[616c]

Perhaps having lived close to Saudi Arabia, your comment is asinine and reflects a true a true misunderstanding of the region and the US government and other Western powers influence within it, past and present.

I lived there six plus years, why don't you go there and report back what you learned?

This is akin to speaking lazily about hardware and software engineering lazily on this site contradicting many available resourced and not expecting to be called out. It is expected though by me here and elsewhere. Studying languages and regional politics is just as much a speciality as computer science, but many in the US write it off, especially for Arab studies. It's why I pivoted from that expertise into IT and security since people with that expertise especially are not in government influencing or implementing sound policy based on that discipline. So this year's news has not been a surprise to me or my colleagues at all.