Monarchies are a thing of the past in most countries in the 21st century. At present, only 25 countries in the world, including The United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Spain, Andorra, Monaco, Liechtenstein, Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Brunei, Bhutan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Qatar, Lesotho, Eswatini, Morocco and Tonga, have retained their monarchies. The vast majority of these 25 monarchies are constitutional monarchies.
Even Bhutan, a mysteriously isolated country in the foothills of the Himalayas on the China-India border, was transformed into a constitutional monarchy in 2007. However, the six Arab Gulf countries of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman still maintain an authoritarian monarchy. Among the six countries, Saudi Arabia has the largest land area, population, economic aggregate, military strength, and international influence, so Saudi Arabia is usually regarded by the outside world as a typical representative of the Gulf Arab autocratic monarchy. Saudi Arabia, which has hitherto banned all political parties, is under absolute monarchical rule.
The conservative nature of saudi arabian customs has become international news in previous years, so that even women driving on the road have become international news. The Saudi royal family may be the most powerful royal family in the world. The Saudi royal family consists of 15,000 family members. The combined fortunes of these people are as high as $1.4 trillion. If the money is spread equally among more than 7 billion people around the world, it means that the average person can get 200 US dollars (more than 1,300 yuan). The world's impression of Saudi Arabia's local tycoons often comes from the Saudi royal family's unscrupulous "trench inhumanity" show off its wealth behavior.
On March 15, 2017, Saudi King Salman visited China with 506 tons of luggage and an entourage of 1,500 people. Among the 1,500 people was 10 ministers, 800 delegates, 25 princes, and more than 150 cooks. The 506-ton luggage included two gold-plated escalators and two Mercedes-Benz sedans. The Boeing 747 plane on which the Saudi king traveled on this visit was also gilded. Such a luxurious formation makes people have to sigh that it is indeed "trench inhumanity". One might have noticed that there were 25 princes in this large retinue.
Some people may lament that this old king can really give birth, but in fact these princes are not necessarily the king's own children. Ancient China placed considerable emphasis on the patriarchal concept of kinship within the family. Especially in the imperial family, the emperor's sons can be made princes, the sons of the princes can be made kings, and then they can also be knighted, marquis, uncle, son, and baron. Depending on the estrangement of the emperor himself, he would enjoy different ranks of knighthood, and some collateral royals who were too distant from the emperor would gradually become indistinguishable from the commoners after several generations.
For example, although Liu Bei, who we know as Emperor Liu, calls himself Uncle Liu, in fact, his relationship with the emperor has long been out of the five suits. What Liu Bei's generation did was actually to weave mats and sell shoes for a living. The reason why Liu Bei said that he was a descendant of Liu Sheng, the King of Zhongshan Jing, was actually purely to put gold on his own face. But if Liu Bei had been born in the current Saudi royal family, he would not have had to go around the bend and climb the monarch to climb relatives, because he could directly say that he was a prince. Descendants of the Saudi royal family can call themselves princes, regardless of their relationship with the current king.
This is markedly different from other monarchies in the world. For example, in England, because the throne will be inherited by Prince William in the future, the descendants of Harry's line can no longer call themselves princes. On October 13, 1947, the Japanese Imperial Family reduced all 51 members of the 11-house family, except for Emperor Showa and the immediate family members of the three princes Chichibu Palace, Takamatsu Palace, and Mikasa Palace, to civilians. However, the descendants of the Saudi royal family can still call themselves princes no matter how estranged they are from the current king after many generations, and each prince can effectively enjoy the corresponding treatment regardless of the distance from the king.
Some Middle Eastern countries, including Saudi Arabia, are actually made up of tribal families. Each tribal chieftain is a land emperor on his own turf. The saudi state in the modern sense of the word was laid down in 1750 by a tribal chief named Mohammed bin Saud. For more than 150 years, the House of Saud continued to conquer and integrate other Arab tribes until 22 September 1932, when Ibn Saud, a descendant of Mohammed bin Saud, established the present-day unified State of Saudi Arabia.
The House of Saud's conquest and integration of other tribes was mainly achieved through military annexation and political marriage. In total, Ibn Saud married more than 300 women (38 of whom are famous and surnamed in historical records alone) in the course of political marriages with other tribes. These women bore him more than 90 heirs. Ibn Saud alone has more than 90 heirs, not to mention that Ibn Saud's sons are also a group of wives and concubines, and the descendants of Ibn Saud's brothers and cousins can also call themselves princes according to the rules of the Saudi royal family.
As a result, the number of Saudi princes is so large. At present, the total population of the Saudi royal family has reached 15,000. Of course, this includes the wives of royals, and these wives do not all give birth to sons. If you exclude these princesses and princesses, the number of princes left is about 5,000. The princes travel in luxury sports cars and private planes, and the princes' wives are all celebrities and models. It costs at least $2 billion a year to feed these big-spending princes. Saudi princes often flaunt their wealth all over the world.
In 2004, Saudi Prince Alwaleed spent $500 million to order the world's most luxurious private jet. The Alwaleed prince was the first buyer in the world to buy an Airbus A380 as a private jet. The Airbus A380 is the world's largest wide-body airliner: four-engine, 525-seat, 14,800 km, bare-metal cost of $300 million. Alwaleed spent another $300 million on the plane to renovate the presidential suite, dance floor, dedicated prayer room and more. In addition to this Airbus A380, Alwaleed also owns a Boeing 747 and a Falcon.
In our opinion, it is considered rich to have a private plane of our own, but Alwaleed owns 3 of the world's top ultra-luxury private jets. What's more, Alwaleed's fortune is not limited to private jets: he bought a yacht for $600 million, and he also likes to collect limited-edition luxury cars and famous horses. In fact, the other saudi princes are all "trenchless" like Alwaleed. In 2005, when the 14-year-old prince Abdul followed his father to London, England, he argued that he would buy Buckingham Palace with his bank card.
The 14-year-old prince had $1.6 billion in his bank account, and his weekly pocket money was as high as $6 million (42 million yuan). At that time, the little prince of Abdur owned 7 Cadillacs and 3 aircraft. It was only when his father talked badly that Abdul dismissed the idea of buying Buckingham Palace, but later when the father and son visited the United States, the little prince proposed to buy the White House. Today the Abdul prince is worth billions of dollars in palaces around the world. In 2019, another Saudi prince bought a ticket for each of his 80 falcons and chartered the entire cabin.
Please note that this is the cabin, not the cargo compartment. These falcons are not packed in bird cages, but sit in the cabin of the plane like people. These eagles are worth $20,000 each. Despite all the brashness of Saudi arabia's princes, princes and princes are not exactly the same: Saudi princes are not necessarily the sons of King Salman, and even the king's own sons are not necessarily the princes who will inherit the throne in the future. Since even an ordinary prince can be so arrogant, what about the prince's grandfather, Little Salman?
Little Salman's net worth is as high as 9 trillion yuan. When the young Salman was on a business trip, he saw the castle of Louis XIV and bought it directly for 230 million pounds. The 4,600-square-meter castle houses a swimming pool, a natural aquarium, a private cinema, a ballroom and other entertainment facilities. Salman Jr. also bought the world's largest yacht, the Tranquility, for £3.6 billion, and he spent another 3 billion yuan to decorate the yacht for Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting "The Savior". In 2014, Little Salman spent £20 million renting three small islands in the Maldives to play on them for a month.
A declassified website has disclosed the details of the Saudi royal subsidy in the 1990s: Ibn Saud's sons can receive subsidies ranging from $200,000 to $270,000 per month from the state treasury, Ibn Saud's grandchildren receive $27,000 per month, Ibn Saud's great-grandchildren receive $13,000 a month, and lower-ranking distant relatives receive $800 a month. In the 1990s, 1 US dollar was about equal to 8.3 yuan. According to this conversion, even the distant relatives who were most estranged from the king could receive more than 6,600 yuan per month.
Some people may think that more than 6,000 yuan is not a lot. Note that this is the level of the 1990s, and it is also the standard enjoyed by the closest relatives of the king. In fact, most Saudi princes receive subsidies that are well above this minimum standard. In addition to receiving monthly cash subsidies, princes also enjoy various subsidies such as marriage and funeral, housewarming, travel, and accommodation according to their own level. In other words, the monthly allowance received by the princes was actually an additional pocket money after they were reimbursed for their expenses on food, clothing, housing and transportation.
If you don't have to pay for anything from your own pocket, do you still feel less than someone sending you more than 6,000 yuan? What's more, most Saudi princes receive far more subsidies than that. In fact, financial subsidies account for only a small fraction of the Saudi prince's income. Saudi princes have never lived on financial subsidies, just as some high-ranking officials and rich people in other countries do not live on wages, because people have a lot of invisible and invisible hidden incomes - which actually accounts for the majority of their income.
Even Ibn Saud's own son receives only $270,000 a month from the state treasury. This is of course a huge amount of money in the eyes of our ordinary people, but it is a drop in the bucket to rely on this money to maintain the hundreds of millions of dollars spent by the members of the Saudi royal family. If the members of the Saudi royal family really rely on the subsidies they receive every month, it is impossible to maintain the life of a local tycoon like them now. As we all know, Saudi Arabia is a major oil and gas exporter. It is precisely by exporting oil, natural gas and other energy sources that Saudi Arabia has become rich.
Saudi Arabia, as a country that still maintains the rule of an authoritarian dynasty, theoretically owns all resources to the king. Saudi law and doctrine originally prohibited members of the royal family from doing business, and the ban was indeed enforced for a long time in history, but now the ban has effectively become a dead letter. The male members of the Saudi royal family all married a large number of wives, and almost all of them were very fertile. The rapid expansion of the number of royals made it difficult for the princes to rely on subsidies to enrich their families.
Although the princes cannot be directly involved in business activities, do not forget that all the resources of Saudi Arabia are owned by the royal family. Under the Saudi state system, the king is the law. As long as the king turns a blind eye, the ban can easily be broken. On the surface, saudi princes are indeed not engaged in commercial activities, but in fact, the bosses behind many Saudi companies are members of the royal family. Today, almost all industries in Saudi Arabia are monopolized by the princes. This kind of monopoly of state resources can be much more abundant than the little subsidy received every month.
In a "storm against corruption" in Saudi Arabia in 2017, a number of princes and senior officials were arrested for corruption. But the Saudi royal family is not really determined to fight corruption. Saudi Arabia's so-called "anti-corruption storm" is just a big drama in the power struggle within the Saudi royal family. The Saudi royal family holds absolute authoritarian power and all the national resources, but the struggle for power and profit within the royal family is also quite fierce. This is essentially the same thing as the court struggle of the ancient feudal autocratic dynasty. Almost all of the princes arrested in Saudi Arabia's "anti-corruption storm" are people who pose a threat to the crown prince's position as prince Salman jr.
With these threatening princes purged, Saudi Arabia's "anti-corruption storm" ended in a tailspin. Today, Saudi Arabia's major industries are effectively monopolized by the princes. It is not a problem at all to support the 15,000 royal family members under the premise that the Saudi royal family monopolizes the state's resources. Saudi Arabia's oil exports alone are now enough to feed 300,000 members of the royal family. Mecca in Saudi Arabia is a pilgrimage shrine for Muslims all over the world. Muslims make pilgrimages to the holy city of Mecca as much as possible in their lifetime.
Every year in December of the Ilidic calendar, millions of pilgrims from all over the world come to Mecca. These people have greatly promoted the development of Saudi tourism and provided a stable fiscal revenue for the Saudi government. The income from energy exports and Hajj tourism is enough to feed Saudi Arabia's large number of princes. The problem is that Saudi Arabia is now almost entirely dependent on oil exports, a pillar industry. Saudi Arabia has not developed and expanded its own industrial and agricultural system and national defense forces, nor has it carried out any reform and innovation in the country's political and economic system.
Saudi Arabia can almost entirely make ends meet by selling oil. Although Saudi Arabia has now become a local tycoon by selling oil, oil is a non-renewable resource. This means that the more oil resources are developed, the less they will be, and there will always be a dry day. On the one hand, the number of members of the Saudi royal family is increasing exponentially, and on the other hand, Saudi Arabia's resources and oil are getting less and less. Of course, there will be problems if this trend continues, but at least for now, this problem has not yet erupted.
In recent years, Saudi Arabia has also begun to prepare for the future depletion of oil resources. The Saudi government uses the money from previous oil sales to make various investments around the world. At present, Saudi Arabia's overseas assets have reached several trillion US dollars. If Saudi Arabia can move from being a country that makes money entirely from selling resources to becoming a country that invests overseas, it may be possible to solve the problem of future oil resource depletion. Of course, whether Saudi Arabia can successfully complete such a transformation cannot be accurately predicted, at least for now. It all depends on what Saudi Arabia will do in the future.