The White House is set to approve an offensive arms sale to Saudi Arabia. After taking office in 2021, President Joe Biden curbed some weapon sales to Riyadh.
On Friday, Reuters reported that the State Department will lift the ban on offensive weapon sales to Saudi Arabia. An official told the outlet, “We will consider new transfers on a typical case-by-case basis consistent with the Conventional Arms Transfer Policy.“
The move paves the way for the US to ship air-to-ground munitions to Saudi Arabia. On the campaign trail in 2020, Biden told voters he would treat Riyadh as a pariah. He made the promise because Saudi’s brutal war in Yemen had claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, and the Kingdom assassinated Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi at a diplomatic building in Turkey.
As president, Biden never fulfilled that campaign pledge. He continued most arms sales to Saudi Arabia, allowing Riyadh to execute the war in Yemen for more than a year before a ceasefire deal was reached with the Houthis. Additionally, rather than treat Riyadh as a pariah, Biden has sought to ink a major deal with Saudi Arabia that would give the Gulf state a Japan-style defense commitment from the US.
The President is also responsible for dragging out the war in Yemen, which has been in a ceasefire since April 2022. Parts of the agreement to end the conflict are currently being delayed by the White House’s eight-month bombing of Yemen.
The ruling Houthis, or Ansar Allah, have attacked shipping in the Red Sea over Israel’s onslaught in Gaza. Washington has attempted to prevent the Houthi attacks by dropping hundreds of bombs on Yemen. Ansar Allah says its drones and missiles will continue to target shipping in the region until Tel Aviv ends the war in Gaza.
If the State Department does approve a sale of air-to-ground bombs to Saudi Arabia, it could meet stiff resistance in Congress. Under the Donald Trump administration, Congress came close to overriding the State Department’s approval of an arms sale to the Kingdom.
The Biden administration could be looking to reverse the offensive weapons ban as it sees Riyadh as key in any post-war Gaza plans. Saudi Arabia recently rejected a US proposal to send its soldiers to act as peacekeepers in the besieged enclave.
