Visit that wrecked the West’s bombast about evil regimes

THE visit by President Biden to Saudi Arabia utterly destroys months of Western propaganda against Russia. We have been invited to think that our hostility towards President Putin was based on our lofty moral disapproval of his regime, its murders of the Kremlin’s enemies, its repressive character and its aggression abroad.

But the Saudi ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Sultan Al Saud (MBS), was found to have approved the grisly murder and dismemberment, using bone saws, of dissident Jamal Khashoggi.

His country is a blood-splattered despotism that recently (just before a visit by our Mr Johnson) executed 81 people. Saudi Arabia – I put this mildly – does not have independent juries, free media or an opposition. It is a political slum. And it has launched a horrible aggression in Yemen, in which Western nations have helped to arm, train and equip its forces.

Mr Biden used to say he wanted to turn Saudi Arabia into a pariah.

But now, in an embarrassing paradox, his pseudo-moral posturing over Russia has forced him to toady to the Saudis. He needs them to sell more oil because we won’t buy it from Russia.

This is how it goes. There are no real principles in such things. During the Second World War, the US was far friendlier to the Kremlin than it needed to be, blatantly sucking up to Stalin, while snubbing Churchill. It even put up for years with Stalin’s refusal to join the war against Imperial Japan.

So you may be sure that Washington’s policy in Ukraine is nothing to do with democracy, freedom or anything like that. And worries must be growing in the White House and the Pentagon about the war. It is not going very well.

Moscow’s control over gas and oil is hurting many European countries. So is its blockade of Ukraine’s wheat exports. Serious rationing of heat and power are on the cards. The West’s military machine turns out not to be as good as it thought. Russia, with its enormous Cold War reserves of shells, may even be able to outgun us, as we have closed many of our arms factories. Nato nations daren’t get directly involved as this could widen the war and even lead to a nuclear exchange.

If Mr Biden can meet the grisly MBS now (even if he tries hard not to seem too friendly), then don’t rule out the possibility of him meeting Putin too, in time. And then all the bombast about evil regimes, appeasement and the rest will be set on one side.