While President Trump has said that the US is not interested in a war with Iran, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister, Adel al-Jubeir, took to a UN meeting to suggest that US military options are still being considered.



While it seems a bit presumptive for the Saudi FM to decide to speak to US policy, his comments that US patience is “not inexhaustible” seems to be directed both at threatening Iran, and at trying to get the rest of the world on board with the conflict.



Al-Jubeir says that the UN report on the attack will be available soon, and that there is a whole list of options, including military options, still being considered, with him wanting to mobilize international support for what is to come.



Trump, however, had already announced the US response, by way of sanctions increases and a lot of posturing. Though indications were that this was the sum total of the US response, the Saudis seem to be trying to put US responses back on the table to try to wrangle more moves against Iran out of them.



Though President Trump is always interested in pleasing the Saudis, they are facing growing anger in Congress for doing too much to sway US policy, and this effort risks putting a Saudi stamp on whatever the US does next.





Author: Jason Ditz Jason Ditz is news editor of Antiwar.com. View all posts by Jason Ditz