
President Joe Biden has announced a huge move in international affairs, lifting a ban that the U.S. had of not selling offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia.
Last Friday, the State Department announced this change in approach, which reverses a policy that’s been in effect for three years now. It was initially put in place to apply pressure to Saudi Arabia to wind down its war in Yemen.
The suspension is now being lifted by the State Department, though, for certain transfers of air-to-ground munitions to the kingdom, an official with the State Department confirmed to Reuters.
As that official said:
“We will consider new transfers on a typical case-by-case basis consistent with the Conventional Arms Transfer Policy.”
Reuters also cited five sources in its initial report that said this move was coming.
Congress was briefed just this week on the decision by Biden administration officials, according to one congressional aide. It’s possible that sales of these weapons to Saudi Arabia could resume in the next few days.
One person who has been briefed about the situation said that the federal government was already moving to issue notifications about a sale.
A senior official in the Biden administration told Reuters:
“The Saudis have met their end of the deal, and we are prepared to meet ours.”
All major international weapons deals have to be reviewed by Congress before they’re allowed to be finalized, according to U.S. law. In recent years, lawmakers from both sides of the political aisle have questioned sending offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia, as they are worried about the toll it is having on civilians during the country’s war campaign in Yemen.
Many lawmakers also have significant concerns about a number of different human rights.
As the threat of war in the Middle East has increased in recent months — following the terrorist organization Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel, and Israel’s ongoing response in Gaza — the opposition to the Saudis has softened in the U.S.
In addition, Saudi Arabia has changed its conduct in the Yemen campaign.
The Houthis entered a truce with Saudi Arabia in March of 2022, which was led by the United Nations. Since that time, the Saudis haven’t conducted airstrikes in Yemen, and the fire launched by Yemen across the border has just about stopped, according to an official in the Biden administration.
One official with the State Department told Reuters:
“We also note the positive steps that the Saudi Ministry of Defense have taken over the past three years to substantially improve their civilian harm mitigation processes, in part thanks to the work of U.S. trainers and advisors.”
The war in Yemen has been viewed as a proxy battle between Saudi Arabia and Iran — just one of many.
In late 2014, the Houthis were able to oust a government in Sanaa that was backed by the Saudis, and the two have been battling in a war against alliances of the two sides since 2015.
That has led to hundreds of thousands of people being killed, with 80% of the population in Yemen now being dependent on various international humanitarian aid.