As part of a monthlong tour in Asia to promote economic ties, King Salman of Saudi Arabia arrived in Indonesia on Wednesday to great fanfare, accompanied, the news media said,
by a retinue with a net worth in the billions of dollars, including about 1,500 people, among them 25 high-ranking princes, 10 ministers and more than 100 security personnel.
The king, 81, used a golden-hued escalator to descend from a jet painted with the words “God Bless You.”
Pageantry is hardly unusual for any royal family, even less so for the Saudis, who are famously extravagant
spenders even as their citizens are struggling under a government austerity program.
The sale of oil provides billions of dollars in annual allowances, public sector sinecures
and perks for royals, the wealthiest of whom own French chateaus and Saudi palaces, stash money in Swiss bank accounts, wear couture dresses under their abayas and frolic on some of the world’s biggest yachts out of sight of commoners.
But the size and pomp of the king’s entourage may indicate efforts to strengthen trade ties with Asia
at a time of falling oil prices, experts said: A demonstration of wealth can be a show of power.
They arrived in six Boeing passenger jets and one Lockheed C-130 Hercules, a military transport aircraft carrying 506 tons of cargo, two Mercedes-Benz S600 limousines
and two electric elevators for the king’s personal use.