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Comment by aritmo | Hacker News Reader

Why isn't Saudi Arabia afraid of US sanctions? Biden should do something.

The Saudi government bankrolled 9/11 without consequences. Seems logical to not expect consequences now.

> Why isn't Saudi Arabia afraid of US sanctions?

Because of lots of historical precedent that the US values it's relationship with SA over any principled objection to bad behavior on the part of SA? Obviously there are lines that couldn't be crossed, but SA believes this murder wasn't one of them.

Bezos was good buddies with MBS and then changed his mind. Seems like others could as well.

Posting about Bezos and MBS's relationship really triggers Amazon workers I suppose. Nothing like working for a homophobe in-waiting.

Baby steps: they're withdrawing support for the war in Yemen. https://www.defensenews.com/news/your-military/2021/02/04/us...

Which has, in fact, resulted in a change in S.A.'s tune on the war, at least to the point of offering a cease fire. Baby steps, indeed.

I believe you are underestimating the importance of Biden refusing to speak with the Crown Prince as he called world leaders as his term began. It might seem just symbolic but it's much more than that.

Can you elaborate on that? I'm not doubting you, It's just not obvious to me why it's a big deal rather than a token gesture.

Yeah, it is Biden pandering to a domestic audience who will forget all about this in a few years. The spice must flow.

What spice? The US is a net exporter of oil, these days.

If the spice doesn't flow, Saudi Arabia can't afford US weapons.

Also the oil dependency graph can change during resource-intensive conflicts.

I always thought of America as the Harkonnens, but now that you said it I realize that we are the Imperium, OPEC is CHOAM and Saudi Arabia are the Harkonnens.

It's a reference to the 1984 movie Dune. I don't remember the exact details, but it's very similar to oil, in that it's a valuable natural resource that different factions go to war over.

The fictional Spice (Melange) is used by ordinary rich people to live longer. More importantly since their culture has rejected the use of AI they use much larger amounts of Spice to give the Guild Navigators sufficient foresight to be able to pilot Highliners through space-time, enabling the empire to cover a number of star systems.

Note: It’s “Heighliner”, not “Highliner”.

Or a reference to the 1965 novel Dune, if you're lucky.

Given that the phrase doesn't appear anywhere in Frank Herbert's novels (the horrible dumpster fires by his son may have it, but I couldn't say), it's certainly a Lynch reference.

But my question wasn't what "spice" means, I assumed everyone on Hacker News knows that.

I was asking why Saudi spice is particularly relevant to US interests, when we're a net exporter of said spice.

It was admittedly a bit tongue in cheek; dramatically reduced Saudi supplies would impact energy markets in a bunch of second and third order ways we might not like.

But that doesn't mean we have to keep selling them guns.

It's been almost a few years already, which few were you thinking of?

And with England you call the Queen, not William.

1) Biden has not caused a dramatic rupture in relations with S.A., but he has backed things off a bit (e.g. officially distancing from war in Yemen).

2) The literal answer is that the U.S. never bought anything much from S.A. except oil, and that pretty much ended after fracking made the U.S. a net exporter.

3) If S.A. actually executed a UN official from a NATO country, it might result in a lot more.

4) Given the state of the U.S. economy, and the nearly-civil-war level of polarization, I don't think Biden is looking for an excuse to get into foreign policy projects right now. We have enough trouble running our own country.

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