The United States and Saudi Arabia are experiencing a level of tension in their relationship unseen in years, the Wall Street Journal reported, after Riyadh effectively torpedoed Project Freedom, President Trump's Hormuz escort operation within roughly a day of its launch by restricting the US military's use of its bases and airspace.
Project Freedom was announced by Trump in early May as an effort to guide stranded commercial ships safely out of the Strait of Hormuz amid Iran's blockade of the waterway. Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, caught off guard by the announcement, moved almost immediately to bar the US military from using the Prince Sultan Airbase and their airspace to carry out the mission, according to multiple US officials cited in earlier reporting. A phone call between Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman failed to resolve the standoff, forcing Trump to pause the operation roughly a day after it began.
The rift has not fully healed in the months since. The Journal reported last week that Washington is now weighing a reduced military footprint in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and considering shifting some capabilities westward, including potentially to Israel, following extensive damage Iran inflicted on US bases across the Gulf, among them roughly 400 million dollars in damage to the US Navy's Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain that the Pentagon has largely not publicly acknowledged. A Saudi official quoted in that reporting acknowledged that the war exposed the limits of relying exclusively on the US alliance, saying it showed the partnership could not be treated as unconditional.
The tension sits against a backdrop of broader strain between the two governments over how the war with Iran should end, with Gulf states pushing Washington to fully dismantle Iran's military capabilities while the Trump administration has pursued a negotiated settlement, including a memorandum of understanding reached with Tehran in June.
