Trump’s trip to Saudi Arabia: High stakes, low expectations

Donald Trump embarked on his maiden international trip as president Friday. It’s a humdinger of a voyage, too; he’ll spend nine days in the Middle East and Europe. His first stop is Saudi Arabia. There, he will have talks with senior Saudi royals, including influential up-and-comer, Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council.    

Before becoming president, Trump was, on occasion, harshly critical of Saudi Arabia. Now we can expect him to be fulsome in his praise of the Kingdom. His planned speech on Islam is a potential minefield, but the real risk arises from any impromptu remarks the president might make. He has a track record of impulsive, often counterproductive comments. It is unclear whether he will use Twitter while on the road.

{mosads}The Saudis are preparing a royal welcome, in both the literal and figurative sense of the term. The U.S.-Saudi special relationship has been a cornerstone of the Kingdom’s foreign policy for decades. Saudi Arabia sees in Trump a U.S. president prepared to strengthen that relationship in the aftermath of often troubled ties between Riyadh and Washington under President Obama.

Trump is unlikely to press the Saudis on human rights or reverse support for Riyadh’s military intervention in Yemen. Trump and the Saudi leadership both see Iran as a major threat. Whatever misgivings the Saudis might have about Trump (particularly on his views of Islam), they see potentially huge strategic advantages to building a strong working relationship with him. 

The Trump administration, for its part, sees the Kingdom as a key partner in the struggle against ISIS and as a bulwark against Iranian expansion in the region.   Moreover, the optics of the visit — occurring amid a maelstrom of criticism about Trump’s actions ranging from the firing of FBI Director James Comey to sharing sensitive intelligence with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov — are important to Trump if he is to make progress in establishing his bona fides as an effective leader.

There will likely be further agreements on closer Saudi-U.S economic and military relations. The president may lay out his vision for an “Arab NATO.” He will likely find the Saudis receptive to this idea, as it would bind the United States even closer to the Gulf Arab states and create a de facto anti-Iranian alliance. Actually making an Arab NATO into a reality is another issue altogether.    

Thus far, the idea is largely just that — a concept without any details about membership, mission and military commitments. Let’s see if anything more than rhetoric emerges from the president’s visit. 

There is one potential point of contention between Trump and the Saudi leadership: Syria. Riyadh — long an enemy of the Assad regime — is extremely wary of U.S.-Russia cooperation in Syria. But U.S. airstrikes against the Syrian military in April and against pro-Assad militia Thursday are, from Riyadh’s perspective, heartening signs.    

The Saudi visit possesses potentially high stakes for both Riyadh and Washington. For the Saudi leadership, the trip is an opportunity to shift the U.S.-Saudi relationship onto a new, more intimate plane. For the Trump administration, the visit could help move the president’s shambling Middle-East policy into something more closely resembling a coherent strategy.

Politically, Trump has an important, if ambiguous, advantage. Expectations for the trip are low. Indeed, if he manages to depart Saudi Arabia without a major fumble, the visit will be judged by many observers to be a success. Trump is, by any standard, in deep political trouble here at home. Any success, however modest, will be welcome news to a beleaguered White House.

Joe Barnes is the Bonner Means Baker Fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute. Since coming to Rice University in 1995, he has written extensively on international economics, with a focus on the geopolitics of energy.

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