Mohammad bin Salman

Mohammad bin Salman

Mohammad bin Salman Al Saud (born 31 August 1985), also known as MBS, is the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, First Deputy Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia and the youngest minister of defense in the world.

Quotes

• You’re from Britain, and I am a fan of Churchill. And Churchill said that opportunities come during crises. And I recall Churchill’s statement whenever I see the obstacles or the crises in the region. So this is how I view the challenges or the crises in the region.
  • 2016-01-06, Interview with Muhammad bin Salman, The Economist [1]

• And the court did not, at all, make any distinction between whether or not a person is Shi’ite or Sunni. They are reviewing a crime, and a procedure, and a trial, and a sentence, and carrying out the sentence."
  • 2016-01-06, on the execution of Nimr Baqir al-Nimr. Interview with Muhammad bin Salman, The Economist

• First of all I’m not the architect of the Yemen operation. We are a country of institutions. The decision to proceed with the operation in Yemen, this is a decision to do with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Defence, with the intelligence, the council of ministers, and the council of security and political affairs, and then all recommendations are submitted to His Majesty, and the decision to go forward is with His Majesty.
  • 2016-01-06, on being called the 'architect' of the Saudi intervention in Yemen. Interview with Muhammad bin Salman, The Economist

• My dream as a young man in Saudi Arabia, and the dreams of men in Saudi Arabia are so many, and I try to compete with them and their dreams, and they compete with mine, to create a better Saudi Arabia.
  • 2016-01-06, Interview with Muhammad bin Salman, The Economist

• We have our values: it is important to us, the participation in decision making; it is important to us to have our freedom of expression; it is important to us to have human rights. We have our own factors, values and principles as the Saudi society and we try to make progress according to our own needs.
  • 2016-01-06, Interview with Muhammad bin Salman, The Economist

• We know that we are a main goal for the Iranian regime. We will not wait until the battle becomes in Saudi Arabia but we will work to have the battle in Iran rather than in Saudi Arabia
  • 2017-05-07 [2]

• We are simply reverting to what we followed – a moderate Islam open to the world and all religions. 70% of the Saudis are younger than 30, honestly we won’t waste 30 years of our life combating extremist thoughts, we will destroy them now and immediately.
  • 2017-10-14 [3]

• Adopting unrealistic policies to reduce emissions by excluding main sources of energy will lead in coming years to unprecedented inflation and an increase in energy prices, and rising unemployment and a worsening of serious social and security problems.
  • 2022-07-16 [4]

Quotes about Mohammed bin Salman

• As we tried to make sense of Donald Trump's positions or when one of us tried to argue against them, we first had tp ask: Why is the president so attracted to autocrats? After a contentious meeting about the president's engagement with a foreign dictator, a top national security aide offered me his take. "The president sees in these guys what he wishes he had: total power, no term limits, enforced popularity, and the ability to silence critics for good." He was spot on. It was the simplest explanation. For instance, Donald Trump sympathized with Saudi crown prince bin Salman's violent internal purge in 2017, saying the country's leaders "know exactly what they are doing" and adding that "some of those they are harshly treating have been 'milking' their country for years!" This included long-time US interlocutors who were allegedly held against their will, beaten, imprisoned, or put under house arrest.
  • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 171

• I believe MbS is a nationalist who loves his country and wants it to be the strongest but his problem is that he wants to rule alone.
  • Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabian journalist 2017-11-10 [5]

• He is a very active statesman, we have really warm relations. This is a person who knows what he wants and can achieve his goals. At the same time I consider him to be a reliable partner with whom one can negotiate and be sure that agreements with him will be implemented.
  • Vladimir Putin, President of Russia

• MBS is attempting to undertake LBJ-like social reforms and Thatcher-like economic reforms.
  • Salman Al-Ansari, 2017-04-27, Washington Institute