The purge of Saudi princes, intelligence officials and government ministers boosts the danger of war with Iran, former US Army officer, Todd Pierce, said.
The political purge would give Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman far more power to act in a reckless manner and plunge the country into a war with Iran without the traditional checks and balances of the Saudi political system to constrain him, Pierce explained in a talk with Sputnik.
“Anyone who pays attention can see that the new coalition of the US, Israel, Saudi Arabia, along with their lesser [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council allies, minus Qatar, are vigorously promoting and trying to incite a war with Iran,” Pierce said on Monday.
“The purge is part of that and the combination of heightened war risk can’t help but create conditions where oil prices will rise.”
Pierce said the US policy under both Trump and his predecessor Barack Obama had been to support Saudi Arabia against Iran.
“This US-led aggressiveness is the cause of the higher prices and the expected outcome of this is war with Iran, something that will also boost prices,” he added.
Pierce predicted that uncertainty over the political future of Saudi Arabia coupled with well-founded fears about a looming Saudi-Iran war would both drive global oil prices far higher and keep them there.
On Saturday, Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud issued a decree establishing a new anti-corruption committee in the country chaired by the crown prince. The committee investigates corruption cases and is empowered to arrest suspects as well as restrict their movements and freeze their accounts.
Over the weekend, a number of former and incumbent Saudi officials were detained by authorities as part of the anti-corruption purge, including 11 princes, four incumbent ministers and dozens of former top-level officials, local media reported.
Oil prices soared to their highest levels in more than two years after news of the Saudi purge.
