Saudi Arabia's $83B Defense Budget Has an American Off Switch
Saudi Arabia spends $83.2 billion a year on defense, the 8th-largest military budget on Earth, and just days ago won State Department approval for a $24.3 billion F-35 deal. None of it buys the kingdom the ability to fly its own air force without American permission.This is a structural analysis of what "military sovereignty" actually means when every F-15 and Eurofighter Typhoon in the Royal Saudi Air Force depends on mission data files compiled on American soil, diagnostic software controlled by a European consortium, and foreign technicians holding the only legal signatory authority to…
The skinny
The skinny isn't ready yet — notes appear once the transcript is processed.