Unfortunately, unless you have a subscription with the Wall Street Journal you can't read the full article:
The best article so far on this subject is from the WSJ so maybe we have to wait for CNN, NBC, ABC and CBS or from other outlets for a similar article. Also, the article below I quote was written two days ago on this subject and a lot has changed since then.
US Quandary: How Closely to Align With Saudis
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Washington (CNN)Saudi
Arabia's purge of senior officials and royal family members highlights
aggressive changes taking place in the 85-year-old kingdom and, some
analysts say, possibly risks in the newly close relationship the White
House has forged with Riyadh.
Government
ministers, former officials and princes were swept up in an
anti-corruption campaign that some analysts said could raise the risk of
internal conflict, particularly as the arrests looked more like a
consolidation of power by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the force
behind the kingdom's most assertive new policies.
The
32-year-old, popularly known as MBS, has forged a close working
relationship with President Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser
Jared Kushner, while Trump himself has praised Saudi ruler King Salman,
along with the relationship he's developed with him, and made Riyadh
the first pomp-filled stop of his first official trip overseas.
Trump on terrorism: We're going to end it 01:20
The
Trump administration has aligned the US more closely with Saudi Arabia,
even as some of the kingdom's policies -- including a fight with Qatar,
home to a major US military base, and a Saudi-led war in Yemen that is
creating a catastrophic humanitarian crisis -- have raised concerns
among US national security officials and experts.
"I
would say there are other elements in US government that are concerned
more significantly of the risks that some of MBS' actions pose to
regional security," said Lori Plotkin Boghardt, a former CIA analyst who
is now a fellow at the Washington Institute specializing in Arab Gulf
politics.
While
those officials and experts may see dangers in aligning the US too
closely with Saudi Arabia, Boghardt said, they "are not front and center
and able to overcome the support of key elements of the White House"
for the Saudi view of the way forward.
The 32-year-old trying to revamp Saudi Arabia 01:42
Analysts
point to risks of the war in Yemen, particularly if the US is
identified as complicit, there is a strong possibility that the conflict
will become a terrorist recruiting draw. Meanwhile, Saudis are pushing
increasingly aggressive rhetoric toward Iran, coming close to accusing
it of an act of war after Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen reportedly
fired a missile close to Riyadh airport on Saturday.
The
spat with Qatar could create openings for Iran to sow division and,
separately, difficulties for the US military, which uses its base there
to fly critical missions to Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. None of that
seems to have dimmed the White House affinity for Saudi Arabia or,
analysts say, lessened national security officials' wariness.
"I
have great confidence in King Salman and the Crown Prince of Saudi
Arabia, they know exactly what they are doing," Trump, who spoke with
King Salman on Saturday, tweeted Monday evening, adding, "Some of those
they are harshly treating have been 'milking' their country for years!"
'Putting his chips on MBS'
"I
think that President Trump is putting his chips on MBS," said Simon
Henderson, director of the Gulf and Energy Policy Program at the
Washington Institute, but added, "I don't think institutionally, the
State Department or Pentagon are."
The
wariness isn't just in the US. In December 2015, a German intelligence
report leaked to news agencies identified bin Salman, who is also
defense minister and leading economic reforms, as a potentially
destabilizing force in the Middle East, given his youth, inexperience
and the possibility that he might overreach.
Indeed,
bin Salman has been involved in some of the more aggressive moves since
King Salman, his father, assumed power in January 2015. He's been a
driver behind the Saudi-led war in Yemen, the campaign to isolate Qatar,
an overhaul of the Saudi economy, a move to allow women to drive and
the anti-corruption purge that led to the arrests of 17 people on
Sunday.
The prince and his father
have also invested heavily in relationships with the new White House
team, with King Salman making one of his younger sons the new ambassador
to Washington, and bin Salman cultivating close ties with Kushner.
Trump official stumbles over Saudi democracy 01:34
Kushner worked closely with the crown prince on Trump's May visit to Saudi Arabia, helped broker an arms deal to Saudi Arabia worth nearly $100 million that was announced in May, and traveled to the kingdom in August and October.
The
point of cultivating such a close relationship, said Boghardt, was to
"try to get Trump to see their regional view, who are the good guys, who
are the bad guys, who the US should have a tight relationship with, who
are the trouble makers."
"They were very successful," she added.
That
has meant continued strong support for the Saudi-led conflict in Yemen,
where more than 10,000 people have been killed and support systems so
badly crushed that famine and disease are ravaging the country.
"The
longer the war continues without an endgame, the more strongly the US
will be viewed as complicit in the humanitarian tragedy and as not doing
enough to save civilian lives," Boghardt said. "There are also major
security implications for the US that accompany that view," she added,
including the possibility of radicalization.
Perhaps
the most public example of a difference in outlook on Saudi Arabia
might have been early in the ongoing fight between members of the Gulf
Cooperation Council. Saudi Arabia and others accused Qatar of supporting
terrorists and cut diplomatic relations.
State
Department officials privately pointed to concerns that the dispute
could be exploited by Iran to undermine Gulf cooperation and US security
aims in the region.
But even as US
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Defense Secretary James Mattis
pushed for reconciliation and talks when the Gulf spat erupted in June,
Trump dispensed with nuance and took to Twitter: "During my recent trip
to the Middle East I stated that there can no longer be funding of
Radical Ideology. Leaders pointed to Qatar—look!"
For
Henderson, it was clear that, "the Trump White House has supported the
position of MBS" and allied Gulf countries "to the evident frustration
of Mattis and Tillerson."
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