Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman recently spoke about building a new city in Saudi Arabia that would be one of the future, filled with super technology promoting genetic modification, massive entertainments, and robots who serve people all around the place:
This seaside corner of northwest Saudi Arabia is so barren that the only abundant resources a group of consultants could identify were sunlight and “unlimited access to salt water.”
But Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman didn’t see a wasteland when he landed in his helicopter here a few years ago. He saw the future— and hatched a plan for a $500 billion city-state to cover 10,000 square miles of rocky desert and empty coastline to attract the “world’s greatest minds and best talents” to the world’s best paying jobs in the world’s most livable city.
They’ll fly drone taxis to work while robots clean their homes. Their city will supplant Silicon Valley in technology, Hollywood in entertainment and the French Riviera as a place to vacation. It will host a genetic-modification project to make people stronger.
These ideas are laid out in 2,300 pages of confidential documents by consultants at Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey & Co. and Oliver Wyman that The Wall Street Journal reviewed, and discussed in interviews with people involved in the project called Neom, a portmanteau of the Greek word for “new” and the Arabic word for “future.” The documents, dated September 2018, offer the most detailed look inside Neom and its planning since the project was unveiled in 2017.
Tasked by the crown prince, known as MBS, to help turn his imaginary city into a reality, the consultants created an expensive mix of science fiction and corporate buzzwords interrupted by uncomfortable realities: Local tribes would be forcibly relocated. A court system developed by law firm Latham & Watkins and labeled “independent” would have judges reporting directly to the king, and operating under Shariah law, or Islamic jurisprudence.
This should be an automated city where we can watch everything,” Neom’s MBS-led founding board said, according to the documents—a city “where a computer can notify crimes without having to report them or where all citizens can be tracked.”
Neom’s board has adopted the consultants’ recommendations, the documents show. The consulting firms and Latham declined to comment on the documents, which were completed before MBS’s underlings allegedly killed journalist Jamal Khashoggi last fall, according to Saudi officials. Former Neom employees and people familiar with the project say they don’t know how much of the plan will become reality due to potential funding issues and technological limitations.
The Saudi government didn’t respond to a request for comment on the plans for Neom. (source, source)
“Panem et Circenses” was the social policy for the late Roman Empire- keep the people fed and their minds distracted and they would not focus on the real problems in society, such as the overspending, the crumbling infrastructure, and the invading Germanic tribes. Such is common to all falling societies, as they try to keep the masses from realizing how truly awful their situation is until it is absolutely too late.
Saudi Arabia, who is in decline right now is desperately trying to “reform” herself on a world scale to save her rear from the Turkish khazouk, which Erdogan joyfully sharpens with his Ottoman dream. However, little is working to solve the fundamental problems. Saudi knows that she is in trouble, so while she desperately tries to prepare for the inevitable war, she has resorted to an equivalent “dates and dabke” diplomacy, where she is trying to keep her people fed and distracted from the reality of her situation as represented by the government opening of movie theaters across the country as well as promoting “food expos” in country while exporting food to her neighbors.
All of these stories represent a the pattern that we at Shoebat.com have pointed out of Saudi Arabia’s desperate attempts to “reform” herself in the eyes of the world.
But do not be deceived, Saudi Arabia has not reformed in the least. All that has changed is that she has realized that she cannot continue on as she did in the past if she wants to survive.
Remember that just as the USA and Saudis have funded terrorism, it was the USA and the nations of western Europe who created the current Turkish military for the purpose of her acting as a countering force against Russia. Turkey now has the largest military in Europe and one of the most powerful in the world, and Turkey has made clear under Erdogan her intentions to return to her historical state as a world power that for centuries controlled the Middle East and were the “guardians” of Islam.
Saudi Arabia has the most to lose in this arrangement, especially since the USA and Israel have strong ties to Turkey. Given the strength of the USA and the near inseparability of Israeli policy from American posturing in the Middle East, it would not take much for the USA and Israel to jettison Saudi Arabia and leave her to Turkey, who openly wants to destroy the Saud family as part of their plan to re-make the Ottoman Empire.
Prince Salman will talk of flying cars, robots, and making Saudi Arabia into a world destination like no other to travel to, but the reality is that nobody wants to go to Saudi Arabia for reasons other than making the Hajj in most cases, even for many Muslims. The only people who really want to go to Saudi Arabia are the Turks, and they are not coming for the entertainment that Saudi offers, but to have a barbecue and entertain themselves, which will be khazouking the members of the House of Saud as they march triumphantly back into the territory that was once a part of their empire.