Saudi Arabia Is Erdogan’s Biggest Global Move—and His Biggest Gamble
- MBS seen as having amassed too much power to be replaced
- Trump hands responsibity for Khashoggi response to Congress
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks about the murder Khashoggi on Oct. 23.
Photographer: Stringer/Getty Images
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is making his biggest move on the global stage as he seeks to undercut Saudi Arabia’s ambitious would-be king. It’s also his biggest gamble.
Erdogan is very publicly pitting himself against 33-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who has had no qualms about leveraging his own power. If he holds on through the furor over the killing of Saudi critic and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, Prince Mohammed, known as MBS, could theoretically take and keep the Saudi throne for decades to come.