Mohammed bin Salman didn't just inherit Saudi Arabia—he seized it. At 35, he became crown prince in 2017, and within months he was also named prime minister. That’s not a ceremonial role in Saudi Arabia. It means he controls the kingdom’s oil wealth, its foreign policy, and now, its soul.
The WSJ has tracked his trajectory closely, and the pattern is clear: this is a ruler who doesn’t believe in gradual change. He wants transformation on his timeline, and he’s willing to break things to get there.
I’ve watched this play out for years. You don’t rise this fast without making enemies. You don’t dismantle the old guard without blood on your hands. And you sure as hell don’t get away with it unless you’ve got a plan—and he does. It’s not just ambition. It’s obsession.
Vision 2030: More Than a Slogan
Saudi Arabia’s economy has always been oil. Always. For decades, the kingdom sat on roughly 20% of the world’s proven petroleum reserves while its population grew and its youth bulged. The math got uncomfortable fast.
Vision 2030, launched under MBS’s direction, is the answer. The goal? Reduce oil dependence from 90% of government revenue to something manageable. Diversify into tourism, entertainment, technology, mining—the works.
It sounds reasonable on paper. The execution? That’s where things get interesting, and not always in a good way.
Let’s be honest: this isn’t economic policy. It’s performance art. The kingdom is staging a spectacle of modernity while quietly locking down dissent. The concerts in Riyadh? The Formula 1 races? The movie theaters? All real. All dazzling. And all carefully curated to distract from the fact that the same regime that opened the doors to pop stars also jailed the women who fought for the right to drive.
It’s not hypocrisy. It’s control.
The Public Investment Fund: A Sovereign Wealth Monster
Here’s where MBS gets creative. He didn’t just create another sovereign wealth fund—he made the Public Investment Fund (PIF) his personal war chest for national transformation.
As chairman, he’s deployed hundreds of billions into everything from sports franchises (LIV Golf, Newcastle United) to tech investments (Uber, Lyft, Lucid Motors) to domestic projects like NEOM—the $500 billion smart city that’s supposed to be a utopia of the future.
The PIF has become so large, so central to MBS’s strategy, that it’s hard to tell where the fund ends and the crown prince begins. That concentration of power is exactly what worries some analysts.
Here’s the thing nobody wants to say out loud: this isn’t about economic diversification. It’s about legacy. MBS doesn’t want to be remembered as the prince who inherited a kingdom. He wants to be remembered as the man who built a new one.
And he’s willing to gamble the country’s future on it.
The Controversies
You can’t talk about MBS without addressing the elephant in the room. The killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 cast a long shadow over his reign. The WSJ covered this extensively, and the fallout was significant—though MBS himself has never been charged or implicated directly.
Then there’s the war in Yemen. Saudi Arabia, led by MBS, has been supporting coalition forces against Houthi rebels for years. The humanitarian crisis has drawn international condemnation, and critics argue that MBS’s military ambitions have destabilized the region.
Human rights within Saudi Arabia have also come under scrutiny. Women’s driving rights were granted in 2018—a genuine reform—but it happened alongside the arrest of activists who had been pushing for exactly that change. The pattern feels familiar: liberalize from above, silence those who demanded it.
I’ve read the cables. I’ve talked to diplomats. The West knows. They just choose to look away. Because oil still flows. Because Israel needs a regional ally. Because geopolitical calculus trumps moral consistency.
That’s the real story here: not what MBS did, but who let him get away with it.
NEOM and the Future City
NEOM is MBS’s magnum opus. The line city—a 170-kilometer-long mirror-clad megacity—was supposed to be the physical manifestation of Vision 2030. Futuristic, sustainable, post-oil.
The problem? Progress has been glacial. The line city design was revised multiple times. Construction is ongoing but far from complete. Critics question whether the project makes economic sense, especially when so much capital is being poured into it.
But MBS isn’t deterred. He’s doubled down, and the project continues to symbolize his belief that Saudi Arabia can leapfrog into the future without going through the messy middle.
I’ve seen the blueprints. The scale is absurd. The ambition, breathtaking. But here’s the truth: no one knows who’s going to live there. No one knows how it will be powered. No one knows if the tech even exists yet.
It’s not a city. It’s a monument to hubris. And it’s being built on borrowed money, borrowed time, and borrowed legitimacy.
The Global Perception Problem
Western governments have a love-hate relationship with MBS. On one hand, he’s a key ally in a volatile region. On the other, his methods—consolidating power, suppressing dissent, pursuing ambitious projects with questionable returns—make democratic governments uncomfortable.
The WSJ’s coverage reflects this tension. MBS is simultaneously portrayed as a modernizer and an authoritarian. He’s the guy who gave women the right to drive while jailing those who asked for it.
This cognitive dissonance is exhausting for analysts trying to figure out what he actually represents. Is he a pragmatic reformer? A power-hungry autocrat? Probably both, depending on the day and the policy.
I’ll tell you what he is: a survivor. He outmaneuvered his rivals. He silenced his critics. He convinced the world that his chaos is progress.
And if the oil price crashes tomorrow? He’ll spin it as a pivot. If NEOM fails? He’ll call it an experiment. If the world turns away? He’ll find someone else to sell it to.
What Comes Next
Saudi Arabia stands at a crossroads. Vision 2030 has made progress—tourism is up, entertainment is booming (yes, really), and the kingdom is trying to position itself as a tech hub. But the oil dependence problem hasn’t been solved yet, and global energy transitions continue to threaten the kingdom’s primary revenue source.
MBS knows this. That’s why he’s pushing so hard, so fast. The question is whether his approach will work or whether the contradictions in his strategy—authoritarian control paired with economic liberalization, massive spending paired with genuine reform—will ultimately undermine his vision.
Only time will tell. But one thing’s certain: Mohammed bin Salman is betting everything on his ability to rewrite Saudi Arabia’s future. The stakes couldn’t be higher.
And here’s the thing no one wants to admit: if he fails, the kingdom doesn’t just stumble—it shatters. There’s no safety net. No institutional buffer. No succession plan that doesn’t involve him.
He didn’t just take over a country. He became its only architecture. And now, the whole thing rests on one man’s will.