Poll of the Day > Saudi Arabia vows to retaliate with 'greater action' if hit with sanctions.

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.npr.org/2018/10/14/657277639/saudis-vow-to-retaliate-with-greater-action-if-hit-with-sanctions

Updated at 1:14 p.m. ET - Nearly two weeks since Jamal Khashoggi vanished in Istanbul, the shadow of the Saudi journalist's disappearance continues to loom ever larger. Now, President Trump is threatening "severe punishment" for Saudi Arabia if suspicions of Khashoggi's murder are confirmed and Saudis have vowed to retaliate in kind.

"The Kingdom also affirms that if it receives any action, it will respond with greater action," Saudi Arabia's state-run news agency said Sunday, ominously noting that the country plays "an influential and vital role in the global economy."

Citing an "official source," the Saudi Press Agency added that Riyadh "affirms its total rejection of any threats and attempts to undermine it." Rather, if Saudis face "political pressures" such as accusations or sanctions, "the outcome of these weak endeavors, like their predecessors, is a demise."

The Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C., later sought to "clarify" those threats on Twitter, noting that "the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia extends it appreciation to all, including the US administration, for refraining from jumping to conclusions on the ongoing investigation."

The comments Sunday follow Trump's toughest comments yet about the simmering international controversy. Speaking with CBS's 60 Minutes, the president said that "nobody knows yet" whether the Saudi government ordered the killing of Khashoggi, a frequent critic, as Turkish officials reportedly allege.

"It's being investigated, it's being looked at very, very strongly," Trump said. "And we would be very upset and angry if that were the case."

Still, he was careful to hedge his language as he has been largely since Khashoggi vanished after the journalist's visit to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. His administration has been on friendly terms with the Gulf regional power since taking office, supporting the Saudi-led airstrike campaign in Yemen and brokering an arms deal that could be worth $110 billion over the next decade.

During a news conference in the Oval Office on Saturday, Trump responded to a question about his response to the Khashoggi controversy by touting the economic benefits of the weapons sale.

"If they don't buy it from us, they're going to buy it from Russia or they're going to buy it from China or they're going to buy it from other countries," he said. "From the standpoint of jobs, economic development, a lot of other reasons, I would like to do something where we could maybe look at other things [than canceling the deal]."

Nevertheless, the Saudi Stock Exchange plummeted about 7 percent at one point Sunday on fears of economic fallout from the diplomatic dispute, before recovering some of its losses later in the day.

So far, administration officials have also expressed reluctance to canceling participation in Saudi Arabia's signature economic forum, the Future Investment Initiative. A wide array of global business leaders including World Bank President Jim Yong Kim and Virgin founder Richard Branson has pulled out of the conference later the month. At the moment Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin plans to keep his own plans to attend though Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says they're evaluating the situation closely.

U.S. lawmakers, for their part, have come out more strongly. A bipartisan group of nearly two dozen senators have called for an investigation into Khashoggi's disappearance, and some have suggested they would be willing to block the Saudi arms deal if more damaging details come to light.

"I don't think that we should continue with business as usual until we know exactly what happened here, because what we do know is this: He walked into that consulate and he never came out," Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., told CNN on Sunday. "So the only two things that could have happened is, he's alive and somehow still in there, or he's dead and the Saudis are the ones who did it. There's no other explanation for it."

And Rubio said that no U.S. government officials should be attending the Saudi conference until they get some official answers about what happened.

"No matter how important they may be to our Iranian strategy," he added, "our ability to be a voice for human rights and to go after regimes like [Syrian President Bashar] Assad, like [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, like what China does, like what [President Nicolas] Maduro does in Venezuela all of that is undermined and compromised if we are not willing to confront something as atrocious as what's allegedly happened here."

Greater action meaning what? Killing more journalists? >_>
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Theyre clearly innocent though, you can tell because none of their cameras were working that day
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lol ya, shit hole country threatens to overflow and flood neighbors with shit.
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Gee, maybe it's about time we seriously invested in solar, wind, and even nuclear energy research and infrastructure to reduce our dependence on these guys?
No? Well, just a thought...

Zeus posted...

Greater action meaning what? Killing more journalists? >_>

They mean artificially jacking up the price of oil. Even though they aren't the only game in town, they provide a large share of it, and they could cause a lot of economic mess by doing so. They'd also in the interim wreck their own economy far worse than it'd hurt us, though.

It's time to ween off the Saudi oil teet. Fuck them and their tyrannical regime.
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I wonder if Saudi agents were responsible for the Venezuela collapse in order to maintain their oil noose
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All they have to do is start accepting yuan directly for oil
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Fuck Saudi Arabia. The missing pages from the 9/11 report should be enough to make that call.

We invaded the wrong country. Twice.
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They're going to do fuck all. They would be hurting themselves far more than they'd hurt us.
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Leftists should probably keep up witch hunts against guys like elon musk for smoking a joint who would eventually make countries like SA unnecessary for us to deal with!

the US is actually now the worlds largest oil producer, so fuck em
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Great. This means WWE Crown Jewel will probbaly be delayed or cancelled altogether. Thanks Trump.
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Lokarin posted...

I wonder if Saudi agents were responsible for the Venezuela collapse in order to maintain their oil noose

Imagine being dumb enough to believe that.

Chavez nationalized/expropriated more than 6500 private companies since 2002. Today less than 2% of those are alive. Everything from food production, to medicines, textiles, metallurgy, chemical companies and more.

Killed internal production, trusting that oil would keep the country afloat because it was at over $100 per barrel for a few good months. Oil prices dropped, and everything went to shit.

Blame Chavez, not the Saudis, or the US.
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People forget that a vast portion of the Saudis (from the top of the regime all the way down to the commoners) absolutely HATE the USA on principle. We are not their friends (and never were).

Just like with the China trade deals, we've been reliant on the good graces of the Saudi's for oil for so dang long, we need to chop off the cancerous toes we've been hobbling on. How we find replacement feet to walk on will take some time and energy, but I fear most people will only see the temporary price bumps at the gas pump and cry foul without considering anything farther than their own paycheck next Friday.

There actually IS a method to the madness here (and we'd be better off for it in the long run), but for most people, all they see is madness.
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WastelandCowboy posted...

Saudi Arabia's state-run news agency said Sunday, ominously noting that the country plays "an influential and vital role in the global economy."

hahahahahahahahahahahaha

no it fuckin doesn't
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https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/10/15/you-couldnt-make-bunch-mops-cleaners-and-trash-bags-delivered-saudi-consulate-ahead

Funny that they needed a shit ton of bleach and a cleaning crew right before anyone checked out the alleged murder site
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The Saudis are just gonna start funding more terrorists. GG
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WhiskeyDisk posted...

Fuck Saudi Arabia. The missing pages from the 9/11 report should be enough to make that call.

We invaded the wrong country. Twice.

Pretty much what I was thinking. We need to end our dependence on them and/or find a suitable casus belli.
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