OT Things are getting hairy in the Middle East

[RN7]

As of 2019 Saudi Arabia had the world's third largest defence budget and has overtaken Russia.

The Saudi's have spent a fortune on buying top-of-the range equipment in all areas from the West, and on paper they are the best equipped force in the Middle East after Israel, but they are not considered an ineffective force and would struggle if they had to take on Iran by themselves. Their main weakness is their army which is considered second rate. It suffers from lack of training, chronic shortages of manpower and rivalry between the Saudi Army, National Guard and Royal Guard. They also have a lack of logistical equipment and experience in large-scale operations and expeditionary operation outside their own borders.

The Saudi's have been fighting a proxy war against the Iranian backed Houthi in Yemen for three years and have got nowhere. Its mainly been an air campaign against the Houthi as relatively few Saudi land units have been sent into Yemen. Sending larger Saudi land forces into Yemen would probably cause more trouble with the Houthi who have been successful at attacking Saudi forces in Yemen and Saudi Arabia, and might even embarrass the Saudi government if their army got overrun. The Iranian's don't rate the Saudi's very highly or do the West. They could defend Saudi airspace and contest the air and sea over the Persian Gulf, but other than that they would need American help against Iran.