Aftandilian Publishes Op-Ed on US-Saudi Relations
Gregory Aftandilian, Lecturer at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, published a recent Op-Ed examining the future of US-Saudi relations under President Donald Trump.
Aftandilian’s Op-Ed, entitled “Trump’s Style is at the Heart of Closer US-Saudi Relations,” was published in The Arab Weekly on May 21, 2017.
From the text of the article:
Much has been written about how the US-Saudi relationship soured during Barack Obama’s tenure as US president but has improved under Donald Trump’s.
After all, the thinking goes, Trump made Saudi Arabia the first stop in his first trip overseas as president and both governments view Iran as the main regional threat and are eager to prevent Tehran’s meddling in the Arab world.
Gone is the lingering effect of Obama’s comment, made in an interview in 2015, that Saudi Arabia and Iran must find a way to “share the neighbourhood.”
Moreover, Trump and his team have gone to great lengths to not concern themselves with the internal affairs of countries. US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, in a recent speech at the State Department, said: “If you condition our national security efforts on someone adopting our values, we probably can’t achieve our national security goals.”
Aftandilian spent over 21 years in government service, most recently on Capitol Hill where he was foreign policy adviser to Congressman Chris Van Hollen (2007-2008), professional staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and foreign policy adviser to Senator Paul Sarbanes (2000-2004), and foreign policy fellow to the late Senator Edward Kennedy (1999).