In case you didn't know, NEOM is basically a crypto techbro's fever dream made real, a 170 km long city built of skyscrapers in the shape of a line that Saudi Arabia is in the beginning stages of building – in the middle of a desert. The video gives a more extensive explanation, but suffice it to say that it is perhaps the most delusional construction project in all of human history in every conceivable aspect.
Whether it ever becomes even a speck of what its glossy promo videos are promising, I think NEOM could have profound geopolitical effects all over the world if it ever starts being actually built. Saudi Arabia, or at the least Mohamed Bin Salman, has basically staked the country's future on it. And since it's being commissioned by a totalitarian monarch, there's basically no way out of it short of a coup. If MBS digs his heels in and doubles down, I think it could genuinely bankrupt Saudi Arabia. The foundations are being dug, the project's already in motion. There's already an entire city's worth of construction workers and an army of machines digging the thing, you can see it on Google Maps.
The cost of the thing is nigh incomprehensible even in comparison to other megaprojects. Merely the amount of material you would need to actually build the thing would no doubt skyrocket global prices. The infrastructural and logistical demands of the place are nothing short of parody. And even if by some string of miracles the thing ends up actually being built, the running costs will be absolutely eye-watering, and there is no way on this earth it could ever recoup even a fraction of its costs or hope to actually house the over 9 million people they're planning for. And that's without even getting into its environmental impact, which would be nothing short of apocalyptic for the area.
As it is right now I genuinely don't see how the Saudis could bow out of it with dignity. MBS is famously dictatorial, and backing out of a project like this midway would be losing face on a level we rarely see in politics. The 170 km long trench is already being dug. Seeing as its projected costs have already ballooned over tenfold and it's failed to meet basically every milestone initially set, I think it's only going to get worse and worse for them. At this point the best case scenario would seem that they built maybe 1/200th of the project as initially planned and then quietly shut it down hoping that everyone just forgets about it.
What do you think?
https://old.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/1dfnrh7/what_do_you_think_will_become_of_neom_in_saudi/