For Saudi Arabia, the conservative Gulf kingdom whose number one priority in the region is to keep the status quo, it’s hard not to come to the conclusion that the entire Middle East is on the fire. Indeed, if Saudi Arabia resembled a giant mansion in the middle of the neighborhood, the rest of the street would be littered with abandoned houses and empty lots. In other words, the neighborhood outside the Kingdom doesn’t look good at the moment, and King Salman bin Abdulaziz knows it.
With Syria largely split among what is left of the Assad regime and dozens of Islamist factions, Iraq in the middle of its own large-scale war with ISIL, Yemen in a state of civil war, and ISIL launching sporadic terrorist attacks on mosques and police officers in the Kingdom itself, King Salman’s number one job is ensuring that the Saudi armed forces have the equipment and support that they need. To that effect, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques is doing his job quite well.
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