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Speaker 1: Also media.

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Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, welcome back to Behind the Bastards, the

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Speaker 2: podcast about the very worst people in all of history,

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Speaker 2: and we have a very special episode for you this week.

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Speaker 2: We are talking about finally we're going to give the

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Speaker 2: first two episodes that will be a multi part series

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Speaker 2: about Mohammed Ben Salomon, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia,

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Speaker 2: and to talk about this. Obviously, the only guest we

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Speaker 2: could bring on for this episode is a guy I

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Speaker 2: think most people are aware of, one of the world's

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Speaker 2: leading experts on Saudi Arabia, my former colleague Get Cracked,

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Speaker 2: David Bell. David, welcome to the show.

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Speaker 3: Thanks for having me. Yeah, if anything, I'm gonna be

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Speaker 3: teaching you a thing or two.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of people don't know this. You live

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Speaker 2: for forty seven years in Saudi Arabia, that which is

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Speaker 2: impressive because you're not that old.

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Speaker 3: Yeah no, no, that's several years. Yeah, several years more

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Speaker 3: than I have existed.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: I think it's actually older than Mohammed Ben Solomon. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: that's that's very good. So you're more qualified to talk

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Speaker 2: about the country than the king of the country. Well,

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Speaker 2: not the king, he's not actually the king. He's the

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Speaker 2: crown Prince and he's going to be the king and

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Speaker 2: he's effectively ruling the country. But you know, you know

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Speaker 2: how it goes with with with with these sort of

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Speaker 2: royal families.

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Speaker 4: Of course, I do, like I said, expert, Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Expert on Saudi Arabia. In addition to that, you and

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Speaker 2: I lived together for a period of time in the

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Speaker 2: in the late aughts. We worked. We worked at Cracked

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Speaker 2: magazine together. You are currently a writer and script polisher

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Speaker 2: and finisher offer at some more news and even more news. Yes,

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Speaker 2: and you also co run the podcast network Gamefully Unemployed

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Speaker 2: with our also fellow former roommate and colleague Tom Ryman,

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Speaker 2: which hosts several of my favorite podcasts, including Fox Mulders,

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Speaker 2: a Maniac, and the new him Boos.

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Speaker 4: Him Boos, which is about supernatural.

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Speaker 2: Yes, it's your supernatural rewatch podcast.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's I even a rewatch. I've never seen Supernatural,

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Speaker 3: so it.

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Speaker 2: Used to watch for you. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's me discovering those beautiful, beautiful boys, the Winchesters.

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Speaker 2: And you're I didn't do it this year. I did

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Speaker 2: a big old basket costume for a Halloween this year,

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Speaker 2: but I think next year, I'm gonna do a Fox

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Speaker 2: Mulder costume, and I'm trying to pick between either just

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Speaker 2: wearing the FBI like suit and having an empty holster,

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Speaker 2: because as Fox Moulder, I have lost my gun before

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Speaker 2: showing up at the party, or show up at the

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Speaker 2: party with like five or six fake guns and give

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Speaker 2: them the people, like accidentally drop them in people's laps.

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Speaker 2: If I see someone dress as a gondola player, maybe

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Speaker 2: point it at them. You know, all the Fox Molder classics.

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Speaker 3: Anywhere you can leave it, where kids can reach it

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Speaker 3: is preferable.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, these are all classic Fox Molder tactics.

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Speaker 3: I know. I'm if Fox Moulder really existed, you would

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Speaker 3: have done a six part series on.

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Speaker 2: Him well, because it would have been a congressional investigation,

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Speaker 2: and as the things that he did, like multiple of them,

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Speaker 2: like the Church Committee would have had like a Church committee.

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Speaker 4: My favorite, not to deviate, but my favorite things.

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Speaker 3: I've been rewatching the X Files recently because I'm always

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Speaker 3: rewatching the X Files.

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Speaker 2: Of course, as you are wont to do.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, my favorite thing he's ever done, in my opinion,

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Speaker 3: is they were at a crime scene where there's blood

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Speaker 3: and he wanted to prove that blood was fake. So

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Speaker 3: he reaches down and he dabs it on his finger

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Speaker 3: and he tastes it and he goes, it's sugar. And

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Speaker 3: it's like, that is just something you don't do. I

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Speaker 3: know it's small, but I can't get over the idea

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Speaker 3: of being in a crime scene seeing blood and tasting it.

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Speaker 3: That would stop everything. Like that alone would be like, Mulder,

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Speaker 3: go home, What do you need to go to the

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Speaker 3: doctor here?

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Speaker 2: If he's an FBI agent, like a beat cop would

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Speaker 2: kick you off the scene. Then what you just you

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Speaker 2: just tasted the blood. Get out of it.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, even if it's fake blood, don't taste it.

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Speaker 2: Don't taste That's crazy stuff. When I was at Oxford,

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Speaker 2: they kept trying to show me like, you know, oh,

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Speaker 2: here's where Tolkien worked, Here's where C. S. Lewis wrote.

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Speaker 2: And I was like, where did Where was Fox Molder's

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Speaker 2: dorm when he was canonically at Oxford?

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Speaker 4: Yes, and he had sex on Sir Arthur Doyle's grave.

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Speaker 2: And they were all like twenty and they were like,

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Speaker 2: who is that a graduate of Oxford? And I'm like, God,

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Speaker 2: damn it, you fucking children. You know who else is

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Speaker 2: a young bastard. Mohammad Salomon the crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.

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Speaker 2: Well US two. But yes, so you've probably the listener obviously, Dave. Again,

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Speaker 2: as I stated, you're an expert on Saudi Arabia, internationally

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Speaker 2: recognized for the listeners who know less. Mohammad Ban Solomon

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Speaker 2: is the crown Prince and the current effective ruler of

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Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia. His dad is the king, but he's not

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Speaker 2: like super on the job right now, like what most

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Speaker 2: people tend to agree that his son is kind of

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Speaker 2: the power behind the throne. The thing you will probably

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Speaker 2: know him best for if you were a casual reader

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Speaker 2: of news in Saudi Arabia is that he's the guy

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Speaker 2: you had that journalist bone saw to Jamal Kashogi from

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Speaker 2: the Washington Post almost certainly ordered a team of people

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Speaker 2: to have him killed and sawed up with the bone

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Speaker 2: saw in Turkey. Yeah, he's that guy. And NBS, as

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Speaker 2: he's generally called, is one of the most dangerous and

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Speaker 2: in some ways competent like bastards in the world today.

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Speaker 2: He's a world leader who has been generally very successful

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Speaker 2: in pushing his specific ideology and his specific plans. He's

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Speaker 2: been running into increasing issues as he's gotten more power,

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Speaker 2: and as he's accumulated more power, and as he's spent

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Speaker 2: more time at the top. But you know, it's kind

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Speaker 2: of one of those things where his overall level of

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Speaker 2: success has been pretty great, So you have to credit

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Speaker 2: him as being extremely competent, at least kind of within

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Speaker 2: his broad remit right. He has put his fingers on

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Speaker 2: the scale to push anti democratic policies around the globe,

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Speaker 2: using his influence and the amount of money that the

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Speaker 2: Saudis have through their oil wealth, and at home, he

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Speaker 2: has mixed a series of dizzying reforms with unprecedented authoritarian crackdowns,

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Speaker 2: often against members of his own family. Now, before we

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Speaker 2: discuss how he got to where he is today and

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Speaker 2: what he's done with his time and power, we need

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Speaker 2: to talk about the origins of his family, the House

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Speaker 2: of Saud. As you might guess, the country of Saudi

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Speaker 2: Arabia takes its name from the Saud family line, which

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Speaker 2: has its origins in the eighteenth century in a small

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Speaker 2: town on the Arabian Peninsula named Diria. In the mid

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Speaker 2: seventeen hundreds, there was a religious leader in that town

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Speaker 2: named Mohammad Abd al Wahab in the Arabian state of Najd,

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Speaker 2: who began preaching about the need to return to a

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Speaker 2: pure form of Islam. He was angry at what he

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Speaker 2: saw is the decadence and many moral compromises of the

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Speaker 2: Ottoman Cahliph, who had allowed such evils as relatively open

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Speaker 2: socialization between unmarried men and women, and women to work

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Speaker 2: in the world. Right, Like ladies were getting jobs in

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Speaker 2: the Ottoman Empire, right, particularly in the capital. Yeah, he

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Speaker 2: was really unhappy about that, like women are making money. Nah.

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Speaker 2: He was also unhappy about a lot of art in

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Speaker 2: the Ottoman world that depicted the human form, which you're

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Speaker 2: not really supposed to do under the strictest interpretations of Islam.

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Speaker 2: And he was unhappy about music. You're not supposed to

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Speaker 2: have music, right. There's certain kinds of what we would

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Speaker 2: call music that just involves like harmonizing voices that are allowed,

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Speaker 2: but you're not supposed to have like instruments. Right. These

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Speaker 2: are all things that under yeah, under the strictest interpretations

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Speaker 2: of Islam. Right again, in most Muslims I have known,

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Speaker 2: in most places Muslims in the Muslim world, you're going

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Speaker 2: to encounter music, but not in the strict parts.

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Speaker 4: Right, Yeah.

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Speaker 3: I mean it's every religion, right is like the strictest

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Speaker 3: parts are always ridiculous, and most people, even if they

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Speaker 3: subscribe to that religion, are going through and they're just like, yeah,

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Speaker 3: we're not gonna do that, Like well, yeah, it's fine.

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Speaker 2: Like you can run into like people who are like

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Speaker 2: American Christian anti Muslim folks who will be like, well,

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Speaker 2: you know, if they're actually following their religion, they're supposed

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Speaker 2: to do this and this and this, and it's like, well,

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Speaker 2: if you were following the letter of the Bible, there's

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Speaker 2: a lot of shit you shouldn't be doing that you're doing, right.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it feels like it's all kind of part

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Speaker 3: of the same thing, whether it be like these people

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Speaker 3: or I don't know, the Heritage Foundation where it's like, yeah,

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Speaker 3: they're all the same kind of maniac.

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Speaker 2: You can see Wahab as sort of like a Heritage

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Speaker 2: Foundation maniac of his time, where he's like, very minor

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Speaker 2: compromises had been made with the hardest lined version of

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Speaker 2: the faith in order to like exist in the in

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Speaker 2: the increasingly modern world, and Wahab was like fuck that shit,

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Speaker 2: Like we need to go back right like we have,

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Speaker 2: we have to returven. You know, he's really one of

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Speaker 2: those guys. There's a lot of debate, and I am

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Speaker 2: not a scholar of Islam on how theologically sound Wahab's

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Speaker 2: arguments are right. And this is not a podcast. That

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Speaker 2: doesn't matter for our purposines today. What matters is that

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Speaker 2: he had a lot of supporters, and one of these

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Speaker 2: supporters was his local emir, a guy named Mohammad ibn Saud,

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Speaker 2: who is the kind of founder. He's obviously not the

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Speaker 2: first member of the House of Saud, but he is

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Speaker 2: the guy who is generally seen as the founder of

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Speaker 2: like the House of Saud as a modern political dynasty, right,

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Speaker 2: and Mohammed ibn Saud seemed to seems to have seen

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Speaker 2: Wahab as a useful tool for building a base of support.

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Speaker 2: Saud was an ambitious man. The Arabia of his day

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Speaker 2: was a scantly populated backwater with nomadic tribes who were

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Speaker 2: constantly at each other's throats and too busy fighting to

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Speaker 2: build a credible state. In seventeen forty four, Wahab again,

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Speaker 2: this guy is basically the leader of a militant extremist

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Speaker 2: religious movement of his day. He leads like a mob

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Speaker 2: to destroy the tomb of one of the prophet Muhammad's companions,

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Speaker 2: framing his attack on idolatry. Right, if you've got if

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Speaker 2: you've got a tomb that is like a venerated spot,

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Speaker 2: that's id that's worshiping an idol, right, And you're not

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Speaker 2: supposed to do that under the strictest interpretations of the religion,

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Speaker 2: you know, Like that that's kind of his arts, is

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Speaker 2: that people were worshiping the tomb as opposed to like,

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Speaker 2: you're only supposed to worship God.

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Speaker 3: The tomb is the place where his body is though, right, right, yes,

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Speaker 3: Like that just seems like what are we gonna do

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Speaker 3: at that point? Like that just I don't know, man'

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Speaker 3: that's yeah, strict I.

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Speaker 2: Guess it's the point. That's exactly what it is. Right.

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Speaker 2: He also stones a woman to death for alleged adultery.

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Speaker 2: I'm pointing out, like who knows what the turn Like

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Speaker 2: the standards of evidence back then were not high, right,

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Speaker 2: And eventually he does a lot of shit like this,

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Speaker 2: and Wahab has to go on the run because people

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Speaker 2: get angry at him for being a giant dick and

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Speaker 2: yeah for being an asshole. And when he goes in

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Speaker 2: the run, Muhammed bin Saud takes him in and he

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Speaker 2: kind of welds his followers. And this version of Orthodox

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Speaker 2: Islam which has this, it includes all of these strict

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Speaker 2: returns to like old rules, but it also includes these

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Speaker 2: new calls for Arab nationalism, right, which is an increasingly

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Speaker 2: popular idea in the in the area. Right at the time,

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Speaker 2: Arabs are not governing themselves. They're they're under the rulership

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Speaker 2: of a Turkish caliph in large part. Right, this is

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Speaker 2: we talk about this in the Lawrence of Arabia episodes.

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Speaker 2: This is going to culminate in the early night in

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Speaker 2: hundreds in the Arab Revolution. But this is kind of

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Speaker 2: a lot of the origins of a lot of that stuff,

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Speaker 2: right is Wahab is preaching that, like we should be independent,

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Speaker 2: and even Saud is like, Okay, well if I this

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Speaker 2: guy just wants to be a religious figurehead, and he's

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Speaker 2: willing to back my family as the ruling kings of

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Speaker 2: an Arab kingdom, right, And that's what I want for

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Speaker 2: my family. I don't want us to just be like

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Speaker 2: local big wigs. I want us to be the Kings

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Speaker 2: of the Arab world in seventeen.

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Speaker 3: Forty is Arab nationalism? I assume that it was very popular, right,

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Speaker 3: like that idea.

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Speaker 2: Yea, not yet, it's starting to be because of Saud

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Speaker 2: and Wahab, Right, it starts to be popular. It's going

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Speaker 2: to be very popular in the nineteen hundreds, right and

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Speaker 2: seventeen forty five they're kind of ahead of the curve, right, Okay, yeah,

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Speaker 2: they're like the first punk bands.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: I just think about how a lot of bad ideas

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Speaker 3: will be couched in, you know, generally popular ideas or

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Speaker 3: the idea that this system isn't working where it's like

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Speaker 3: they're not wrong. You know, it's like someone being like,

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Speaker 3: hey Twitter sucks, let me buy Twitter, and then making

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Speaker 3: Twitter even worse, where it's like, if you're exploiting, like

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Speaker 3: people's frustrations that are valid, you can sneak in all

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Speaker 3: sorts of bullshit.

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Speaker 4: I guess this is my point. Is it like that?

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Speaker 2: It's yeah, it's kind of and it's kind of a

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Speaker 2: symbol of how there's not enough. There's not enough just

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Speaker 2: raw support for the idea of an independent Arab state,

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Speaker 2: so Saud has to kind of grab this crazy dude

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Speaker 2: and his followers who are angry about like women working

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Speaker 2: and people playing music to be like if they're angry

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Speaker 2: about other things mostly, but they're willing to be angry

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Speaker 2: about the thing I'm angry about. And if I get

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Speaker 2: them on my back, they're crazy and they're willing to

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Speaker 2: fight and die, right, So, like it kind of makes

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Speaker 2: sense to partner up with these these insane motherfuckers. It's

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Speaker 2: a lot Again, this happens all the time, right, Like

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Speaker 2: the religious right is largely a factor of like very rich,

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Speaker 2: rich people whose primary goal was to not be taxed

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Speaker 2: and to not have their workers have rights, who are like, oh,

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Speaker 2: these people are angry about like women wearing skirts and

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Speaker 2: getting abortions. Well, if they're angry about taxes too, if

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Speaker 2: I can get them to oppose taxes too, then like, yeah,

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Speaker 2: throw all on the bus, right, Yeah, that's kind of

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Speaker 2: how reactionary movements always work.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just whoever's pissed off who can tolerate each other,

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Speaker 3: getting together and like.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, And that's and again, there are some

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Speaker 2: legitimate grievances here Arabs are being persecuted by the Ottomans,

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Speaker 2: but there's a lot of like there's not enough persecution

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Speaker 2: for there to be a large enough movement to cause

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Speaker 2: a revolt on its own. So Soud has to find

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Speaker 2: these maniacs and kind of get them on his side.

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Speaker 2: So for about half a century. In seventeen forty five,

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Speaker 2: they establish what is technically a country. It's really just

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Speaker 2: like a city state based around the city of Derriya,

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Speaker 2: which is today kind of like a suburb of Riod. Right.

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Speaker 2: Riada is the current capital of Saudi Arabia, So basically

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Speaker 2: that region what is today the capital of Saudi Arabia.

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Speaker 2: They have like a micro state that is ruled by

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Speaker 2: the Saud family and is a semi an independent Saudi state.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: That exists in seventeen forty five for about fifty years,

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Speaker 2: a little bit more than half a century, right, a

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Speaker 2: little more than fifty years. So that's a pretty good job, right,

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Speaker 2: Like they're able to kind of like make their own

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Speaker 2: country for like two generations almost until in eighteen nineteen. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: pretty good. Better than I probably would have done if

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Speaker 2: I tried to make a breakaway.

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Speaker 3: Saf I, mine will be done in an afternoon, Like

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Speaker 3: it won't even last a day.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, I really wish you'd been able to get

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Speaker 2: hold of those nuclear missiles day, but unfortunately, without them,

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Speaker 2: you're unlikely to secede from the United States.

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Speaker 4: How they take you seriously?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we all learned that lesson from North Korea.

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Speaker 2: So for half a century or so, the Saud family

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Speaker 2: rules their new country from Darrea until in eighteen nineteen.

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Speaker 2: This kind of like the black and white teachings that

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Speaker 2: Wahabism are preaching, leads to increasing conflicts with the Ottomans.

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Speaker 2: The Alsaud rulers of the country run into a version

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Speaker 2: of the same problem that afflicts any authoritarians who ally

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Speaker 2: with crazy religious hardliners, which is that sooner or later

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Speaker 2: they're going to try to get you to do crazy

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Speaker 2: stuff for them because they think that's what God wants. Right,

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Speaker 2: Like you, if you hit yourself to these guys, they're

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Speaker 2: going to make demands increasingly that you, like, you have

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Speaker 2: to do some crazy stuff, right, Like you're on team

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Speaker 2: crazy guys. You have to do some crazy shit.

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Speaker 4: Right, that's what you signed up for.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, don't you believe the crazy stuff?

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Speaker 3: Well this is sorry, this is just parallelling because you know,

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Speaker 3: obviously it's on my mind a lot, but today where

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Speaker 3: it's like it feels like a lot of the far

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Speaker 3: right that you have the grifters and then you have

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Speaker 3: the true believers, right, the people who are like, no,

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Speaker 3: we're gonna unmask the deep state and get all the pedophiles.

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Speaker 3: And then the other people are like no, no, no, no,

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Speaker 3: this is like kind of a grit So we are

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Speaker 3: just what money, yeah, exactly, like.

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Speaker 4: You don't understand, we're just trying not to pay a

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Speaker 4: lot of taxis. Yeah, it's a weird mix.

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Speaker 2: In this case, the Wahabis believe that God wanted them

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Speaker 2: to occupy Mecca and Medina and to sack Carbala, which

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Speaker 2: is a town in a rock, and destroy a tomb

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Speaker 2: for Mohammad's grandson, which again people were like going to

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Speaker 2: to pray basically, right, this is the kind of thing

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Speaker 2: the automance were kind of fine with ignoring them. Well,

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Speaker 2: they were just running this backwater. But now they're trying

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Speaker 2: to take the capital city of the Faith and sack

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Speaker 2: a random town and also take the second city of

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Speaker 2: the Faith. And that's just too you're getting too busy, right,

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Speaker 2: and you don't have the ability to actually.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like a cult, right, is like we all

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Speaker 3: want to wear robes and like do drugs.

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Speaker 4: And hang out and then they're like why not, all.

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Speaker 3: Right, yeah, and then it's suddenly like all right, everybody

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Speaker 3: take a dagger and we're gonna stab ourselves and you're like, well, no,

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Speaker 3: I don't want to do.

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Speaker 2: Didn't you guys believe in the cult? Shit? Not that much?

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Speaker 1: Right?

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Speaker 3: It was in the terms and agreements, like did you

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Speaker 3: not read them? Like this was where it was heading.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So the uh the Wahabas accused the Ottoman governors

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Speaker 2: of the state of not respecting Sharia law, which forbade idolatry.

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Speaker 2: And the Ottomans don't react well with this, and unlike

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Speaker 2: the Saudis, they have an army, like a big army

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Speaker 2: because they're an empire. They're not like a good empire,

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Speaker 2: but they're bigger than this backwater little town. So the

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Speaker 2: first Saudi state gets crushed by Ottoman arms. Their capital

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Speaker 2: at Darria was destroyed, and the saud in charge is

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Speaker 2: taken to Constantinople, where his head gets cut off. His

356
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Speaker 2: body is posed holding the severed head into played for

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Speaker 2: three days before being thrown into the sea, which is,

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Speaker 2: you know, one way to handle an insurrection.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, did it work?

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Speaker 1: Not?

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Speaker 2: In the long run, not in the long run, but

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Speaker 2: you know points for trying. If this out family was

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Speaker 2: good at one thing, it was the fact that they

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Speaker 2: were really good at making more of themselves. Right. This

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00:19:22,600 --> 00:19:24,919
Speaker 2: is continues to be a strength of this family to

366
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Speaker 2: the modern day. Despite the Ottoman Empire's best efforts, a

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Speaker 2: prince managed to get free of their dragnet and survived

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Speaker 2: to rebuild the family movement. This guy was Turkey bin

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Speaker 2: Abdullah bin Mohammad al Saud, and he fought against the

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Speaker 2: Ottomans to Fenderia, Escaping after his son and two of

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Speaker 2: his brothers were killed. He spends five years in exile

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Speaker 2: in the desert, rebuilding an army and gathering followers to

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Speaker 2: his banner. Biographer Ibrahim al Kamis says this about the man.

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Speaker 2: Turkey vowed to himself to stand firm in the face

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Speaker 2: of enemies and to fight in battle, even if alone,

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Speaker 2: carrying his sword al Azrib, which he referred to in

377
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Speaker 2: his famish poem. If every friend forsakes their friend, I

378
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Speaker 2: will carry all reab as a steadfast companion. Right. Basically,

379
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Speaker 2: if I don't have any other friends, at least I've

380
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Speaker 2: got my knife, which is pretty cool.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's pretty bad ass, right, you can get gangster.

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Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, So I'm I'm like you said, they like

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Speaker 3: there's a lot of them. I start picturing the Scars Guards, Like,

384
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Speaker 3: is it like that where if you strike down two?

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Speaker 4: Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Are the family, Yes, they're they're charismatic like the

387
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Speaker 2: Scars Guards. One of them was in the the series

388
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Speaker 2: and or like the Scars Guards. Yes you can uh yeah,

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Speaker 2: the Al Saud families every.

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Speaker 4: Time one yeah, got it?

391
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Speaker 2: So uh. In eighteen twenty four, this this guy Turkey,

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Speaker 2: the kind of like inheritor of the Al Saud family,

393
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Speaker 2: establishes the second Saudi State, moving the capital to Riyad

394
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Speaker 2: proper and governing there for about ten years. Near the

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Speaker 2: end of eighteen thirty four, while he's kind of consolidating

396
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Speaker 2: his power, he's fighting a series of battles against his rivals,

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Speaker 2: and you know, he's got to fight the Ottomans. But

398
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Speaker 2: a lot of his rivals are members of his own family, right,

399
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Speaker 2: because it's a big family and they're not all in

400
00:21:15,280 --> 00:21:18,399
Speaker 2: agreement about who should be in charge. And near the

401
00:21:18,520 --> 00:21:21,040
Speaker 2: end of eighteen thirty four, after about ten years of

402
00:21:21,080 --> 00:21:25,879
Speaker 2: governing this revitalized Saudi State, Turkey is ambushed while leaving

403
00:21:25,960 --> 00:21:28,800
Speaker 2: his mosque and slain by three assassins who had been

404
00:21:28,880 --> 00:21:32,600
Speaker 2: hired by his second cousin, Mishari bin Abdul Rahman, who

405
00:21:32,680 --> 00:21:35,400
Speaker 2: tried to make himself the new a mom. Turkey's son

406
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Speaker 2: Faisal returned home immediately after this and put an end

407
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Speaker 2: to the insurrection, although fighting would continue for another decade.

408
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Speaker 2: This is going to be a common feature of the

409
00:21:44,720 --> 00:21:50,080
Speaker 2: second Saudi state, right, is that they're all fighting each other, right,

410
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Speaker 2: that's kind of their biggest enemy. And honestly, even up

411
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Speaker 2: to the modern day, the Saudi royal family spends a

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Speaker 2: lot of time killing other members of the Saudi royal family.

413
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Speaker 2: It's kind of one of their great pastimes.

414
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Speaker 4: H Well, you gotta have a pastime. I mean.

415
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Speaker 3: That's the thing about power, right, is like never enough right, So,

416
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Speaker 3: like no, it'll just keep whittling down more and more.

417
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Speaker 3: So if there's a family in power, it's like, well

418
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Speaker 3: who in the family is in power? And then you

419
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Speaker 3: have your own little power struggle within that family.

420
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Speaker 2: You never have enough power. But you can have too

421
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Speaker 2: many cousins, right, that's kind.

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Speaker 3: Of yeah, sorry, I have I have eight uncles and notts,

423
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Speaker 3: so I have a lot just on one side, and

424
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Speaker 3: we're always trying to kill each other.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, exactly.

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Speaker 4: I got a couple of them. They keep coming at me,

427
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Speaker 4: but I'm very careful.

428
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Speaker 2: Yeah, you have a lot of land mines in your yard.

429
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Speaker 2: Speaking of killing your cousins, maybe our sponsors will help

430
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Speaker 2: you do that or not if you like them. And

431
00:22:58,880 --> 00:23:06,400
Speaker 2: we're back. So Turkey alone creates about four branches of

432
00:23:05,840 --> 00:23:08,680
Speaker 2: the of the Saudi royal family, just one of which

433
00:23:08,760 --> 00:23:12,359
Speaker 2: the Al Faisal, contains several thousand male descendants by the

434
00:23:12,440 --> 00:23:16,480
Speaker 2: late twentieth century. So that's like how prolific this family is.

435
00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:19,280
Speaker 2: Is this one guy because of how many kids he has,

436
00:23:19,359 --> 00:23:22,080
Speaker 2: creates four branches of the family that are like thousands

437
00:23:22,080 --> 00:23:25,600
Speaker 2: of people strong today. This brings us to what will

438
00:23:25,600 --> 00:23:27,560
Speaker 2: become a pattern within the House of Saud, which is

439
00:23:27,600 --> 00:23:31,280
Speaker 2: the sheer number of these guys causes a constant problem

440
00:23:31,359 --> 00:23:34,399
Speaker 2: with political turnover, as there are always more princes and

441
00:23:34,440 --> 00:23:36,560
Speaker 2: other royals who hate each other and think they really

442
00:23:36,640 --> 00:23:38,760
Speaker 2: ought to be the branch of the family that's in charge.

443
00:23:39,200 --> 00:23:42,640
Speaker 2: The Second Saudi State ultimately collapses in eighteen ninety one

444
00:23:42,920 --> 00:23:45,040
Speaker 2: as a civil war within the house leads to their

445
00:23:45,080 --> 00:23:47,879
Speaker 2: defeat by the al Rashid tribe and the destruction of

446
00:23:47,920 --> 00:23:50,639
Speaker 2: the country. For more than a decade, the al Saud

447
00:23:50,680 --> 00:23:53,760
Speaker 2: family struggles to regain their lost glory. Many of them,

448
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:57,080
Speaker 2: like Abdul Aziz al Saud, grandfather of Mohammed bin Salman,

449
00:23:57,119 --> 00:23:59,320
Speaker 2: the guy we're talking about in these episodes, went into

450
00:23:59,320 --> 00:24:04,080
Speaker 2: exile and like Kuwait. Abdulaziz is probably the most significant

451
00:24:04,119 --> 00:24:06,840
Speaker 2: member of the House of Saud. Right he is the

452
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:10,600
Speaker 2: guy who establishes the modern Saudi state. Like I said,

453
00:24:10,640 --> 00:24:12,960
Speaker 2: he goes into exile in Kuwait, and he returns to

454
00:24:13,040 --> 00:24:16,280
Speaker 2: Arabia in nineteen oh two with an army. Right. He

455
00:24:16,320 --> 00:24:18,879
Speaker 2: spent his time gathering power. He gives a bunch of

456
00:24:19,080 --> 00:24:22,040
Speaker 2: desert warriors to his banner, and he shows up in

457
00:24:22,080 --> 00:24:25,119
Speaker 2: the early nineteen hundreds intent on re establishing the Saudi

458
00:24:25,160 --> 00:24:28,439
Speaker 2: state for a third time. He carries out a daring

459
00:24:28,560 --> 00:24:31,600
Speaker 2: early morning assault on a fort near Riyad called Masmak.

460
00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:34,480
Speaker 2: They take the fort, kill the governor, who was a

461
00:24:34,520 --> 00:24:38,200
Speaker 2: member of the hated Al Rashid tribe, and they retake Ryad.

462
00:24:38,280 --> 00:24:40,520
Speaker 2: In her book the Man who would be King, Karen

463
00:24:40,560 --> 00:24:43,840
Speaker 2: House writes quote, once again, he used religion just as

464
00:24:43,840 --> 00:24:47,280
Speaker 2: his ancestors had to help the Al Saud reconquer Arabia,

465
00:24:47,600 --> 00:24:50,800
Speaker 2: he convinced the Bedouin to congregate in agricultural villages and

466
00:24:50,840 --> 00:24:55,119
Speaker 2: adopt a sedentary life focused on Puritanical Islam promoted by

467
00:24:55,160 --> 00:24:58,800
Speaker 2: Mohammad ibn Abd al Wahab. The imam tat that belonged

468
00:24:58,840 --> 00:25:02,000
Speaker 2: to the Uma or kamuneity of believers took precedence over

469
00:25:02,040 --> 00:25:05,439
Speaker 2: other social bonds, including tribe. Anyone who made a judgment

470
00:25:05,440 --> 00:25:09,000
Speaker 2: based on anything other than the Quran was a non believer. Still,

471
00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:11,959
Speaker 2: it took Abdullahzis over thirty years to subdue and unite

472
00:25:12,119 --> 00:25:15,159
Speaker 2: warring tribes under his rule. In nineteen thirty two, he

473
00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:18,520
Speaker 2: announced the creation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Now,

474
00:25:18,560 --> 00:25:20,480
Speaker 2: this is a very short summary of a lot of

475
00:25:20,480 --> 00:25:23,040
Speaker 2: complex history, but it gets across the key bullet points

476
00:25:23,040 --> 00:25:25,080
Speaker 2: that are going to be important for our purposes. The

477
00:25:25,119 --> 00:25:28,679
Speaker 2: House of Saud spends about three hundred years viewing the

478
00:25:28,720 --> 00:25:32,160
Speaker 2: Arabian peninsula as theirs, and they repeatedly try to make

479
00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:35,879
Speaker 2: that so. They create a series of states which often

480
00:25:35,920 --> 00:25:39,080
Speaker 2: failed due to in fighting until they succeed, and they

481
00:25:39,359 --> 00:25:42,600
Speaker 2: are always backed in power by an alliance with religious

482
00:25:42,720 --> 00:25:46,840
Speaker 2: hardliners generally today called Wahabists, who help them secure their power,

483
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:49,280
Speaker 2: and the main threat to said power over the years

484
00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:51,720
Speaker 2: has been their inability to stop killing each other. Right,

485
00:25:51,720 --> 00:25:54,320
Speaker 2: these are all traits of the Saudi state up till

486
00:25:54,320 --> 00:25:57,359
Speaker 2: the present day. The other key point here is that

487
00:25:57,400 --> 00:26:00,639
Speaker 2: Saudi kings and princes have varied wildly in their competency

488
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:05,159
Speaker 2: and efficacy. Abdulaziz is very good. He's probably the best

489
00:26:05,240 --> 00:26:07,879
Speaker 2: Saudi king in terms of his actual level of competency.

490
00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:11,600
Speaker 2: He is the really, really on the ball leader who

491
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:15,440
Speaker 2: establishes the state when he takes power in nineteen thirty two.

492
00:26:15,720 --> 00:26:18,199
Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia is a poor country, and most of its

493
00:26:18,280 --> 00:26:21,280
Speaker 2: citizens live lives that are barely changed from the way

494
00:26:21,320 --> 00:26:24,360
Speaker 2: Bedouins had been living for hundreds of years. The government

495
00:26:24,440 --> 00:26:27,560
Speaker 2: maintained what control it could by doling out government salaries

496
00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:30,400
Speaker 2: and bribes to tribal leaders to keep them loyal. This

497
00:26:30,520 --> 00:26:33,959
Speaker 2: tapped the state treasury almost to the breaking point. Abdulaziz

498
00:26:34,040 --> 00:26:36,879
Speaker 2: was able to put through some minor infrastructure improvements, but

499
00:26:36,960 --> 00:26:39,840
Speaker 2: his only real sources of state income in the early

500
00:26:39,920 --> 00:26:42,720
Speaker 2: period for the state are money that comes from pilgrims

501
00:26:42,800 --> 00:26:45,280
Speaker 2: visiting Mecca for the Hajj and the Zakat, which is

502
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:47,680
Speaker 2: a tax paid by non Muslims who live in the country.

503
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:51,240
Speaker 2: Britain also provided a stipend because of their role in

504
00:26:51,320 --> 00:26:54,679
Speaker 2: helping to establish the Saudi State, so long as Abdulaziz

505
00:26:54,720 --> 00:26:56,920
Speaker 2: could be relied upon to use his forces to crush

506
00:26:56,920 --> 00:26:59,720
Speaker 2: fundamentalists who try to launch insurrections in the places like

507
00:26:59,760 --> 00:27:02,960
Speaker 2: a which were still controlled by the British Empire by

508
00:27:02,960 --> 00:27:05,800
Speaker 2: the late nineteen thirties, this whole house of cards is

509
00:27:05,840 --> 00:27:09,320
Speaker 2: in danger of collapse. Abdulaziz has done kind of the impossible,

510
00:27:09,560 --> 00:27:11,359
Speaker 2: but he's had to make a lot of compromises in

511
00:27:11,480 --> 00:27:13,600
Speaker 2: order to do it. He's had to kind of throw

512
00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:15,840
Speaker 2: a lot of his hardline followers under the bus by

513
00:27:15,880 --> 00:27:19,400
Speaker 2: allowing unbelievers to control chunks of the Muslim world, including

514
00:27:19,440 --> 00:27:22,480
Speaker 2: a rock. And there's not really any money in the

515
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:25,280
Speaker 2: Saudi State yet because oil isn't worth much and they

516
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:27,879
Speaker 2: don't know that Saudi Arabia has it at the moment.

517
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:32,680
Speaker 2: It's a mark of his desperation that Abdulaziz sells standard

518
00:27:32,720 --> 00:27:35,719
Speaker 2: oil of California a concession to drill in his country

519
00:27:35,760 --> 00:27:39,280
Speaker 2: for just fifty thousand pounds when his finance minister bulks

520
00:27:39,280 --> 00:27:42,520
Speaker 2: Abdulaziz tells him put your faith in God and sign

521
00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:45,919
Speaker 2: and that works out that why's up being a really

522
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:46,960
Speaker 2: fucking good bet.

523
00:27:47,080 --> 00:27:50,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is like, this is like nineties Marvel, where

524
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:52,480
Speaker 3: they're like, we don't know what we have yet, we're

525
00:27:52,520 --> 00:27:54,200
Speaker 3: just selling it off to whoever.

526
00:27:54,320 --> 00:27:57,440
Speaker 2: We'll give you twenty dollars for this Iron Man character.

527
00:27:57,600 --> 00:28:02,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Just it's tourism. Did I hear that correctly?

528
00:28:03,720 --> 00:28:05,600
Speaker 2: No? No, no, no, it's drilling. It's drilling.

529
00:28:06,040 --> 00:28:08,200
Speaker 4: Well, there's also religious people coming there.

530
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:11,960
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, to Mecca and Medina, right, like, because

531
00:28:12,119 --> 00:28:15,119
Speaker 2: you have Muslims are supposed to if they can go

532
00:28:15,200 --> 00:28:17,360
Speaker 2: to Mecca, right to do the highs at least once

533
00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:19,879
Speaker 2: in their lives, and that brings in some money to

534
00:28:19,920 --> 00:28:23,040
Speaker 2: the state. But you only get so much money from that.

535
00:28:23,520 --> 00:28:24,199
Speaker 4: It's not Florida.

536
00:28:24,320 --> 00:28:26,159
Speaker 3: It's not Florida where they're like, all right, we got

537
00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:27,640
Speaker 3: this one thing going on for us.

538
00:28:27,920 --> 00:28:30,240
Speaker 4: That's just a little side, little side hustle.

539
00:28:30,680 --> 00:28:32,560
Speaker 2: It's a little size. It's not the kind of side

540
00:28:32,600 --> 00:28:35,520
Speaker 2: hustle that having most of the world's oil is right,

541
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:37,520
Speaker 2: which is going to be kind of oh yeah, with

542
00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:39,400
Speaker 2: their big hustle. Yeah.

543
00:28:39,480 --> 00:28:42,000
Speaker 3: If I could choose between one or the other, I

544
00:28:42,000 --> 00:28:45,560
Speaker 3: guess I would go for the world's oil, right.

545
00:28:45,600 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that that's going to work out for them.

546
00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:51,880
Speaker 2: Per the book NBS by Ben Hubbard, quote, the discovery

547
00:28:51,920 --> 00:28:55,600
Speaker 2: of oil in nineteen thirty eight attracted speculators, technicians, oil companies,

548
00:28:55,600 --> 00:28:58,720
Speaker 2: and representatives of Western government seeking access to the Kingdom's

549
00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:01,560
Speaker 2: black gold and claning. The United States In a secret

550
00:29:01,640 --> 00:29:04,640
Speaker 2: meeting in nineteen forty five between President Franklin D. Roosevelt

551
00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:07,880
Speaker 2: and King Abdulaziz aboard an American warship in the sus Canal,

552
00:29:08,160 --> 00:29:10,600
Speaker 2: the two leaders headed off, laying the groundwork for a

553
00:29:10,640 --> 00:29:13,640
Speaker 2: lasting agreement that guaranteed American access to Saudi oil in

554
00:29:13,680 --> 00:29:16,200
Speaker 2: exchange for American protection from foreign attacks.

555
00:29:17,080 --> 00:29:19,480
Speaker 4: Now, this is funny how leaders always hit it off.

556
00:29:20,480 --> 00:29:23,880
Speaker 2: They seem to right, Wow, the rich guy at charge

557
00:29:23,920 --> 00:29:25,280
Speaker 2: to this country, like this other rich.

558
00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:28,080
Speaker 4: Guy, huh yeah, you like money and power, and like, yeah,

559
00:29:28,200 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 4: me too.

560
00:29:28,800 --> 00:29:31,520
Speaker 2: It's like cool, you was born in money, me too.

561
00:29:32,040 --> 00:29:34,840
Speaker 4: Yeah.

562
00:29:34,880 --> 00:29:37,200
Speaker 2: And this is it kind of starts with FDR. The

563
00:29:37,320 --> 00:29:40,040
Speaker 2: very close relationship to this day that Saudi Arabia and

564
00:29:40,040 --> 00:29:43,720
Speaker 2: the United States enjoy like starts here, and from this

565
00:29:43,800 --> 00:29:47,880
Speaker 2: point forward, money begins flowing into the peninsula in its millions,

566
00:29:47,920 --> 00:29:50,800
Speaker 2: and its tens of millions, and eventually tens of billions.

567
00:29:51,120 --> 00:29:53,720
Speaker 2: At the start of the Third Saudi State, King Abdulaziz

568
00:29:53,840 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 2: had agreed to curb the spread a fundamentalist Islam to

569
00:29:56,600 --> 00:30:00,760
Speaker 2: maintain the favor of European colonizing powers. But now Saudi

570
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:04,600
Speaker 2: Arabia has money, and the Saudi royal family starts investing

571
00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:08,280
Speaker 2: piles of it into spreading Wahabist teachings around the world.

572
00:30:08,440 --> 00:30:11,920
Speaker 2: Saudi Aramco soon the world's most valuable company by a mile.

573
00:30:12,000 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 2: This isn't the case today, but it is going to

574
00:30:13,520 --> 00:30:15,960
Speaker 2: be the case for quite a while. Allows the royal

575
00:30:16,000 --> 00:30:19,600
Speaker 2: family to accumulate vast fortunes. This helps fund the further

576
00:30:19,680 --> 00:30:23,400
Speaker 2: expansion of the family. King Abdulaziz married some eighteen women

577
00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:26,640
Speaker 2: and fathered more than sixty children. The next generation of

578
00:30:26,680 --> 00:30:29,200
Speaker 2: his family would be freed from the material concerns that

579
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:33,200
Speaker 2: had dominated their forbearers' lives. Oil money provided stipends to

580
00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:35,680
Speaker 2: the many hundreds of royal children. Right this is like

581
00:30:35,920 --> 00:30:39,720
Speaker 2: how Saudi royals live from now, Juan, there's money coming

582
00:30:39,720 --> 00:30:42,080
Speaker 2: into the state, and a big chunk of it gets

583
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:44,520
Speaker 2: earmarked for the members of the House of Saud. Right,

584
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:49,040
Speaker 2: Vast fortunes of what should have been state funds start

585
00:30:49,080 --> 00:30:51,959
Speaker 2: disappearing into the pockets of different royal family members. As

586
00:30:52,040 --> 00:30:55,920
Speaker 2: grift and graft become an increasingly accepted pastime, large numbers

587
00:30:55,920 --> 00:30:58,600
Speaker 2: of Saudi men, even outside of the family, are given

588
00:30:58,680 --> 00:31:01,400
Speaker 2: government jobs that are themselves elves basically bribes to keep

589
00:31:01,440 --> 00:31:04,960
Speaker 2: anyone from complaining about the endemic corruption. Right, So the

590
00:31:05,000 --> 00:31:08,520
Speaker 2: Saudi royal family are all living luxurious lives for doing nothing,

591
00:31:08,760 --> 00:31:10,920
Speaker 2: or at least lots of the Saudi Royal family are,

592
00:31:11,440 --> 00:31:15,960
Speaker 2: and regular Saudis get jobs that they basically have to

593
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:19,280
Speaker 2: do almost nothing right in order to get enough money

594
00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:19,680
Speaker 2: to live.

595
00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:24,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's the thing about like corruption or like, yeah,

596
00:31:24,720 --> 00:31:28,080
Speaker 3: trying to run like you have to make enough people happy, right,

597
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:33,120
Speaker 3: otherwise it's just not gonna last. So at some point,

598
00:31:33,840 --> 00:31:37,320
Speaker 3: you know enough people who like who matter I guess

599
00:31:37,360 --> 00:31:39,560
Speaker 3: to staying in power have to be happy with it.

600
00:31:40,400 --> 00:31:43,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, And the first group that the family is concerned

601
00:31:43,760 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 2: with is the other members of the family, right, the

602
00:31:46,040 --> 00:31:49,640
Speaker 2: princes lower down the line. Who these are the guys who,

603
00:31:49,800 --> 00:31:53,200
Speaker 2: if they were uncomfortable and they had to struggle, might

604
00:31:53,280 --> 00:31:55,880
Speaker 2: become rivals for power. Right, So part of why you

605
00:31:55,960 --> 00:31:58,960
Speaker 2: make sure they all get something is that then none

606
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:01,120
Speaker 2: of them want to rock the boat, which has been

607
00:32:01,160 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 2: a continuing problem in the family. Ben Hubbard describes the

608
00:32:04,800 --> 00:32:09,200
Speaker 2: state of like the Saudi royal family's basic welfare fund quote.

609
00:32:09,560 --> 00:32:12,440
Speaker 2: There were thousands of them, all subsidized by the Saudi state.

610
00:32:12,640 --> 00:32:15,400
Speaker 2: In nineteen ninety six, an American diplomat visited the office

611
00:32:15,400 --> 00:32:17,720
Speaker 2: that distributed their monthly stipends and found a stream of

612
00:32:17,720 --> 00:32:20,800
Speaker 2: servants picking up their master's allowances, which varied based on

613
00:32:20,800 --> 00:32:23,920
Speaker 2: their status. The sons and daughters of King Abdulaziz received

614
00:32:24,040 --> 00:32:27,160
Speaker 2: two hundred and seventy thousand dollars, his grandchildren up to

615
00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:30,280
Speaker 2: twenty seven thousand, and his great grandchildren thirteen thousand. The

616
00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:33,560
Speaker 2: most distant relatives got eight hundred dollars. Princes also got

617
00:32:33,600 --> 00:32:36,560
Speaker 2: million dollar bonuses to build their palaces when they got married,

618
00:32:36,760 --> 00:32:39,840
Speaker 2: as well as perks for having children. The diplomat estimated

619
00:32:39,840 --> 00:32:41,960
Speaker 2: that the stipends cost the state more than two billion

620
00:32:42,000 --> 00:32:44,680
Speaker 2: dollars per year, but that was merely a guess. Much

621
00:32:44,720 --> 00:32:47,320
Speaker 2: of that money trickled into society to earn the royals

622
00:32:47,320 --> 00:32:50,120
Speaker 2: the loyalty of the population. One of Salmon's sons said

623
00:32:50,160 --> 00:32:51,960
Speaker 2: he spent more than a million dollars of his own

624
00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:55,200
Speaker 2: money during the holy month of Ramadan hosting feasts for

625
00:32:55,240 --> 00:32:58,200
Speaker 2: his subjects. But the royal still had large commanding fleets

626
00:32:58,200 --> 00:33:01,200
Speaker 2: of yachts, building palaces from Lasts Angeles to Monaco, and

627
00:33:01,240 --> 00:33:04,720
Speaker 2: taking foreign vacations so lavish that they caused economic booms

628
00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:09,240
Speaker 2: in the communities where they landed. So they're doing pretty good,

629
00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:11,400
Speaker 2: even though about forty percent of the country lives in

630
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:15,480
Speaker 2: poverty and about forty percent of the Saudi youth are unemployed. Right,

631
00:33:15,600 --> 00:33:18,520
Speaker 2: all of these princes are are fairly comfortable.

632
00:33:18,760 --> 00:33:22,600
Speaker 4: Right. Again, enough people, just enough enough people.

633
00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:25,320
Speaker 2: And one of the things that is remarkable at the

634
00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:29,560
Speaker 2: Saudi state is how few Saudis actually have to work. Right.

635
00:33:29,920 --> 00:33:32,920
Speaker 2: The majority of jobs in the country are done by

636
00:33:33,040 --> 00:33:36,160
Speaker 2: foreign workers who are brought in and often some of

637
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:38,360
Speaker 2: them are very colo. It's a mix. You have. Some

638
00:33:38,440 --> 00:33:40,440
Speaker 2: of them are like Western workers who are paid pretty

639
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:43,560
Speaker 2: well by like Saudi Aramco, but the largest number of

640
00:33:43,640 --> 00:33:46,600
Speaker 2: them are very close to slaves, and ninety percent of

641
00:33:46,640 --> 00:33:49,720
Speaker 2: the private sector labor force is foreign born in Saudi

642
00:33:49,800 --> 00:33:53,320
Speaker 2: Arabia by the twenty first century, which is crazy, right

643
00:33:53,800 --> 00:33:57,480
Speaker 2: like that that that's like an unsustainable situation unless you've

644
00:33:57,480 --> 00:34:00,920
Speaker 2: got all of this oil money. Slashing in the royal

645
00:34:01,000 --> 00:34:04,280
Speaker 2: family increasingly starts to exist as a subculture within broader

646
00:34:04,320 --> 00:34:08,319
Speaker 2: Saudi society. The constant infighting and sometimes deadly conflicts mean

647
00:34:08,360 --> 00:34:10,720
Speaker 2: that the vast majority of royals know they're in potential

648
00:34:10,840 --> 00:34:13,800
Speaker 2: danger anytime they attend a family gathering. It becomes the

649
00:34:13,880 --> 00:34:16,640
Speaker 2: norm for everyone to memorize each other's birthdays so that

650
00:34:16,640 --> 00:34:18,239
Speaker 2: they would all know at a glance who in the

651
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:20,400
Speaker 2: room was most senior and thus who they had to

652
00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:23,000
Speaker 2: show deference to, right, Like, you have to always be

653
00:34:23,080 --> 00:34:25,920
Speaker 2: careful to make sure that you're not seen as like

654
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:28,480
Speaker 2: looking to get one up on your betters, because that

655
00:34:28,480 --> 00:34:29,640
Speaker 2: could be dangerous to you.

656
00:34:30,600 --> 00:34:31,319
Speaker 4: Right See.

657
00:34:31,320 --> 00:34:33,480
Speaker 3: That's that's what the scars guards don't have to worry

658
00:34:33,480 --> 00:34:36,920
Speaker 3: about because they know who's in charge at any given point.

659
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:40,960
Speaker 2: Like that's that's definitely not Bill, Yeah.

660
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:43,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly, And there's not too too many of them.

661
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:44,680
Speaker 3: That's part of the secret too.

662
00:34:44,719 --> 00:34:48,320
Speaker 2: I feel like, yeah, Stellin, unlike Unlike the King, Solomon

663
00:34:48,440 --> 00:34:50,560
Speaker 2: Stellin does not keep a prison for members of his

664
00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:54,600
Speaker 2: family who displease him. Right, well, we don't know that,

665
00:34:54,920 --> 00:34:58,719
Speaker 2: so sure we're aware of right right, that's a good point.

666
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:00,920
Speaker 2: Now there's a couple of scars guards accounted for as

667
00:35:00,960 --> 00:35:04,440
Speaker 2: far as I'm as far as I'm concerned, King of

668
00:35:04,520 --> 00:35:07,600
Speaker 2: Dulazes establishes another key precedent for the House of Saud,

669
00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:10,919
Speaker 2: taking bloody vengeance upon their enemies. Early in his reign,

670
00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:13,279
Speaker 2: several of the king's cousins put together an army to

671
00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:15,480
Speaker 2: threaten Riad as part of a play to shift power

672
00:35:15,520 --> 00:35:19,279
Speaker 2: to a different branch of the family. Abdulaziz smashes the

673
00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:23,160
Speaker 2: army rather than negotiate, and his brutality convinces the village

674
00:35:23,160 --> 00:35:24,839
Speaker 2: of Leilah, where a lot of these guys had been

675
00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:28,120
Speaker 2: like base, to surrender, and the king condemns nineteen leaders

676
00:35:28,120 --> 00:35:31,240
Speaker 2: of the rebellion to death. He immediately issues a twenty

677
00:35:31,280 --> 00:35:34,120
Speaker 2: four hour stay of execution, not as an act of mercy,

678
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:35,960
Speaker 2: but so his men can direct a gallows at the

679
00:35:36,040 --> 00:35:39,160
Speaker 2: entrance of the town and kill them all publicly by dawn.

680
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:42,080
Speaker 2: The next day. He has the rebels beheaded in pairs,

681
00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:45,520
Speaker 2: each person killed by a black enslaved man with a sword.

682
00:35:45,840 --> 00:35:48,680
Speaker 2: After the first eighteen have been killed, the king pardons

683
00:35:48,719 --> 00:35:50,880
Speaker 2: the nineteenth man and orders him to go tell his

684
00:35:50,880 --> 00:35:53,400
Speaker 2: friends and family members about the just and vengeance of

685
00:35:53,520 --> 00:35:56,840
Speaker 2: King Abdulaziz. Right, yeah, go tell everybody. I could have

686
00:35:56,960 --> 00:35:57,920
Speaker 2: killed you, but I didn't.

687
00:35:58,800 --> 00:36:03,760
Speaker 3: Well, hold on, I'm saying he made a public execution. Yeah,

688
00:36:03,840 --> 00:36:06,200
Speaker 3: and then he saved the last person. Who is like,

689
00:36:06,480 --> 00:36:09,640
Speaker 3: go tell people what happened here. I wouldn't I listen,

690
00:36:09,719 --> 00:36:12,279
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say anything, but at the time I'd be thinking, like,

691
00:36:12,600 --> 00:36:14,080
Speaker 3: I think they'll know it's public.

692
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:18,280
Speaker 4: But obviously I'm not gonna argue, Right, I'm not gonna argue.

693
00:36:18,320 --> 00:36:23,040
Speaker 3: I'll be like, yeah, I'll totally tell everybody about Yes, sure, man,

694
00:36:23,120 --> 00:36:26,000
Speaker 3: it still seems redne It just seems redundant. I think

695
00:36:26,040 --> 00:36:28,640
Speaker 3: you could have killed that guy and his family would

696
00:36:28,640 --> 00:36:28,960
Speaker 3: have known.

697
00:36:29,120 --> 00:36:29,759
Speaker 4: But it's fine.

698
00:36:29,800 --> 00:36:31,640
Speaker 2: I'm not going to back seat. I'm not gonna get

699
00:36:31,640 --> 00:36:34,960
Speaker 2: it for this king. But yeah, salmon been. Abdulaziz al

700
00:36:35,080 --> 00:36:38,799
Speaker 2: Saud was born into this increasingly weird and isolated world

701
00:36:38,840 --> 00:36:41,400
Speaker 2: in nineteen thirty five. This is Muhammed bin Salmon the

702
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:42,520
Speaker 2: subject different episodes.

703
00:36:42,600 --> 00:36:42,880
Speaker 4: Dad.

704
00:36:43,080 --> 00:36:45,839
Speaker 2: Right, So he comes into the world in nineteen thirty five,

705
00:36:45,840 --> 00:36:48,720
Speaker 2: which is about ten years before the oil deal with FDR.

706
00:36:49,800 --> 00:36:52,359
Speaker 2: His early years are spent living the traditional way. He's

707
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:55,080
Speaker 2: born before oil money makes a thing becomes a thing

708
00:36:55,080 --> 00:36:57,280
Speaker 2: in Saudi Arabia. He's living in tents in the desert

709
00:36:57,400 --> 00:36:59,560
Speaker 2: several months out of the year, and he comes of

710
00:36:59,640 --> 00:37:01,799
Speaker 2: age just as the house of Saud is flooded with

711
00:37:01,840 --> 00:37:05,600
Speaker 2: oil money for the very first time. King Abdulaziz passes

712
00:37:05,600 --> 00:37:08,600
Speaker 2: on in nineteen fifty three, leaving a wealthy and powerful

713
00:37:08,600 --> 00:37:11,879
Speaker 2: state after being born into exile because he had grown

714
00:37:11,960 --> 00:37:14,000
Speaker 2: up conscious of the fact that the internal struggle for

715
00:37:14,040 --> 00:37:17,399
Speaker 2: power had shattered their last state. On his deathbed, Abdulaziz

716
00:37:17,400 --> 00:37:20,319
Speaker 2: begs his oldest son Saud and Faisal to join hands

717
00:37:20,360 --> 00:37:23,319
Speaker 2: and swear to work together, and they totally swear to

718
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:25,640
Speaker 2: do that, and then as soon as he dies they

719
00:37:25,719 --> 00:37:29,080
Speaker 2: start fighting with each other. Right, They're like, yeah, Dad,

720
00:37:29,480 --> 00:37:32,640
Speaker 2: we totally aren't going to fight over the throne cold

721
00:37:32,760 --> 00:37:34,920
Speaker 2: all right, let's get let's let's get let's get at it.

722
00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:38,800
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, let's get the weapons out. Yeah, I'd created

723
00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:41,280
Speaker 3: an arena, like I would make it official, right.

724
00:37:41,280 --> 00:37:43,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, a knife fight right in the right in

725
00:37:43,400 --> 00:37:44,680
Speaker 2: the fucking hospital chamber.

726
00:37:44,840 --> 00:37:46,080
Speaker 4: Oh yeah.

727
00:37:46,200 --> 00:37:48,680
Speaker 2: King Saud rules for eleven years, and he is not

728
00:37:48,880 --> 00:37:50,839
Speaker 2: good at it. He is so corrupt that he has

729
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:54,560
Speaker 2: completely bankrupted the kingdom. After a little over a decade,

730
00:37:54,800 --> 00:37:57,640
Speaker 2: his younger brothers, headed by Faisal, have to ally to

731
00:37:57,760 --> 00:38:00,439
Speaker 2: force him to go to exile in Greece, at which

732
00:38:00,480 --> 00:38:03,440
Speaker 2: point Faisal takes over. Faisil is going to prove to

733
00:38:03,440 --> 00:38:05,560
Speaker 2: be a much better king. He's one of the most

734
00:38:05,600 --> 00:38:08,960
Speaker 2: successful Saudi monarchs, and in the nineteen seventies he embarks

735
00:38:08,960 --> 00:38:11,480
Speaker 2: on an ambitious campaign to modernize the country and pull

736
00:38:11,560 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 2: power away from the clerics. For a brief moment, it

737
00:38:14,520 --> 00:38:17,200
Speaker 2: seems as if the kingdom is bending to secular modernity,

738
00:38:17,400 --> 00:38:20,080
Speaker 2: and it becomes increasingly normal to see women with their

739
00:38:20,080 --> 00:38:24,360
Speaker 2: heads uncovered, socializing with men who aren't relatives. Television's proliferate,

740
00:38:24,400 --> 00:38:26,960
Speaker 2: and alcohol is common at parties hosted by members of

741
00:38:26,960 --> 00:38:30,360
Speaker 2: the royal family. Right the Saudi, at least the leaders

742
00:38:30,360 --> 00:38:33,560
Speaker 2: of the Saudi royal family are increasingly like modern and

743
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:36,560
Speaker 2: a lot of the religious hardliners seem to be losing

744
00:38:36,600 --> 00:38:40,600
Speaker 2: power in the country. Faisal's chief innovation is splitting control

745
00:38:40,640 --> 00:38:43,520
Speaker 2: of the military between three different princes in order to

746
00:38:43,520 --> 00:38:46,319
Speaker 2: reduce the odds of a successful coup. Right, you kind

747
00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:49,000
Speaker 2: of make sure no one has all of the military

748
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:51,759
Speaker 2: in their hands and just trust that no group of

749
00:38:51,800 --> 00:38:54,279
Speaker 2: three Saudi princes will ever trust each other enough to

750
00:38:54,320 --> 00:38:54,920
Speaker 2: work together.

751
00:38:55,080 --> 00:38:58,319
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very funny listening to this because it's like,

752
00:38:59,080 --> 00:39:01,960
Speaker 3: it seems like all governments sort of naturally settle into

753
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:04,680
Speaker 3: a certain way, right where it's like, Okay, we need

754
00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:07,040
Speaker 3: to cool it with the religious stuff. We need to

755
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:10,640
Speaker 3: allow people to just do whatever they want. Oh, we

756
00:39:10,719 --> 00:39:13,840
Speaker 3: need to spread out power so it's not just like

757
00:39:13,960 --> 00:39:16,960
Speaker 3: one person can make this decision, like it's not one

758
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:19,319
Speaker 3: to one. But it's just funny hearing this of like, yeah,

759
00:39:19,360 --> 00:39:23,279
Speaker 3: this is if you want to be in charge for

760
00:39:23,320 --> 00:39:25,800
Speaker 3: a long amount of time in a functional way without

761
00:39:25,800 --> 00:39:28,799
Speaker 3: everybody killing each other, it all kind of goes in

762
00:39:28,840 --> 00:39:32,320
Speaker 3: this direction. It feels like, yeah, to work.

763
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:37,360
Speaker 2: Yep, yep. In nineteen seventy five, King Faisal is assassinated

764
00:39:37,400 --> 00:39:39,960
Speaker 2: by his nephew in an act offingeance for his brother,

765
00:39:40,160 --> 00:39:43,720
Speaker 2: who'd been executed by Faisal for protesting the king's decision

766
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:47,560
Speaker 2: to allow television in Saudi Arabia, So there's always backlashes

767
00:39:47,560 --> 00:39:48,759
Speaker 2: to the modern ISA, right.

768
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:52,440
Speaker 4: Man, like dying for television to stay.

769
00:39:52,160 --> 00:39:56,360
Speaker 2: In television nineteen seventy five TV. There's not even anything

770
00:39:56,440 --> 00:39:56,920
Speaker 2: good on.

771
00:39:57,760 --> 00:40:00,520
Speaker 3: I kind of get it, but you could if you

772
00:40:00,600 --> 00:40:03,400
Speaker 3: told this person, like, don't worry. Once the Internet shows up,

773
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:05,400
Speaker 3: no one's gonna give a shit about television.

774
00:40:05,520 --> 00:40:05,719
Speaker 4: Yeah.

775
00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:08,359
Speaker 2: I don't think Cheers is even on the air yet, Man, Ryan,

776
00:40:08,480 --> 00:40:09,879
Speaker 2: what were you fighting for?

777
00:40:10,840 --> 00:40:11,520
Speaker 4: God?

778
00:40:13,320 --> 00:40:16,240
Speaker 2: While all this is going on, Prince Solomon, NBS's father

779
00:40:16,320 --> 00:40:18,799
Speaker 2: in the current king is keeping his head down and

780
00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:22,200
Speaker 2: avoiding making himself a target. He'd been born the twenty

781
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:25,680
Speaker 2: fifth of Abdullah Ziz's thirty six sons, and on paper

782
00:40:25,800 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 2: again the twenty fifth son of the now dead king.

783
00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:32,439
Speaker 2: Shouldn't get anywhere close to the throne, right Like, You've

784
00:40:32,440 --> 00:40:34,680
Speaker 2: got a lot of guys have to die for that

785
00:40:34,800 --> 00:40:36,920
Speaker 2: to ever become your job. And he's not going to

786
00:40:36,960 --> 00:40:39,960
Speaker 2: become the king until like twenty fifteen. But he is

787
00:40:40,040 --> 00:40:43,000
Speaker 2: distinguished from the start from a lot of his brothers

788
00:40:43,040 --> 00:40:45,480
Speaker 2: and half brothers by the fact that he is willing

789
00:40:45,520 --> 00:40:48,640
Speaker 2: to actually work, like he's not scared of actually doing

790
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,120
Speaker 2: a real job which's promoted.

791
00:40:51,560 --> 00:40:55,759
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're Nepo babies, but he's like Jack Quaid, right,

792
00:40:55,880 --> 00:40:57,680
Speaker 3: We're like, yeah, you're a Neppo baby.

793
00:40:57,760 --> 00:40:59,000
Speaker 4: You're fine, You're fine. It's creol.

794
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:02,719
Speaker 2: I'd say he's the nickel cage of King Abdulaziz ass right,

795
00:41:02,719 --> 00:41:05,000
Speaker 2: where he's like, he's definitely like he gets a head

796
00:41:05,080 --> 00:41:07,239
Speaker 2: up because of who he is. But he's also in

797
00:41:07,320 --> 00:41:10,440
Speaker 2: Face Off. You know a lot of people don't know

798
00:41:10,480 --> 00:41:12,880
Speaker 2: that about the current king of Saudi Arabia that he

799
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:15,560
Speaker 2: was in the movie Face Off. But he was good

800
00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:18,600
Speaker 2: for him. It's not impossible. You can't prove it wasn't

801
00:41:18,920 --> 00:41:22,359
Speaker 2: so his When this guy's half brothers and brothers, they're

802
00:41:22,360 --> 00:41:26,160
Speaker 2: all fighting throughout this period of time for the choicest positions,

803
00:41:26,200 --> 00:41:28,520
Speaker 2: from which they can largely just shunt oil money into

804
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:32,040
Speaker 2: their own pockets while not doing anything. Solomon, Prince Salmon

805
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,680
Speaker 2: actually works and he focuses on building a base of support.

806
00:41:36,040 --> 00:41:38,480
Speaker 2: He sits down with citizens who need his royal help,

807
00:41:38,480 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 2: and he makes deals with business interests in his area

808
00:41:41,200 --> 00:41:43,920
Speaker 2: who provide him with support throughout his life. And he

809
00:41:43,960 --> 00:41:47,200
Speaker 2: gets invited by influential clerics to his court to discuss

810
00:41:47,280 --> 00:41:50,640
Speaker 2: like religious things and whatnot. You know, he's he's kind

811
00:41:50,680 --> 00:41:54,000
Speaker 2: of making himself well known with the thinkers and doers

812
00:41:54,000 --> 00:41:57,880
Speaker 2: in Saudi society. He develops a reputation for seriousness and

813
00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 2: a relative lack of corruption to say, he's not corrupt,

814
00:42:01,600 --> 00:42:04,880
Speaker 2: but he's not like primarily motivated by money. In fact,

815
00:42:05,120 --> 00:42:07,920
Speaker 2: he's poor by the standards of the Saudi royal family.

816
00:42:08,120 --> 00:42:11,120
Speaker 2: He's not a poor man, but he's not like just

817
00:42:11,560 --> 00:42:14,120
Speaker 2: in it to suck cash out of the family oil money.

818
00:42:14,120 --> 00:42:16,400
Speaker 4: He's doing something the bar is low.

819
00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:20,279
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, just like Nicholas Cage was poor after he

820
00:42:20,320 --> 00:42:22,279
Speaker 2: had to give all that money back to Mongolia for

821
00:42:22,360 --> 00:42:23,480
Speaker 2: buying dinosaur bones.

822
00:42:23,520 --> 00:42:26,600
Speaker 4: I legally exactly where's poor?

823
00:42:26,760 --> 00:42:31,080
Speaker 2: But like, yeah, he's just got to do a couple

824
00:42:31,080 --> 00:42:34,720
Speaker 2: more face offs, you know, and he's gonna be fine. Now.

825
00:42:34,920 --> 00:42:37,280
Speaker 2: Some of the fact that he like has financial issues

826
00:42:37,320 --> 00:42:38,840
Speaker 2: has to do with the fact that he has a

827
00:42:38,880 --> 00:42:41,520
Speaker 2: lot of kids like his dad, although not a crazy

828
00:42:41,520 --> 00:42:44,640
Speaker 2: amount of kids, but he's still pretty kid having his

829
00:42:44,640 --> 00:42:48,560
Speaker 2: first wife, Sultana, gives him five sons and one daughter. Now,

830
00:42:48,640 --> 00:42:51,040
Speaker 2: because their branch of the family can't count on a

831
00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:54,600
Speaker 2: vast fortune of grafted oil money. Prince Salmon raises his

832
00:42:54,760 --> 00:42:57,399
Speaker 2: sons to be hard workers who, in a reversal from

833
00:42:57,440 --> 00:43:00,399
Speaker 2: the norm for science of the royal family, actually grow

834
00:43:00,440 --> 00:43:03,440
Speaker 2: up knowing how to do stuff. His oldest son, Fought

835
00:43:03,760 --> 00:43:05,719
Speaker 2: went to school in the West and developed a deep

836
00:43:05,800 --> 00:43:08,799
Speaker 2: understanding of how to communicate with Americans and Europeans. His

837
00:43:08,880 --> 00:43:11,719
Speaker 2: second son, Sultan, joined the Saudi Air Force and became

838
00:43:11,800 --> 00:43:14,000
Speaker 2: the first Muslim in space as an astronaut on the

839
00:43:14,040 --> 00:43:17,480
Speaker 2: Shuttle Discovery in nineteen eighty five. His third son, Ahmed,

840
00:43:17,640 --> 00:43:21,440
Speaker 2: studied mining in Colorado and graduated from Wentworth Military Academy

841
00:43:21,600 --> 00:43:25,040
Speaker 2: and then enlisted in the Saudi Air Force. His fourth son, Abdulaziz,

842
00:43:25,160 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 2: went to work in the oil industry and became an

843
00:43:26,960 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 2: expert on modernizing Saudi energy extraction methods. While his kids

844
00:43:31,239 --> 00:43:35,520
Speaker 2: work diligently, the kingdom struggles. In nineteen seventy nine, the country,

845
00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:40,120
Speaker 2: still reeling from Feisal's assassination, endures another shock. On November twentieth,

846
00:43:40,200 --> 00:43:43,880
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy nine, fifty thousand worshippers crowded into the Grand

847
00:43:43,920 --> 00:43:47,000
Speaker 2: Mosque in Mecca. As the AmAm finishes giving his blessings,

848
00:43:47,080 --> 00:43:50,239
Speaker 2: hundreds of armed men begin rushing forward, firing into the

849
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:52,879
Speaker 2: air and forcing people away from the doors. A gang

850
00:43:52,920 --> 00:43:56,040
Speaker 2: of militants grabbed the Amam's microphone and held the dagger

851
00:43:56,080 --> 00:43:58,680
Speaker 2: to his neck. All fifty one doors to the Mosque

852
00:43:58,719 --> 00:44:02,200
Speaker 2: are chained shut, thousands of people are taken prisoner now.

853
00:44:02,200 --> 00:44:05,160
Speaker 2: The guy responsible for this massive act of terrorism is

854
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:09,400
Speaker 2: Johaiman al Hoititabi, an anti monarchy is Lamist insurgeon who

855
00:44:09,440 --> 00:44:12,200
Speaker 2: had put together a small army of around six hundred rebels.

856
00:44:12,480 --> 00:44:14,560
Speaker 2: He and his followers hated the House of Salad for

857
00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:17,880
Speaker 2: allying with Christian infidels in order to make their fortunes,

858
00:44:18,040 --> 00:44:21,760
Speaker 2: and accused the royal family of betraying Islam. Alo Taibi

859
00:44:22,040 --> 00:44:24,560
Speaker 2: and his followers also believe that one of the group's leaders,

860
00:44:24,600 --> 00:44:27,560
Speaker 2: Mohammad Abdullah al Katani, was the Mahdi. For the sake

861
00:44:27,600 --> 00:44:30,360
Speaker 2: of brevity, to know that the Mahdi is basically Islam's

862
00:44:30,360 --> 00:44:33,359
Speaker 2: equivalent of the Second Coming. He's a messianic figure whose

863
00:44:33,480 --> 00:44:36,840
Speaker 2: rival heralds the end of days. So these guys have

864
00:44:36,920 --> 00:44:40,240
Speaker 2: now taken the Holy Mosque and Saudi soldiers spend days

865
00:44:40,320 --> 00:44:42,960
Speaker 2: trying to retake it. But the rebels have a commanding

866
00:44:42,960 --> 00:44:46,280
Speaker 2: position and they massacre anyone who comes close. The Saudi

867
00:44:46,280 --> 00:44:48,160
Speaker 2: government has to reach out to France and get the

868
00:44:48,200 --> 00:44:50,840
Speaker 2: help of an elite unit of commandos. And I'm going

869
00:44:50,880 --> 00:44:53,640
Speaker 2: to quote next from Lawrence Wright's book The Looming Tower.

870
00:44:54,440 --> 00:44:57,360
Speaker 2: Because of the prohibition against non Muslims entering the Holy City,

871
00:44:57,400 --> 00:45:00,200
Speaker 2: they converted to Islam in a brief formal ceremony these

872
00:45:00,239 --> 00:45:04,040
Speaker 2: French commandos. The commandos pumped gas into underground chambers, but

873
00:45:04,080 --> 00:45:07,520
Speaker 2: perhaps because the rooms were so bafflingly interconnected, the gas

874
00:45:07,560 --> 00:45:11,240
Speaker 2: failed and the resistance continued, with casualties climbing. Saudi forces

875
00:45:11,320 --> 00:45:13,759
Speaker 2: drilled holes in the courtyard and dropped grenades into the

876
00:45:13,840 --> 00:45:17,400
Speaker 2: rooms below, indiscriminately killing many hostages but driving the remaining

877
00:45:17,400 --> 00:45:19,520
Speaker 2: rebels into more open areas where they could be picked

878
00:45:19,520 --> 00:45:20,560
Speaker 2: off by sharpshooters.

879
00:45:21,560 --> 00:45:22,760
Speaker 4: That is so messy.

880
00:45:23,200 --> 00:45:28,600
Speaker 2: It's like, first off, is it not worse to fake

881
00:45:28,719 --> 00:45:29,600
Speaker 2: that they're Muslim?

882
00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:29,839
Speaker 1: Now?

883
00:45:30,040 --> 00:45:31,400
Speaker 2: Like, is that not worse?

884
00:45:32,000 --> 00:45:34,480
Speaker 3: Any mission that starts with okay, we're gonna need you

885
00:45:34,520 --> 00:45:37,319
Speaker 3: to pretend to convert to Isla, I would be like,

886
00:45:37,880 --> 00:45:39,800
Speaker 3: all right, let's let's take a step back here and

887
00:45:39,880 --> 00:45:41,920
Speaker 3: let's look at the bigger plan. First, did none of

888
00:45:41,960 --> 00:45:47,480
Speaker 3: these French commandos go like, uh, sir, why They're like,

889
00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:48,359
Speaker 3: it's fine, you can lie.

890
00:45:48,400 --> 00:45:49,960
Speaker 4: You can lie. It's fine a lie.

891
00:45:50,000 --> 00:45:54,279
Speaker 2: It's apparently fine to lie. Yeah, and also though gus

892
00:45:54,360 --> 00:45:56,799
Speaker 2: did work, I guess we dropped grenades and discriminately into

893
00:45:56,800 --> 00:45:57,560
Speaker 2: the mosque.

894
00:45:58,000 --> 00:46:00,879
Speaker 3: Oh god, that's what they're like, do we like, yeah,

895
00:46:00,920 --> 00:46:04,000
Speaker 3: what's the point of converting to that grenade?

896
00:46:04,200 --> 00:46:06,279
Speaker 2: Like how is not angry at this?

897
00:46:07,680 --> 00:46:10,160
Speaker 4: Like what what rule book are they going by?

898
00:46:10,320 --> 00:46:13,120
Speaker 3: Like I'm trying to think of like the afterlife of

899
00:46:13,280 --> 00:46:16,040
Speaker 3: like who is checking things off of? Like is it

900
00:46:16,120 --> 00:46:18,560
Speaker 3: the air bud idea where they're like, yeah, well, there's

901
00:46:18,600 --> 00:46:21,239
Speaker 3: no rule that says they can't do this according to

902
00:46:21,280 --> 00:46:21,880
Speaker 3: our rules.

903
00:46:22,160 --> 00:46:23,840
Speaker 2: I haven't imagine you're just in a mom with like

904
00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 2: forty cigarettes in his mouth reading the Yeah it's fine.

905
00:46:29,719 --> 00:46:34,120
Speaker 2: It takes bloody weeks. It's not stuff. It takes two

906
00:46:34,160 --> 00:46:36,879
Speaker 2: bloody weeks for the rebels to surrender. The so called

907
00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:39,600
Speaker 2: Madi is killed during the fighting, while all O Tybee

908
00:46:39,600 --> 00:46:43,120
Speaker 2: and nearly seventy of his followers are captured alive. In total,

909
00:46:43,200 --> 00:46:45,839
Speaker 2: about a thousand people die during the fighting. A mix

910
00:46:45,880 --> 00:46:50,160
Speaker 2: of soldiers, civilian worshippers, and insurgents. Sixty three militants are

911
00:46:50,200 --> 00:46:53,520
Speaker 2: ultimately beheaded for their parts in the attack. The fallout

912
00:46:53,520 --> 00:46:56,440
Speaker 2: for all of this is substantial. As Karen House writes

913
00:46:56,480 --> 00:46:59,720
Speaker 2: in The Man Who Would Be King, Saudi religious clerics

914
00:46:59,719 --> 00:47:02,719
Speaker 2: actually felt sympathy for the militants occupying the mosque. The

915
00:47:02,760 --> 00:47:05,920
Speaker 2: Amam's sermon that very morning lamented the kingdom's moral decay,

916
00:47:06,239 --> 00:47:08,360
Speaker 2: and the Revolts leader had studied with the AmAm he

917
00:47:08,400 --> 00:47:10,880
Speaker 2: now held captive. His goal was to end what he

918
00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:14,120
Speaker 2: saw as the Awl Saud's tolerance of infidel innovations like

919
00:47:14,160 --> 00:47:17,000
Speaker 2: women working and mixing with women, or the government's tolerance

920
00:47:17,000 --> 00:47:18,640
Speaker 2: of Shia is, a sective Islam that he and his

921
00:47:18,719 --> 00:47:23,040
Speaker 2: fanatics saw as heretics, not Muslims. The Wahabis, clerics, they

922
00:47:23,080 --> 00:47:25,919
Speaker 2: find themselves in a tough position after this right. Their

923
00:47:26,000 --> 00:47:28,319
Speaker 2: power is tied to the House of Saud, who's just

924
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:32,239
Speaker 2: made kind of the biggest compromise with hardline is Lam imaginable,

925
00:47:33,120 --> 00:47:36,200
Speaker 2: you know, like it's kind of it's pretty tough to

926
00:47:36,200 --> 00:47:36,600
Speaker 2: top that.

927
00:47:37,840 --> 00:47:38,680
Speaker 4: Yeah.

928
00:47:39,120 --> 00:47:42,000
Speaker 2: So this is rough the most prominent of these clerics

929
00:47:42,000 --> 00:47:44,960
Speaker 2: issue of Fatua, which doubles down on the legitimacy of

930
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:47,920
Speaker 2: the House of Saud, but demands that the current rulers

931
00:47:47,920 --> 00:47:51,320
Speaker 2: of the kingdom stop flouting the rules. As Karen House

932
00:47:51,360 --> 00:47:54,520
Speaker 2: writes of what would come in the future, no more movies,

933
00:47:54,600 --> 00:47:57,520
Speaker 2: no more alcohol, no more women on television, no more

934
00:47:57,560 --> 00:48:00,640
Speaker 2: gender mixing anywhere, no more soccer to just youth from

935
00:48:00,640 --> 00:48:04,239
Speaker 2: studying a laws Holy Koran. Almost overnight, everything changed in

936
00:48:04,239 --> 00:48:07,120
Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia. During my first visit in nineteen seventy eight,

937
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:10,200
Speaker 2: I attended a dinner at Oil Minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani's

938
00:48:10,200 --> 00:48:13,360
Speaker 2: house in Jedda, where men and women mixed. Alcohol was plentiful,

939
00:48:13,400 --> 00:48:15,880
Speaker 2: and after dinner, the minister and his guests watched a

940
00:48:15,960 --> 00:48:18,320
Speaker 2: table feed of the nineteen seventy eight World Cup soccer

941
00:48:18,360 --> 00:48:21,640
Speaker 2: final between Argentina and the Netherlands, just the sort of

942
00:48:21,680 --> 00:48:26,360
Speaker 2: evening deplored by religious clerics. So no more fun, no

943
00:48:26,480 --> 00:48:28,280
Speaker 2: more fun is going to be the rule in Saudi

944
00:48:28,280 --> 00:48:30,799
Speaker 2: Arabia after this point. But there's also going to be

945
00:48:31,000 --> 00:48:33,120
Speaker 2: no more fun for a minute here, because we're going

946
00:48:33,160 --> 00:48:34,160
Speaker 2: to have our second ad break.

947
00:48:34,680 --> 00:48:35,360
Speaker 4: That's a fun.

948
00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:47,319
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's good, and we're back. Howre you feeling about

949
00:48:47,320 --> 00:48:51,080
Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia, Dave, it's going on yeah.

950
00:48:51,160 --> 00:48:51,799
Speaker 4: Always.

951
00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:55,200
Speaker 3: Like I said, I'm an expert on this, So everything

952
00:48:55,200 --> 00:48:58,520
Speaker 3: you're telling me are things I already are you already new?

953
00:48:58,960 --> 00:49:00,960
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm just humoring you, you know.

954
00:49:01,080 --> 00:49:02,880
Speaker 3: I'm like, it's like when you talk to it like

955
00:49:02,920 --> 00:49:05,240
Speaker 3: a kid about Star Wars, you know, and the kids

956
00:49:05,320 --> 00:49:07,720
Speaker 3: discovering things, and you're like, uh huh, yeah, yeah.

957
00:49:08,200 --> 00:49:11,560
Speaker 2: I'm just imagined now in like the in the International

958
00:49:11,600 --> 00:49:14,920
Speaker 2: like Anti Terrorist Commando Handbook, they're like the they're like

959
00:49:14,960 --> 00:49:16,640
Speaker 2: that one character in The Mummy where they just have

960
00:49:16,719 --> 00:49:19,680
Speaker 2: a bunch of different religious symbols on necklaces that they're like, Okay,

961
00:49:19,760 --> 00:49:22,520
Speaker 2: which country am I going into? All right, this is

962
00:49:22,520 --> 00:49:24,200
Speaker 2: the religion I am for the time being.

963
00:49:25,880 --> 00:49:26,680
Speaker 4: It's tough, man.

964
00:49:26,719 --> 00:49:30,560
Speaker 3: When you inject money into any situation, everybody in that

965
00:49:30,600 --> 00:49:32,840
Speaker 3: situation loses their goddamn minds.

966
00:49:33,200 --> 00:49:36,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the one constant rule of the world is

967
00:49:36,880 --> 00:49:39,799
Speaker 2: that as soon as people get access to billions of

968
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:45,000
Speaker 2: dollars in oil money, they go fucking crazy. A lot

969
00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:47,839
Speaker 2: of why Saudi Arabia is so fucked up in like

970
00:49:48,080 --> 00:49:50,520
Speaker 2: the religious ways that it is and has been for

971
00:49:50,680 --> 00:49:53,359
Speaker 2: most of the modern era, comes down to the fact

972
00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:56,400
Speaker 2: that they were following a pretty natural path of people

973
00:49:56,440 --> 00:49:59,120
Speaker 2: being like, I don't know, we're rich, now, do we

974
00:49:59,200 --> 00:50:02,120
Speaker 2: need to abide by all these crazy religious strictures? Like

975
00:50:02,120 --> 00:50:03,759
Speaker 2: we're okay being muscle, we don't have to be such

976
00:50:03,760 --> 00:50:07,719
Speaker 2: hardliners about all of the batshit stuff. And then there's

977
00:50:07,760 --> 00:50:11,200
Speaker 2: this hideous terrorist attack and the government responds in like

978
00:50:11,239 --> 00:50:14,800
Speaker 2: the worst way they possibly could whims.

979
00:50:15,200 --> 00:50:15,640
Speaker 4: Yeah.

980
00:50:15,800 --> 00:50:17,719
Speaker 2: So many people be like, okay, but we're gonna become

981
00:50:17,760 --> 00:50:21,799
Speaker 2: assholes again. Don't worry. We did drop grenades in the mosque.

982
00:50:22,360 --> 00:50:25,600
Speaker 2: We understand that it's a problem. But women will no

983
00:50:25,680 --> 00:50:28,279
Speaker 2: longer get to be on television. Are you cool with us?

984
00:50:28,360 --> 00:50:28,640
Speaker 3: Now?

985
00:50:29,120 --> 00:50:30,319
Speaker 2: Can we keep being rich?

986
00:50:30,840 --> 00:50:31,560
Speaker 4: Yeah?

987
00:50:31,600 --> 00:50:35,840
Speaker 2: And it turns out, yeah.

988
00:50:34,120 --> 00:50:35,040
Speaker 4: It's just I don't know.

989
00:50:35,480 --> 00:50:39,359
Speaker 3: You just it's that battle between like I get the

990
00:50:39,400 --> 00:50:44,040
Speaker 3: idea of having a set of beliefs, not necessarily these beliefs,

991
00:50:44,400 --> 00:50:47,279
Speaker 3: but beliefs that you are, like you stand by and

992
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:50,399
Speaker 3: you have certain rules in your life. When you tried

993
00:50:50,440 --> 00:50:52,800
Speaker 3: to apply that to a country, it always gets messy

994
00:50:52,840 --> 00:50:56,480
Speaker 3: where it's like, no, I need everybody be doing this stuff.

995
00:50:57,320 --> 00:50:59,640
Speaker 3: Meanwhile the country's like, we just want to have like

996
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,920
Speaker 3: good relationship with our neighbors, and yeah, prosper and make money.

997
00:51:04,360 --> 00:51:07,040
Speaker 3: Or make a stupid amount of money in this case,

998
00:51:07,320 --> 00:51:09,120
Speaker 3: and it's just like it's just not gonna work. These

999
00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:12,279
Speaker 3: all these factors are not gonna work. Or maybe they do.

1000
00:51:12,400 --> 00:51:14,200
Speaker 4: I don't know, maybe I'm wrong.

1001
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:17,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it's it's going to work because of

1002
00:51:17,120 --> 00:51:19,080
Speaker 2: the amount of money behind them. It's gonna work longer

1003
00:51:19,080 --> 00:51:21,800
Speaker 2: than it probably should have. Right, that's true.

1004
00:51:21,800 --> 00:51:25,120
Speaker 3: It's like it's like going to like Prince's house where

1005
00:51:25,120 --> 00:51:27,320
Speaker 3: you're like, he has enough money that you could he

1006
00:51:27,760 --> 00:51:30,439
Speaker 3: also can have like weird rules at his house, right, Yeah,

1007
00:51:30,480 --> 00:51:32,560
Speaker 3: everybody's just gonna go like all right, fine.

1008
00:51:32,840 --> 00:51:35,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, Prince. I mean I get to hang out

1009
00:51:35,000 --> 00:51:36,400
Speaker 2: at your house, so that seems cool.

1010
00:51:36,880 --> 00:51:37,680
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.

1011
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:40,399
Speaker 2: It's also a case where like, okay, so you had

1012
00:51:40,400 --> 00:51:43,520
Speaker 2: French commandos fake being Muslim and then drop grenades in

1013
00:51:43,560 --> 00:51:46,400
Speaker 2: the holiest mosque and the consequence of this as women

1014
00:51:46,480 --> 00:51:49,799
Speaker 2: don't get to be on TV anymore. Huh Okay, Yeah,

1015
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:54,920
Speaker 2: it seems clearly hitting the main problem. Okay, So for

1016
00:51:54,960 --> 00:51:57,919
Speaker 2: the next twenty years in change. After this point, fundamentalist

1017
00:51:57,960 --> 00:52:00,520
Speaker 2: is law becomes more and more entrenched in Saudi Arabia,

1018
00:52:00,600 --> 00:52:03,040
Speaker 2: as is the power of the religious police to punish

1019
00:52:03,040 --> 00:52:06,560
Speaker 2: men and women who violated even the smallest rules. Karen

1020
00:52:06,640 --> 00:52:09,239
Speaker 2: notes that before nineteen seventy nine, it had been acceptable

1021
00:52:09,239 --> 00:52:11,759
Speaker 2: for foreign women, especially to go about their business without

1022
00:52:11,800 --> 00:52:14,520
Speaker 2: their heads covered. This becomes impossible by the start of

1023
00:52:14,560 --> 00:52:17,359
Speaker 2: the nineteen eighties as the clerics crack down. The House

1024
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:20,080
Speaker 2: of Saud goes through a spate of particularly weak and

1025
00:52:20,160 --> 00:52:23,960
Speaker 2: incompetent kings. King Faisal is followed by King Khalid, who

1026
00:52:24,040 --> 00:52:26,359
Speaker 2: wanted the job so little that he hands power right

1027
00:52:26,360 --> 00:52:29,080
Speaker 2: away to his son, the Crown Prince, who succeeds him

1028
00:52:29,120 --> 00:52:32,239
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty two. This guy, King Fad, was more

1029
00:52:32,239 --> 00:52:34,400
Speaker 2: interested in chilling on his yacht than governing, and he

1030
00:52:34,480 --> 00:52:36,640
Speaker 2: half asses the job himself until he has a stroke

1031
00:52:36,719 --> 00:52:39,920
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety five. It was into this Saudi Arabia

1032
00:52:40,160 --> 00:52:42,640
Speaker 2: sattled with a series of basket case kings and riven

1033
00:52:42,680 --> 00:52:46,080
Speaker 2: with financial corruption straining under the weight of increasingly radical

1034
00:52:46,080 --> 00:52:49,640
Speaker 2: and restrictive religious laws that the subject of our episodes

1035
00:52:49,640 --> 00:52:52,279
Speaker 2: for this week and next week. Mohammed bin Salman is

1036
00:52:52,360 --> 00:52:56,239
Speaker 2: born on August thirty first, nineteen eighty five, and we

1037
00:52:56,320 --> 00:52:59,080
Speaker 2: will talk about his life and how he comes to

1038
00:52:59,120 --> 00:53:02,359
Speaker 2: power in subsequent episodes. But Dave, it's been part one.

1039
00:53:02,560 --> 00:53:03,360
Speaker 2: You're introduced.

1040
00:53:04,040 --> 00:53:06,200
Speaker 4: Sorry, I didn't realize I'm older than him.

1041
00:53:06,640 --> 00:53:07,560
Speaker 2: Yes, yes you are.

1042
00:53:07,920 --> 00:53:08,239
Speaker 4: That is.

1043
00:53:09,800 --> 00:53:11,479
Speaker 2: He's a little older than me, but not much.

1044
00:53:12,000 --> 00:53:15,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, he could have us killed today and he's younger.

1045
00:53:16,000 --> 00:53:17,759
Speaker 2: He's had a lot of people killed. He's had a

1046
00:53:17,800 --> 00:53:20,520
Speaker 2: lot of people killed. You know. I feel like I

1047
00:53:20,520 --> 00:53:22,359
Speaker 2: could take him in a straight fight. But yeah, he

1048
00:53:22,400 --> 00:53:26,400
Speaker 2: does have planes and stuff and I I don't have planes.

1049
00:53:26,440 --> 00:53:28,240
Speaker 4: Right, not yet yet.

1050
00:53:28,880 --> 00:53:31,959
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like learning that Finn wolf Hard was born

1051
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:35,200
Speaker 3: after nine to eleven, where it's just like, man, I

1052
00:53:35,200 --> 00:53:37,080
Speaker 3: haven't done ship with my life.

1053
00:53:37,120 --> 00:53:39,600
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well it's also if we'd had a Finn wolf

1054
00:53:39,600 --> 00:53:41,520
Speaker 2: Heard in two thousand and one, they never would have

1055
00:53:41,520 --> 00:53:43,600
Speaker 2: tried to take those towers. There would have been too

1056
00:53:43,680 --> 00:53:45,759
Speaker 2: high a chance that a Finn Wolfhart might have been

1057
00:53:45,800 --> 00:53:46,360
Speaker 2: on the planes.

1058
00:53:46,400 --> 00:53:47,520
Speaker 4: You know, he's too precious.

1059
00:53:47,640 --> 00:53:51,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he's too They wouldn't they'd be scared of

1060
00:53:51,600 --> 00:53:52,839
Speaker 2: his name with you were like, no, they wouldn't want

1061
00:53:52,840 --> 00:54:00,920
Speaker 2: to risk fin wolf Hard take that danger anyway.

1062
00:54:01,200 --> 00:54:05,200
Speaker 4: Anyway, what were you saying something about a podcast?

1063
00:54:05,520 --> 00:54:08,320
Speaker 2: Where can people find you on the interweb dot com?

1064
00:54:09,280 --> 00:54:15,280
Speaker 3: I can be reached at so just Google Gamefully Unemployed,

1065
00:54:15,320 --> 00:54:21,400
Speaker 3: Gamy f U l l Y unemployed like Robert, like

1066
00:54:21,440 --> 00:54:25,760
Speaker 3: you said, it's a movie podcast. It's just bitching about movies,

1067
00:54:26,000 --> 00:54:29,759
Speaker 3: very low stakes but fun. And then yeah, we have

1068
00:54:29,920 --> 00:54:33,160
Speaker 3: like our Patreon where we have a bunch of extra stuff.

1069
00:54:33,360 --> 00:54:38,239
Speaker 3: We've made like two thousand podcasts. It's too many, but

1070
00:54:38,360 --> 00:54:40,239
Speaker 3: you can find that. I'm the head writer at some

1071
00:54:40,280 --> 00:54:44,760
Speaker 3: more News again Google, some More News. Completely different vibe

1072
00:54:44,800 --> 00:54:48,919
Speaker 3: than the movie podcast thing. So if you like politics

1073
00:54:50,040 --> 00:54:55,000
Speaker 3: and like doom, or you like people complaining about Marvel movies,

1074
00:54:56,000 --> 00:54:57,920
Speaker 3: I got I got you, I got you covered for

1075
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Speaker 3: those two things, so check that out.

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Speaker 2: Excellent. Well, everybody, this has been Behind the Bastards. We

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Speaker 2: will be back in due time. But until we're back,

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Speaker 2: think about us every waking second. Don't think about driving.

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Speaker 2: Close your eyes if you're driving right now, you know,

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00:55:14,960 --> 00:55:17,319
Speaker 2: you get on the road, close your eyes, drift off,

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00:55:17,360 --> 00:55:18,520
Speaker 2: fall asleep, you know.

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Speaker 4: Yep, let you know, like, let instinct guide you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it'll be fine.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Bye.

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Speaker 1: Behind the Bastards is a production of cool Zone Media.

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Speaker 1: For more from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool

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Speaker 1: Zonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Behind the

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00:55:42,200 --> 00:55:46,280
Speaker 1: Bastards is now available on YouTube, new episodes every Wednesday

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00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:46,960
Speaker 1: and Friday.

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Speaker 2: Subscribe to our

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Speaker 1: Channel YouTube dot com slash at Behind the Bastards