Welcome everybody to Crystal Khyne with friends.

Today we got Ryan Grimm with us.

Ryan, thanks as always for joining us, man.

We appreciate it.

Always great to be here.

So you did some original reporting the other day, and this is kind of a huge deal.

Trump's Project Freedom, as they call it, collapsed after

Saudi Arabia suspended U.S. military access to their bases, airspace, and overflight rights.

And then you reported, well, it's actually not just Saudi Arabia, it's Kuwait. So basically,

the Gulf Arab states are now saying, we want no further part of this war that's being waged against Iran.

So my question for you right off the bat is, was it always propaganda when the media was reporting early on that like, oh yeah, Saudi Arabia is like prodding Trump to do this war.

They want him to do this war because Crystal can tell you, I was saying behind the scenes to you, I'm not sure I buy that. I feel like, you know, their luxury tourism just got nuked. The oil market is obviously, you know, it's a catastrophe now. I know Saudi Arabia might actually be doing okay because they have other ways of delivering the oil, but all these, you know, other Gulf Arab states, they're so reliant on the Strait of Hormuz that now they're

cooked. So are they like, have they completely turned on this? I think it was always an

exaggeration that's to say that Saudi Arabia was eager for this war, which is what there was,

which is what the press was saying. Right. That they're like agitating for it and they're loving

it and like cheering, cheering it on.

I think there was some ambivalence from Saudi Arabia that's like,

I think MBS thought that in a zero sum competition that he might emerge better than

some of the other people.

In other words, you know, Qatar and...

Well, UAE is definitely getting screwed worse than Saudi is getting screwed.

And MBS is in this weird place where he seems that UAE and Saudi hate each other almost

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