A Royal Saudi Air Force F-15SA. Credit: US Department of Defense (DoD)
By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, May 23 2025 – When US President Donald Trump offered to declare neighboring Canada as America’s 51st state, the Canadians vehemently rejected the proposal.
“We don’t want to be part of America,” was the rallying cry. And the short-lived offer was shot down in flames.
The next target was Greenland, an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark which retains control over foreign policy, defense, national security, and the judicial and legal system.
Trump said he wants to purchase Greenland. But the Danes were not impressed. “Greenland is not for sale. Greenland is not Danish. Greenland belongs to Greenland,” said Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen.
One of Trump’s enduring political slogans “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) is embedded in thousands of baseball caps, posters and tee shirts. In one of several political demonstrations in Greenland, directed against the US, one placard flipped the MAGA slogan: “Make America Go Away” (MAGA).
Perhaps Trump may be successful in campaigning for a more highly prosperous relationship with Saudi Arabia as a trusted ally and possibly America’s 51st state, according to a joke circulating in the delegate’s lounge, the UN’s watering hole.
The Saudis, who gave him a right royal welcome last week, promised a staggering $600 billion dollar investment in the United States.
Trump praised Saudi Crown Prince and de facto ruler Mohammed bin Salman calling him “an incredible man” and a “great guy,” but made no mention of human rights concerns in the country.
The history-making deal was focused primarily on US arms sales and military assistance to the Saudis, along with investments by Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), two other countries Trump visited.
An oil-blessed Middle Eastern nation, Saudi Arabia is one of the world’s biggest single purchasers of American arms—including fighter planes, combat helicopters, missiles, battle tanks and armored personnel carriers.
Following Trump’s heavily-publicized visit to Riyadh last week, the White House was emphatic in declaring that Saudi Arabia remains “our largest Foreign Military Sales (FMS) partner” with active cases valued at more than $142 billion–nearly double Saudi Arabia’s 2025 defense budget of $78 billion.
“Our defense relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is stronger than ever under President Trump’s leadership, and the package signed (May 13), the largest defense cooperation deal in U.S. history, is a clear demonstration of our commitment to strengthening our partnership”, the White House said.
“The agreement opens the door for expanded U.S. defense industry participation and long-term sustainment partnerships with Saudi entities.”
Zain Hussain, Researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) told IPS Saudi Arabia is heavily reliant on arms imports from the USA.
In 2020-2024, the USA supplied 74% of all Saudi imports of major arms, and in the last decade (between 2015 and 2024), the USA supplied 72% of Saudi imports of major arms, he pointed out.
Looking further at different armament categories reveals the extent of Saudi reliance on arms imports from the USA.
For example, between 2015 and 2024, the USA supplied around 80% of Saudi imports of aircraft, 84% of Saudi imports of missiles, 65% of Saudi imports of armoured vehicles, and 89% of Saudi imports of air defense systems.
Of course, despite the strong reliance of Saudi Arabia on the USA for arms imports, Saudi Arabia also imports arms from other states. For example, Saudi Arabia’s imports of ships between 2015 and 2024 were from Spain (67%), France (21%) and Germany (12%), declared Hussain.
Today in Saudi Arabia, President Donald J. Trump announced Saudi Arabia’s $600-billion commitment to invest in the United States, building economic ties that will endure for generations to come.
“The first deals under the announcement strengthen our energy security, defense industry, technology leadership, and access to global infrastructure and critical minerals.”
- • The deals celebrated are historic and transformative for both countries and represent a new golden era of partnership between the United States and Saudi Arabia.
• From day one, President Trump’s America First Trade and Investment Policy has put the American economy, the American worker, and our national security first, said the White House.
Dr. Natalie J. Goldring, who represents the Acronym Institute at the United Nations, focusing on conventional weapons and arms trade issues, told IPS: ““We’ve seen this movie before”.
In 2017, President Trump said that US companies would sell $110 billion of military equipment to Saudi Arabia. Roughly a year and a half later, Glenn Kessler, fact checker for The Washington Post, concluded that there had been little progress toward implementing the agreement.
He gave the administration’s claim four Pinocchios, the maximum the paper normally gives for a false claim. There’s little if any evidence that the current agreements have any greater basis in fact.”
“As with any number of other issues, President Trump tends to make grandiose claims that frequently are not supported in reality,” said Dr Goldring.
In this case, the press release touts his role as ‘the dealmaker in chief,’ even though it includes virtually no details about the proposed sales of military equipment and services. That makes it impossible to discern what proportion of these proposed sales originated in the Biden administration – or the first Trump administration, for that matter.”
“The Trump Administration’s approach puts the focus squarely on the hypothetical economic benefits of these agreements, rather than foreign policy and international security risks. The Trump administration needs to recognize that weapons aren’t toasters, and shouldn’t be sold as if they are. Yet the proposed deals don’t appear to reflect consideration of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record, for example,” she pointed out.
“Based on US law, Saudi Arabia’s human rights offences should disqualify them from receiving military equipment and services from the United States. And Saudi Arabia is by no means alone in this regard; for example, Israel should be ineligible on similar grounds,” declared Dr Goldring.
A White House Fact Sheet released last week says: Saudi Arabia is one of the United States’ largest trading partners in the Middle East.
Saudi direct investment in the United States totaled $9.5 billion in 2023, focused on the transportation, real estate, and automotive sectors.
In 2024, U.S.-Saudi Arabia goods trade totaled $25.9 billion, with U.S. exports at $13.2 billion, imports at $12.7 billion, and a trade surplus in goods of $443 million
Thalif Deen is a former Director, Foreign Military Markets at Defense Marketing Services (DMS) and one-time UN correspondent for Jane’s Defence Weekly, London. A Fulbright scholar with a Master’s Degree (MSc) in Journalism from Columbia University, New York, he is Senior Editor at IPS and author of the 2021 book on the United Nations titled “No Comment – and Don’t Quote me on That”. The link to Amazon via the author’s website follows https://www.rodericgrigson.com/no-comment-by-thalif-deen/
IPS UN Bureau Report
!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?’http’:’https’;if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+’://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js’;fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, ‘script’, ‘twitter-wjs’);
Saudi Riyal Exchange Rate