This is some of that high quality front page drama <| sep |> Sectarianism , remaining an autocratic monarchy , engaging in needless and destructive disputes others like Iran , Syria , Turkey , Yemen and Russia , remain backwards and support extremists . SA is one of those states that is stable when the government has full control and no one is seriously undermining them . Take that away and it will go to chaos . Countries are strong at their roots when their citizens identify with them . It took tens of thousands of foreign extremists , a huge amount of foreign weapons , billions spent in arming and training extremists along with two military operation rooms guiding battles in Jordan and Turkey to bring Syria to a state where it couldn ' t win but it wasn ' t defeated . Too many Syrians were willing to fight for their country despite the incredible suffering . Can the same be said for SA ? No , it ' s a monarchy not a nation state . An Arab AustroHungary where the only thing that unites people is the fact that they are forced to be in the same country . The root problem is royal families in charge . When you have a monarchy government policy and foreign relations become personal . Institutions aren ' t built up and government policy can change with family members . That is why SA is a declining power against Iran . A country that has been through a revolution , 8 years of destructive wars and 30 years of sanctions . The Iranians have built up institutions that debate and decide policy and their hire highly educated people on the basis of merit not family . That ' s why Iran despite being poor and limited punches above it ' s weight compared to SA . It ' s why they are able to build nuclear facilities , put up more scientific paper done by Iranians only then SA , engage in high level diplomacy wisely and send a monkey to space . If the family ever had any wisdom they would reform politically and become a constitutional monarchy . Things are going to be ok when the money is flowing into people ' s pocket . However it won ' t continue and their regional influence is going one way only and its not up .