Obama to Pitch $60B Saudi Arms Deal to Congress

The Wall Street Journal reports the White House will officially notify Congress in the next two weeks of a $60 billion deal to sell Saudi Arabia dozens of U.S.-made fighter jets and military helicopters. If it goes ahead, the sale of some 84 new F-15 jets and dozens of helicopter will be the largest U.S. arms deal ever.
The Obama administration is pitching the sale as a major opportunity to create new jobs for the beleaguered American economy. Companies including Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin and General Electric say more than 75,000 jobs could be created to build the new aircraft.
According to The Journal's sources, who remained anonymous, negotiations are also continuing on a side-deal which could see the Saudis pay an additional $30 billion for a U.S.-made upgrade to their naval forces.
Congress is expected to okay the sale of the aircraft ---- made tough to reject in America's current economic state by the prospect of new jobs.
As much as it represents a potential boon for the U.S. economy, the deal with Saudi Arabia would also serve to shore-up the defenses of a nation at the heart of the Middle East which is often viewed as America's key partner in the effort to stem Iran's regional influence.
Iran criticized the arms deal with Saudi Arabia as potentially destabilizing almost as soon as it became public three years ago.
"What the Persian Gulf region needs is stability and security," Mohammad Ali Hosseini, a spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry, was quoted as saying on a government Web site in July of 2007. "Americans have been trying to disturb it by selling weapons to the region."

Source



Every time the US sells weapons to the Middle East. it comes back to bite us in the ass. Why is it now a good idea?

 

mk how is ~120 aircraft and 75,000 jobs in the military/industrial complex going to make one difference in the nation's economy for an extended period of time..

 

On Sept 11, 2001, 19 men from Saudi Arabia hijacked 3 of our commercial jets in an attack on America. Don't you see the logic here, now they won't have to use our Commercial jets, they'll have their own brand new fighter jets. But then, Saudi Arabia is our BFF, right?

.

 

i guess a certain prince will have to start calling himself bandar obama . . .

 

Geo-politics, Saudi Arabia and Iran do not get along, so we make Saudi Arabia a regional power capable of balancing out Iran.

 

wait a second. werent the "terrorists" from saudi arabia? hahaha. this is funnier than whose line is it anyways.

 

you think we would've learned from history to not make this mistake again. We armed the afghans a while back to fight the russians, now we are gonna arm the saudis in case of stuff against iran. We need to learn to stay out of the middle east.

 

you think the sheeple would have figgered out by now its a charade they are trying to keep going

 

really you make like the grand design of things is to keep weapons from our enemy?..

this is like the keeping the football at home, during the Superbowl..

each day in America people go to college, work, fuck and make babies.. Its in our nature to make war with our friends..

Hi welcome to America, Pilgrims.,,. "Oh Hai want some turkey?",, Shoot stab stab...

 

OMG, I can't believe this crap there are way to many stupid ppl in the United States. Easy way to tell is to see who is in office, stupid,ignorant ppl. I am glad it is taking someone who has absolutely no brain whatsoever in office to finally wake the people of our country up. Common Sense will prevail again !!

 

Whose common sense should we apply?

 

Seriously? You are joking right.

 

No, I am not. Whose common sense should we apply?

 

It wasn't the Saudi Arabian government.

 

On the plus side at least they're giving us money for once. Fun fact, Saudi Arabia has the 8th largest military budget in the world, slightly behind Germany, and ahead of India.

 

they say doobie funny over there

 

You bet your life it wasn't !!! But they sure did make out like bandits from the ensuing rise in oil prices, probably more than enough to pay for some fighter jets and helicopters.

It's our war, shouldn't we be the ones making the profits.

.

 

If you know they were not, why make some childish remark as if they were?
Oil prices don't work like that, btw.

 

America america where the richer get richer and the poor get poorer where greed and envy live.......................................................................................

 

Yawn.