“Saudi king won’t last 2 weeks without US support”

President Donald Trump has said that Saudi Arabia’s king “might not be there for two weeks” without US military support, further increasing his pressure on one of America’s closest Mideast allies over rising oil prices.

As crude oil prices reached a four-year high, Trump repeatedly demanded OPEC and Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, push prices down. Criticizing America’s longstanding military relationships with allies has been a hallmark of Trump’s presidential campaign and his time in office. Trump returned to that theme in Southaven, Mississippi, mentioning both Japan and South Korea.

Saudi Arabia has increased crude production “significantly” to a near-record level amid intense pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump to reduce prices.

OPEC’s largest producer is currently pumping about 10.7 million barrels a day, Energy Minister Khalid Al-Falih told reporters in Moscow.  That’s just shy of the record set in November 2016, before the kingdom and allies including Russia agreed to cut production to boost prices.“We’re meeting every single demand for barrels,” Al-Falih said. “We’ve increased production quite significantly. We just have to be responsive to demand” because some would say the market is currently oversupplied, he said.