Earlier this year, The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg published “The Obama Doctrine,” in which the president described a Middle East populated by unreliable “free-rider” allies constantly drawing the United States into their petty rivalries, fueled by avarice, tribalism, and sectarianism. Key among those free riders were the Sunni Arab states of the Gulf, Goldberg wrote. The Saudis, along with the Iranians, Obama said, “need to find an effective way to share the neighborhood.” Yet despite the Obama White House's misgivings about Saudi Arabia, it backed its campaign in Yemen, enabling perhaps the chief free-rider's war.
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