over its territory, or allows direct flights for pilgrims from Israel, this doesn't mean it will want Saudi bombers flying over Iran.
Iran confirmed this week that nuclear talks with three European countries are still ongoing, even after the failed Iranian-American negotiations in Doha, Qatar, and as the EU tries to figure out how lifting sanctions on Iran may help solve its energy crisis. European diplomats say that Iran is still a threat even without nuclear weapons, and that the global effort is to block the continued enrichment of uranium.
But Iran is not yet as concrete a threat as Russia, which has shown that it's willing to invade a neighbor and create a global economic crisis. A European diplomat has told Haaretz that the ability to contain Iran's nuclear program, at least at its current level, is still high.
That is, there is no cause for a military campaign at present. It seems that Israel's friends in the Middle East and Europe, and even the United States – let alone China and Russia – don't share its definition of Iran as a clear and present danger. Also, Tehran can't fully replace boycotted Russian gas and oil; Iran consumes about 80 percent of its gas.
To export this gas to Europe, it would need an investment of around $100 billion to develop the gas fields and build liquefaction facilities. So even if sanctions were lifted tomorrow, that's another two or three years. Also, Iran’s energy resources are beholden to China under a multiyear agreement signed two years ago.
On top of all this, Iran won't help the West maintain its harsh sanctions on Russia. But as the price of gas and oil is tied to the panic index, lifting sanctions on Iran may have an immediate impact on calibrating prices at Wisconsin gas pumps. Biden isn't blind to this connection.