Saudi Arabia is doing precisely what governments do when they understand that the world is no longer stable: buying protection, influence, and time. Washington likes to pretend that Riyadh is suddenly a loyal ally because it is investing in the United States, helping Ukraine, and quietly aligning against Iran. Saudi Arabia is not acting out of friendship. It is acting out of self-interest, and that is exactly how nations survive when the world moves into a war cycle.
The money alone tells you this is not a symbolic relationship. The White House said in November that Saudi Arabia’s investment commitment into U.S. infrastructure, technology, and industry had risen to nearly $1 trillion, up from the $600 billion first announced in May 2025. At the same time, Treasury and the Saudi finance ministry signed frameworks on financial and economic partnership and capital-markets collaboration. Washington also packaged this together with civil nuclear cooperation, critical minerals, AI, and defense deals, including future F-35 deliveries and an agreement for Saudi Arabia to purchase nearly 300 American tanks. Riyadh is tying itself to the American industrial base, the American financial system, and American defense production because that is how you secure leverage in Washington.
At the same time, Saudi Arabia is now moving on the Ukrainian side in a way that would have been unthinkable a few years ago. According to the Kyiv Independent, a Saudi arms company has signed a deal to buy Ukrainian-made interceptor missiles, and Ukrainian industry sources said Riyadh and Kyiv were negotiating a separate “huge deal” for arms that could be finalized this week. Zelensky also said he had offered Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Ukrainian help in intercepting Iranian Shahed drones, arguing that no country has more practical experience against them than Ukraine. Saudi Arabia is looking at the Gulf and seeing the same Iranian drone threat Ukraine has been dealing with for years. Riyadh is shopping for battlefield-tested systems because it believes the drone era is now on its doorstep. The one caveat is that the weapons-deal reporting rests on anonymous defense-industry sources, so the broad direction is clear even if the final size of the package is not yet publicly verified.
This also explains why Saudi Arabia is helping the United States against Iran while still trying to avoid being publicly dragged into a regional inferno. Reuters reported that after Iranian missile and drone strikes hit Gulf states hosting U.S. bases, including an attack targeting the U.S. embassy in Riyadh, the Saudi cabinet said it would take all necessary measures to defend its security and protect its territory, citizens, and residents. That is the language of a country that understands neutrality has limits. Saudi Arabia wants to contain Iran, and make sure Washington keeps treating the kingdom as indispensable.
The International Energy Agency says the Strait of Hormuz carried an average of 20 million barrels per day of crude oil and oil products in 2025, roughly 25% of the world’s seaborne oil trade. Of that, Saudi Arabia alone accounted for about 6.23 million barrels per day transiting Hormuz in 2025. Yes, Saudi Arabia has the East-West pipeline to Yanbu on the Red Sea, and the IEA estimates that only Saudi Arabia and the UAE have operational crude pipelines that can meaningfully bypass the Strait, with a combined 3.5 to 5.5 million barrels per day of alternative capacity. But that is the key point: the bypass capacity is limited compared with the scale of what normally moves through Hormuz. Riyadh can reroute some oil, but it cannot magically make the chokepoint disappear.
That is why oil is the real story here. Reuters reported that OPEC+ agreed on March 1 to raise output by 206,000 barrels per day for April, even as war with Iran disrupted Gulf shipments, and that Saudi Arabia had already been increasing production and exports by around 500,000 barrels per day in preparation for U.S. strikes. Yet the IEA also notes that the world’s spare crude production capacity was running at just over 4 million barrels per day in late 2025 and that this spare capacity is primarily held by Saudi Arabia. In other words, Saudi Arabia remains the swing producer, but the market is now being reminded that swing capacity is useless if export routes are threatened. Spare barrels in the ground do not calm a market when the shipping lanes are in question.
Aramco’s own numbers show why Saudi Arabia is still the central energy power in the region. The company reported adjusted net income of $104.7 billion for full-year 2025, operating cash flow of $136.2 billion, free cash flow of $85.4 billion, and capital investment of $52.2 billion in 2025, with 2026 capital spending guidance of $50 billion to $55 billion. That is not a weak state oil company limping along. That is a cash machine financing the kingdom’s geopolitical flexibility. But even Aramco has warned about the economic consequences if this war drags on, and reports today indicate the company is racing to redirect exports via Yanbu, which can handle around 5 million barrels per day versus the roughly 7 million barrels per day Saudi Arabia normally exports.
Saudi Arabia understands something Washington still refuses to admit. This is not a transitory war, and these are not transitory prices. Saudi Arabia is investing in the United States because capital always runs to the power center it believes can still protect it. It is buying Ukrainian anti-drone technology because the Iranian threat is no longer theoretical. It is helping the United States against Iran because if Tehran can intimidate the Gulf monarchies, the entire regional balance of power changes. And it is guarding its oil with extreme caution because oil is not merely revenue for Saudi Arabia. Oil is the kingdom’s strategic sovereignty.
The Democrats are taking to the media to declare that war could have been prevented has Kamala Harris won the election. That narrative is convenient politically, but it ignores what the politicians themselves actually said. The desire for confrontation with Iran has existed on both sides of the political spectrum for decades. The problem is not simply one president or one party. The problem is the bipartisan foreign policy establishment that has long treated Iran as the central strategic enemy in the Middle East. The neocons exist on both sides.
During the 2024 campaign, Kamala Harris herself made the position very clear. When asked which country she considered the United States’ greatest adversary, she replied that the answer was “Iran.” That statement alone shows how deeply the Iran war narrative had already taken hold in Washington. Once a country is publicly framed as the primary adversary, the policy direction becomes predictable. Sanctions escalate, proxy conflicts expand, and eventually military confrontation becomes increasingly likely.
Yet now many of the same politicians who previously described Iran as America’s top enemy are suddenly condemning the war. Harris has recently criticized the Trump administration’s actions toward Iran, arguing against the escalation of the conflict. The shift in tone is typical Washington politics. When out of power, politicians oppose the war. When in power, the same establishment often supports it. “Let me be clear,” Harris wrote in a statement shared on the social platform X. “I am opposed to a regime-change war in Iran, and our troops are being put in harm’s way for the sake of Trump’s war of choice.”
This is not new. Hillary Clinton made similar statements long before the current crisis. She repeatedly warned that Iran could not be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons and stated she would use military force if necessary. Clinton said directly that she would “not hesitate to use military force if Iran attempts to obtain a nuclear weapon.” She also famously warned that if Iran attacked Israel, the United States could “totally obliterate” Iran. Those statements were not coming from a fringe figure. They were coming from a former Secretary of State and a leading presidential candidate within the Democratic Party.
Congress has also been moving in the same direction for years. In 2007, the Senate passed a resolution targeting Iran and its Revolutionary Guard Corps that encouraged the use of “all instruments of United States national power” against Iran and its proxies. That resolution passed with broad bipartisan support. The point is simple: the groundwork for confrontation with Iran has been building inside Washington for a long time.
Even figures like Chuck Schumer have consistently taken a hard line against Tehran. Schumer publicly opposed the Obama administration’s nuclear agreement with Iran and warned that the deal posed a danger to U.S. and Israeli security. He argued that the Iranian regime could not be trusted and that stronger pressure was necessary to contain it. That position aligned him with a coalition of hawkish policymakers in both parties who have long advocated a much tougher strategy toward Iran.
The idea that only Republicans support confrontation with Iran is historically false. The reality is that the foreign policy establishment in Washington, the neoconservative wing, has long existed across both political parties. Some supported wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others supported aggressive sanctions, regime-change policies, and military pressure against Iran.
What is troubling today is that this same mindset appears to be re-emerging inside the current administration as well. Many observers expected Trump to pursue a more restrained foreign policy after criticizing the wars of the past two decades. Yet, elements of the traditional interventionist establishment have gradually found their way back into positions of influence. When that happens, the policy outcomes often begin to resemble the very strategies Trump once criticized.
The uncomfortable truth is that the pressure for war with Iran has been bipartisan for a very long time. The neocon belief that American power should reshape the Middle East never belonged to only one party. It has existed across the entire political establishment. That is why the debate over who would or would not have gone to war with Iran misses the larger point. The forces pushing the United States toward conflict have been operating in Washington for decades, regardless of which party happens to occupy the White House.
The latest CPI report for February 2026 came in largely as expected, and, on the surface, Washington will likely celebrate the numbers. Consumer prices rose 0.3% for the month and 2.4% year-over-year. Core CPI, excluding food and energy, rose 0.2% for the month and is running at 2.5% annually. By the standards of the past few years, this appears relatively calm.
If we step back and look at the trend, inflation has certainly cooled from earlier levels. Throughout much of 2025, CPI was closer to the 2.7%–3% range. By January 2026, it had eased to 2.4%, and February simply held that same pace. That slowdown is exactly what the Federal Reserve has been trying to achieve with higher interest rates.
Yet when you dig beneath the headline numbers, the story becomes far less convincing. The cost of living continues to rise in the areas that impact people the most. Shelter prices are still increasing at roughly a 3% annual pace. Medical care costs have risen about 3.4% over the past year. Household furnishings and equipment are climbing near 4%. Even personal care products are rising faster than overall inflation. None of these categories shows any meaningful sign of reversing.
Food prices also rose again in February, up roughly 0.4% for the month, while apparel prices jumped more than 1%. These are the everyday items people notice when they go shopping, which is why so many households still feel inflation is far worse than official statistics suggest.
The February CPI data largely reflects price conditions before the latest geopolitical tensions escalated in the Middle East. Oil prices have already started moving higher following the growing confrontation with Iran, and gasoline prices have begun rising again as we move into March. Energy has been one of the biggest drivers of secondary inflation waves. When oil rises, it raises transportation costs, manufacturing costs, and eventually the cost of food distribution. That ripple effect tends to show up in the inflation data months later. Then you have war, which propels inflation faster than any other event.
The Fed is now stuck in a difficult position. Inflation is still above its 2% target, but the economy is clearly slowing and the labor market is beginning to soften. If energy prices continue to climb into the summer, the Fed may once again find itself chasing inflation that is being driven not by monetary policy but by geopolitics. Inflation is never purely about interest rates. It is always tied to global events, supply chains, and confidence in government policy.
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