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by Michael C. Ruppert
The most important thing for us is
to find Osama bin Laden. It's our
number one priority, and we will not rest until we find him. -- George W
Bush, September 13, 2001
I don't know where he is. I have no idea, and I really don't care. Its
not
that important. Its not our priority. -- George W. Bush, March 13, 2002
Osama bin Laden is probably the last witness the
United States would like
to
have interrogated. There is a compelling case to be made that Osama bin
Laden has long been a well-cultivated, protected, and valued asset of US
and
British intelligence. It is also possible that he has been used.
The bin Laden family of Saudi Arabia is
vastly different from what has
been
described in the American press. Much of its wealth, power,
sophistication, and
political and economic influence has been overlooked. A close
examination leads
directly to US economic and intelligence interests. And this does much
to explain
why American corporate media has avoided discussing it in detail.
To understand the deep connections and alliances between the bin Ladens
and Western economic and political interests -- including the Bush
family -- is to
glimpse the overall fragmented nature of Saudi Arabia: at once extremely
powerful and extremely fragile because of its own internal fault lines; under
intense
pressure and held together by extraordinary means; manipulated
unceasingly by
the United States and its own elites.
It is necessary to dispel one popular myth that has remained in
the public consciousness since September 11: that of Osama bin Laden as an outcast,
totally estranged from his family. This estrangement allegedly occurred after
the
1991
Iraq War as the United States kept its military bases on Saudi soil and
Osama, who
had been a US ally and CIA protege during the Soviet-Afghan conflict of
the
1980s, turned towards terrorism.
Prodigal black sheep with an open door
Both the United States government
and global business trumpeted a 1993 statement by Bakr bin Laden, the successor as family head after the 1988
death of Osama's older brother Salem. "The entire family regrets, denounces, and
condemns
all of the acts committed by Osama bin Laden." 1 That was a convenient
statement
serving many interests.
After he took a public stance opposing the Saudi regime's decision that
allowed
US troops to be housed on holy soil, Osama bin Laden's citizenship was
revoked
in 1994, giving the appearance of a total split with both his family and
the monarchy. Whenever financial transactions between either the family or Saudi
potentates
and Osama have been disclosed, the explanation has been offered that
these were
extortion payments to keep him from making attacks inside Saudi Arabia.
This position has been essential to the US's credibility in its business and
diplomatic
dealings. And, like so many other official US positions taken since
9/11, it is at
least partially deceitful.
Not only did the bin Laden family continue
to openly receive and visit
Osama
after 1994, members of the family have assisted in funding al Qaeda and
its terrorist operations. That should not be taken to mean that they were
acting in the
interests of Saudi Arabia. It means that they were acting in the
interests of the bin
Ladens and their allies. This, at a time when they operated an enormous
global
financial empire that enjoyed large-scale joint business ventures with
American oil
companies including Enron, major financial institutions, and even the
Bush family itself. The bin Ladens are major players in the new globalized
financial order. For some companies, terrorism is good business.
In their book The Forbidden Truth, French authors Brisard and Dasquie
wrote:
Osama bin Laden's own sister recently
admitted that it was inconceivable that 'none of the fifty-four family members kept
ties with him.'
But she also revealed the change in tone that has recently been adopted with regard
to her brother. Since the September 11 attacks Osama
bin Laden has become a 'half brother' to his siblings. Bur this word
choice is arbitrary; in an Islamic country that practices polygamy, the
children born of different wives are simply brothers and sisrers. 2
Of the more than 50 "brothers and sisters" 3 all fathered by Osama's
father
Mohammed, Osama is the only child to have also been born of a Saudi
mother. In the Saudi culture and "in the eyes of the authorities,
this 'Saudi' son
would make
a trustworthy representative, and he would eventually become a close
confidant of
Prince Turki, the head of Saudi intelligence." 4
Brisard and Dasquie also quote an undated CNN
interview with Peter
Arnett
in which Osama claimed that his "mother, uncle, and brothers" had
visited him in
Khartoum, Sudan. This presumably occurred in the mid 1990s, during the
period
in which Osama resided there after the reported rift.
There is much more information showing that
the reported schism in the
family is a convenient charade. From Paul Thompson's timeline:
Spring, 2000: Sources who know bin Laden later claim
that bin
Laden's mother has a second meeting with her son in Afghanistan.
The trip is approved by the Saudi royal family. The Saudis pass the
message to him that they wouldn't crack down on his followers in
Saudi Arabia as long as he set his sights on targets outside the desert
kingdom. In late 1999, the Saudi government had told the CIA about the trip, and suggested placing a homing beacon on her luggage. This
doesn't happen -- Saudis later claim they weren't taken seriously, and
Americans claim they never received specific information on her travel plans, [New Yorker, 11/5/01, Washington Post, 12/19/01]." 5
This also is one of the literally dozens of opportunities for bin
Laden's capture
which the US government chose to ignore. Sudanese officials had been
keeping
real-time surveillance of bin Laden's movements in the country while he
lived there until 1995 and giving the results to US intelligence. The US
government
could have easily apprehended bin Laden with Sudanese assistance. The
Sudanese
would have gladly provided it in order to continue receiving US financial
aid.
Instead the US forced the Sudanese to expel bin Laden, driving him back
into Afghanistan, where he became a pivotal influence in the growing power of
al
Qaeda and the Taliban. 6 In fact, the Sudanese government offered to take bin
Laden into custody and was rebuffed. One is compelled to ask whether
this is collective, contagious, and continuing stupidity or more evidence of desired
outcomes
being realized.
The Washington Post explicitly suggested
that the real relationship
between the
United States government and Osama bin Laden may be quite the opposite
of
what it seems. "As early as March 1996, the government of Sudan offered
to extradite bin Laden to the United Stares. US officials turned down
the offer,
perhaps
preferring to use him 'as
a combatant in an underground war.'" 7 In other
words,
as a US government agent. 8
In a follow-up story, the Village Voice expanded further on
the Sudanese
fiasco:
Nevertheless, one US intelligence source in
the region called the lost
opportunity a disgrace. "We kidnap minor drug czars and bring them
back in burlap bags. Somebody didn't want this to happen." He added
that the State Department may have blocked bin Laden's arrest to placate a part of the Saudi Arabian government
that supported bin
Laden. (Much of bin Laden's funding and some of his followers,
including suicide bombers, come from Saudi Arabia, which was one
of only three countries to recognize the Taliban. That changed after
September 11. By then, the Saudis had fired their longtime intelligence
chief, Prince Turki al-Faisal, reportedly for his support of bin Laden.)
Another American intelligence official told the Voice, "I've never
seen
a brick wall like this before." 9
Not only did family connections continue after
the "rift," there is
evidence that
members of the family also supported terrorist activity. In reality,
[the family's] ties
with Osama bin Laden had always existed and were never really broken. As
one Western intelligence agency noted, the bin Laden family had rigorously
followed
the principal of total family solidarity among all its members since
the 1980s.
In this way, two of Osama bin Laden's
brothers-in-law, Muhammad
Jamal Khalifa and Saad Al Sharif, played a crucial role, according to
American authorities, in the financing of al Qaeda. The first did so
through a charity organization based in Jeddah that did work in the
Philippines. He also financed bin Laden's activities in Malaysia,
Singapore, and Mauritius. 10
Khalifa was linked by former CIA official Vince
Cannistraro to a Yemeni terrorist Group that claimed responsibility for the 2001 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole.
After he had been detained in the US by immigration authorities when this
was
known, instead of holding him for trial in the US, American officials
deported him to Jordan, where he was wanted but was soon released on a
technicality. 11
Two more compelling citations from Paul Thompson's timeline further give
the
lie to the myth of Osama's ostracism:
February 2001: A former CIA anti-terror expert tells the New Yorker
that an allied intelligence agency sees "two of Osama's sisters apparently taking cash
to an airport in Abu Dhabi, where they are suspected
of handing it to a member of bin Laden's al Qaeda organization." This
is cited as one of many incidents showing "interconnectedness" between
Osama bin Laden and the rest of his family. [New Yorker, 11/5/01] 12
November 5, 2001: A New Yorker article points
to evidence that
the bin Laden family has generally not ostracized ... bin Laden as is
popularly believed (for instance, see [Newsweek, 10/15/01]), but
retains close ties in some cases. The large bin Laden family owns and
runs a $5 billion a year global corporation that includes the largest
construction firm in the Islamic world. One counter-terrorism expert
says, "There's obviously a lot of spin by the Saudi Binladin Group [the
family corporation] to distinguish itself from Osama. I've been following the bin Ladens for years, and it's easy
to say, 'We disown him.'
Many in the family have. But blood is usually thicker than water." The
article notes that neither the bin Laden family nor the Saudi royal
family have publicly denounced bin Laden since 9/11. (New Yorker,
11/5/01] 13
The family's continuing support for Osama bin Laden became a matter of
public record in 1999. As Thompson's timeline observes:
April 1999: A Saudi government audit shows
that five of Saudi
Arabia's billionaires have been giving tens of millions of dollars to al
Qaeda. The audit shows that these businessmen transferred money from the
National Commercial Bank to accounts of Islamic charities
in London and New York banks that serve as fronts for bin Laden. $3
million was diverted from a Saudi pension fund. The only action
taken is that Khalid bin Mahfouz, founder of National Commercial
Bank, Saudi Arabia's biggest bank, is placed under house arrest. Bin
Mahfouz had invested in George Bush Jr.'s businesses starting in
1989. The US has not frozen the accounts of bin Mahfouz, and he
continues to engage in major oil deals with US corporations. [USA Today, 10/29/99, Boston Herald, 12/10/01]
Just what is the "Saudi Binladin
Group" and what does it do?
The Saudi Binladin Group (SBG)
Perhaps the most comprehensive breakdown of
the bin Laden family's
operations
was compiled by former French intelligence consultant Jean-Charles Brisard as a
project commissioned by the French intelligence community entitled The
Economic
Network of the bin Laden Family. Much of that work was reproduced in
Forbidden
Truth.
With its headquarters in Jeddah, the parent company of SBG, Saudi
Investment
Company (SICO) operates four subsidiaries: SICO Curacao (Dutch
Antilles), the
Tropiville Corporation NV (Dutch Antilles), Falken Ltd. (Cayman
Islands), and
Islay Holdings (Isle d'Islay). Falken and Tropiville together own
Russell Wood
Holdings Ltd. (London) and Russell Wood Ltd. (London). An additional six
subsidiaries, controlled by either Russell Wood or Islay Holdings, all with
innocuous-sounding names starting
with "Falcon," "Globe," "Turkey
Rock," or
"Saffron," are
all located in Britain. In addition, one subsidiary, Falcon Properties
Ltd., in conjunction with Saudi investor Ghaith Pharoan, owns the Attock Oil
Company, also
located in England.
Founded in 1931 at the same time as the nation of Saudi Arabia, the bin
Laden
family business is the largest construction company in the Middle East.
But this
easy observation leads to a tangled web of financial and political
machinations.
The holding companies are located on Caribbean islands frequently associated
with money laundering. Obviously a great many financial and corporate
entities
can be concealed within tightly controlled holding companies. What else
is known
about the operations of this empire?
The Saudi Binladin Group owns orbiting satellites and has contracts with
the US Department of Defense (DoD). Iridium Satellite, LLC is a privately
held, bin
Laden Group company which owns a series of 73 low-orbit stationary
satellites
designed to provide satellite phone coverage across the surface of the
Earth.
Originally developed by Motorola, Iridium LLC was bankrupt in 1999 when
the
bin Laden Group purchased it and renamed it Iridium Satellite, LLC. The
company is based in Leesburg, VA, not far from the CIA and the National
Reconnaissance
Office. Since the bankruptcy takeover, the company has garnered a $72
million
DoD contract and a $300,000 NSF grant to "gauge the magnetic
characteristics
of the energy fields caused by solar storms."
Apparently, 600 Iridium Satellite phones were en
route to Florida on
September
11 and were redirected to NYC to help with the tragedy. After September
11, there
was some talk of using Iridium Satellite LLC's "low Earth orbiting
satellites to provide real-time cockpit voice and flight data monitoring of commercial
aircraft,
replacing the on-board 'black boxes.'" 14
SBG's construction arm was involved in
the building of US military bases
in
Saudi Arabia, including the Khobar towers, destroyed by a terrorist bomb
in
June 1996 killing 19 US servicemen. SBG also had business ventures with
US
oil companies such as Unocal and Enron. In addition they built large
portions
of the holy sites at Mecca for the Saudi government as a result of a
special relationship they have enjoyed with the royal family since the founding of
the
kingdom. 15
As the exclusive contractor for the holy sites in Mecca, Medina, and
Jerusalem
(until 1967), SBG and the bin Laden family enjoyed virtually
competition-free
access to government contracts. The company even served as a tutor for
members
of the royal family on matters of business and international finance. 16
Even more significant, in an Islamic culture strictly opposed to the collection of interest:, "the
SBG is the only private Saudi institution able to issue bonds. In 2001
it had
35,000 employees with estimated revenues of $3-5 billion. In the 1980s
it represented the likes of Porsche and Audi and developed Saudi partnerships
with GE,
Nortel, and Schweppes. All of these companies pretend to this day that SBG and
Osama bin Laden are totally divorced." 17
As for its banking relationships, SBG is known
to favor the Saudi
Commercial
Bank,18 Deutsche Bank's London office, and CitiGroup. 19 It also has extensive financial relationships with Goldman Sachs and the Fremont
Group, a
San Francisco investment firm whose directorate includes former Secretary
of State George P. Shultz. His connections to the SBG reach from the banking
side to the construction side; Shultz is the former CEO of the Bechtel
Group,
a heavy
construction firm with major interests in pipeline construction throughout
the
Middle East. 20 Just after the US occupation of Iraq in April 2003,
Bechtel was
awarded a contract worth up to $680 million to assist in the rebuilding
of Iraqi
infrastructure.
In 2001, the Wall Street Journal succinctly captured
the importance of
SBG in
the operations of the Empire:
"If there were ever any company closely connected
to the US and its
presence in Saudi Arabia, it's the Saudi Binladin Group," says Charles
Freeman, president of the Middle East Policy Council, a Washington
nonprofit concern that receives tens of thousands of dollars a year from the bin Laden family. 21
SBG also makes sizeable investments in foreign corporations, including
many
in the US. FTW was among the first, just after the attacks of 9/11, to
bring public attention to the fact that the bin Ladens had a multimillion-dollar
stake in the
Carlyle Group, a privately held US company.
Carlyle
On October 9, 2001, I published a story in
FTW on connections between
the
Bushes and the bin Ladens; it helped start an uproar that eventually led
to the
SBG divesting itself from Carlyle. Why is Carlyle so significant? As a
holding company and investment bank, it is a major component of the US defense
industry. Most people are unaware that on September 11, 2001, as the attacks were
taking
place, members of the bin Laden family (along with other key investors)
were in
Washington, DC meeting with the Carlyle Group at the Ritz Carlton Hotel,
just
blocks away from the White House. 22 Following are excerpts from that
story.
The Carlyle Group, the Bushes, and bin Laden
The warnings about the Carlyle Group,
the [at that time] nation's
eleventh largest defense contractor, and the Bushes came long before
the World Trade Center attacks. The Carlyle Group is a closely held
corporation, exempt, for that reason, from reporting its affairs to the
Securities and Exchange Commission. Little is known of what it actually does except that
it buys and sells defense contractors. As of
October 4, 2001, it has removed its corporate website from the World
Wide Web, making further investigation through that channel impossible. Its Directors include Frank Carlucci, former Reagan Secretary of
Defense; James Baker, former Bush Secretary of State; and Richard
Darman, a former White House aide to Ronald Reagan and
Republican Party operative.
On March 5, 2001, just weeks after George W. Bush's inauguration, the conservative Washington lobbying
Group Judicial Watch
issued a press release. It said;
(Washington, DC) Judicial Watch, the public interest law firm
that investigates and prosecutes government abuse and corruption, called
on former President George Herbert Walker Bush to
resign immediately from the Carlyle Group, a private investment firm, while his son President George W. Bush is in office.
Today's New York Times reported that the elder Bush is an
'ambassador' for the $12 billion private investment firm and last
year traveled to the Middle East on its behalf. The former president also helped
the firm in South Korea.
The New York Times reported that as compensation, the
elder Bush is allowed to buy a stake in the Carlyle Group's investments, which include ownership in at
least 164 companies
throughout the world (thereby by giving the current president
an indirect benefit). James Baker, the former Secretary of State
who served as President George W. Bush's point man in Florida's
election dispute, is a partner in the firm. The firm also gave
George W. Bush help in the early 1990s when it placed him on
one of its subsidiary's board of directors.
"This is simply inappropriate. Former
President Bush should immediately resign from the Carlyle Group because it is an
obvious conflict of interest. Any foreign government or foreign
investor trying to curry favor with the current Bush administration is sure
to throw business to the Carlyle Group. And with
the former President Bush promoting the firm's investments abroad, foreign nationals could understandably confuse the
Carlyle Group's interests with the interests of the United States
government," Stated Larry Klayman, Judicial Watch Chairman
and General Counsel.
"Questions are now bound to be raised if the recent Bush
administration change in policy towards Iraq has the fingerprints of the Carlyle
Group, which is trying to gain investments from other Arab countries who would presumably
benefit from
the new policy," stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
Judicial Watch noted that "even the Clinton
administration called on
the Rodham brothers to stop their business dealings in [the former
Soviet Republic of] Georgia because those dealings started to destabilize that
country."
Since the WTC attacks, the Wall Street Journal has reported
(September 28, 2001) that, "George H. W. Bush, the father of
President
Bush, works for the bin Laden family business in Saudi Arabia through
the Carlyle Group, an international consulting firm." The senior Bush
had met with the bin Laden family, at least twice in the last three
years
(1998 and 2000) as a representative of Carlyle, seeking to expand
business dealings with one of the wealthiest Saudi families, which,
some experts argue, has never fully severed its ties with black sheep
Osama in spite of current reports in a mainstream press that is afraid
of offending the current administration.
The Nation, on March 27, 2000 -- in a story co-authored by
David Corn and Paul Lashma -- wrote, "In January former President
George Bush and former British Prime Minister John Major paid a
social call on Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah " This story
confirms at least one meeting between the elder Bush and Saudi leaders, including the bin Ladens. That
the bin Ladens attended this
meeting was confirmed in a subsequent September 27, 2001, Wall
Street journal (WSJ) story. The January 2000 meeting with the bin
Ladens was also later confirmed by Bush (the elder's) Chief of Staff
Jean Becker, only after the WSJ presented her with a thank-you note
sent by Bush to the bin Ladens after that meeting.
James Baker visited the bin Ladens in 1998 and 1999
with [then]
Carlyle CEO Frank Carlucci.
The WSJ story went on to note, 'A Carlyle executive said that the
bin Laden family committed $2 million through a London investment arm in 1995 in Carlyle Partners II Fund, which raised $1.3
billion overall. The fund has purchased several aerospace companies
among 29 deals. So far, the family has received $1.3 million back in
completed investments and should ultimately realize a 40 percent
annualized rate of return, the Carlyle executive said.
"But a foreign financier with
ties to the bin Laden family,s says the
family's overall investment with Carlyle is considerably larger ..." In
other words, Osama bin Laden's attacks on the WTC and Pentagon,
with the resulting massive increase in the US defense budget, have just
made his family a great big pile of money.
More Bush connections appear in
relation to the bin Ladens. The
WSJ story also notes, "During the past several years, the [bin Laden]
family's close ties to the Saudi royal family prompted executives and
staff from closely held New York publisher Forbes, Inc. to make two
trips to the family headquarters, according to Forbes Chairman
Caspar Weinberger, a former US Secretary of Defense in the Reagan
administration. 'We would call on them to get their view of the country and what would be of
interest to investors."'
President G. H. W. Bush pardoned Weinberger for his criminal
conduct in the Iran-Contra scandal in 1989.
Our current President, George W. Bush, has also had -- at minimum -- indirect dealings with both Carlyle and the bin Ladens. In
1976 his firm Arbusto Energy was funded with $50,000 from Texas
investment banker James R. Bath, who was also the US investment
counselor for the bin Laden family. In his watershed 1992 book, The
Mafia, the CIA and George Bush, award-winning Texas investigative
journalist Pete Brewton dug deeply into Bath's background, revealing
connections with the CIA and major fraudulent activities connected
with the Savings & Loan scandal that took $500 billion out of the
pockets of American taxpayers. A long-time friend of George W.
Bush, Bath was connected to a number of covert financing operations
in the Iran-Contra scandal, which also linked to bin Laden friend
Adnan Khashoggi. One of the richest men in the world, Khashoggi
was the arms merchant at the center of the whole Iran-Contra scandal. Khashoggi, whose
connections to the bin Ladens is more than
superficial, got his first business break by acting as middleman for a
large truck purchase by Osama bin Laden's older brother, Salem.
Another key player in the Bush
administration, Deputy Secretary
of Defense Richard Armitage, left his post as an assistant secretary of
defense in the Reagan administration after a series of scandals connected
to CIA operatives Ed Wilson, Ted Shackley, Richard Secord,
and Tom Clines placed him at the brink of criminal indictment and
jail. Shackley and Secord are veterans of Vietnam operations and have
long been linked to opium/heroin smuggling. The Armitage scandals all
focused on the illegal provision of weapons and war materiel to
potential or actual enemies of the US and to the Contras in Central
America.
Armitage, [allegedly] a former Navy SEAL who reportedly enjoyed
combat missions and killing during covert operations in Laos during the
Vietnam War, has never been far from the Bush family's side.
Throughout his career, both in and out of government, he has been
perpetually connected to CIA drug smuggling operations. Secretary of
State Colin Powell, in a 1995 Washington Post story, called Armitage,
"my white son. " In 1990, then President Bush dispatched Armitage
to
Russia to aid in its "transition" to capitalism. Armitage's Russian work
for Bush has been frequently connected to the explosion of drug trafficking under the Russian Mafias who became virtual rulers of the
nation afterwards. In the early 1990s Armitage had extensive involvement in Albania at
the same time that the Albanian ally, Kosovo
Liberation Army, was coming to power and consolidating its grip,
according to the Christian Science Monitor, on 70 percent of the heroin
entering Western Europe. 23
Armitage and Carlucci are both board members of the influential
Washington think-tank, the Middle East Policy Council. [This is the same
Middle East Policy Council that receives funding from the bin
Laden family.]
According to a 2000 story from Harpers Magazine, in 1990 our
current president had additional connections to the bin Laden family through a
position as a corporate director of Caterair, owned by the Carlyle
Group -- at a time when the bin Ladens were invested in
Carlyle. On March 1, 1995, when George W. Bush was Texas governor and a senior trustee of the
University of Texas, its endowment
voted to place $10 million in investments with the Carlyle Group. As to how much of that money went
to the bin Ladens, we can only
guess.
But we do know that there is a long tradition in the Bush family of giving money
to those who kill Americans. 24
In January 2000 it was announced that Louis Gerstner, outgoing IBM
chairman, had replaced Frank Carlucci as chairman of the Carlyle Group.
Bin Laden special services
Paul Thompson's timeline reveals
what may be long-standing covert
relationships
between the bin Ladens and the Bushes.
Covert operations
October 1980: Salem bin Laden,
Osama's eldest brother, is later
described by a French secret intelligence report as one of the two closest friends of Saudi Arabia's King Fahd. As such, he often performs
important missions for Saudi Arabia. The French report speculates
that he is somehow involved in secret Paris meetings between US and
Iranian emissaries this month. Frontline, which published the French
report, notes that such meetings have never been confirmed. Rumors
of these meetings have been called the "October Surprise" and some
have speculated Bush Sr. negotiated in these meetings a delay of the
release of the US hostages in Iran, thus helping Reagan and Bush win
the presidency. All of this is highly speculative, but if the French
report is correct, it points to a long-standing connection of highly
illegal behavior between the Bush and bin Laden families. [PBS Frontline,
2001] 25
Salem, the same bin Laden who was to turn over US control of US bin
Laden
family finances to George W.'s friend and Air National Guard
squadron-mate,
James Bath, in the early 1980s, also turns up again in Iran-Contra.
Mid-1980s: It is later suggested that Salem bin Laden, Osama's eldest
brother, is involved in the Iran-Contra affair. The New Yorker reports,
"During the nineteen-eighties, when the Reagan administration
secretly arranged for an estimated thirty-four million dollars to be
funneled through Saudi Arabia to the Contras, in Nicaragua, Salem
bin Laden aided in this cause, according to French intelligence." New
Yorker is obviously quoting the same French report posted by Frontline
(see October, 1980). [New Yorker, 11/5/01; Frontline, 2001] 26
George W.'s wallet
Several bin Ladens turn up in the business life of President George W.
Bush.
1988: Prior to this year, George Bush Jr. is a failed oil man. Three
times friends and investors have bailed him out to keep him from
going bankrupt. But in this year, the same year his father becomes
president, some Saudis buy a portion of his small company, Harken,
which has never worked outside of Texas. Later in the year, Harken
wins a contract in the Persian Gulf and starts doing well financially.
These transactions seem so suspicious that even the Wall Street Journal
in 1991 states it "raises the question of ... an effort to cozy up
to a
presidential son." Two major investors into Bush's company during
this time are Salem bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's father, and Khaled
bin Mahfouz. [Salon, 11/19/01; Intelligence Newsletter, 3/2/00] 27
We could devote a whole chapter to Harken Energy. As the corporate
scandals
of 2002 rocked the American financial landscape, a number of stories
surfaced
showing that George W. Bush had knowingly participated in a huge "pump
and
dump" scheme with Harken stock just before its collapse in 1991.
Apart from its
smaller scale, this is strikingly similar to the Enron debacle of a
decade later.
But
in light of the fact that none of the evidence that surfaced in 2002
(including SEC
records and statements) had even the slightest impact on the course of
American
history or the election of 2002, I see no point in delving deeper into
that episode
here. Harken energy is just another little piece that fits nicely into
the broader
landscape of that map.
Kosovo and the Balkans
Osama bin Laden's connections to, and service for,
the CIA did not end
when the
Russians departed Afghanistan prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In fact, a
compelling trail of evidence shows that the US has maintained continuous
ties to
al Qaeda, bin Laden, and other Islamic terror organizations to this day.
Much of
this evidence is found in the recent history of the Balkans, especially
in the robust
American involvement with the Kosovo Liberation Army.
Since 9/11 few have accomplished as much as
Professor Michel Chossudovsky
of the University of Ottawa in exposing the deceitfulness of US
government statements about Osama bin Laden. In 1998 the United States openly sided with
the
Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), then responsible for 70 percent of the
heroin smuggled into Western Europe, in a war against another useful
US-manufactured
bogeyman, Slobodan Milosevic. And it is there, Chossudovsky tells us,
that bin
Laden footprints appear again. After examining 21 different source
records --
including US congressional records and reports by the Republican Party
-- he
found direct links between Osama and the CIA:
The evidence amply confirms that the CIA never severed its
ties to the
"lslamic Militant Network." Since the end of the Cold War, these
covert intelligence links have not only been maintained, they have
become increasingly sophisticated.
New undercover initiatives financed by
the Golden Crescent drug
trade were set in motion in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the
Balkans. Pakistan's military and intelligence apparatus (controlled by
the CIA) essentially "served as a catalyst for the disintegration of the
Soviet Union and the emergence of six new Muslim republics in Central Asia ..."
The same pattern was used in the Balkans
to arm and equip the
Mujahideen fighting in the ranks of the Bosnian Muslim army against
the Armed Forces of the Yugoslav Federation. Throughout the 1990s,
the Pakistan Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) was used by the CIA as a
go-between -- to channel weapons and Mujahideen mercenaries to the Bosnian Muslim Army in the civil war in Yugoslavia. According
to a report of the London based International Media Corporation:
"Reliable sources report that the United
States is now [1994] actively
participating in the arming and training of the Muslim forces of
Bosnia-Herzegovina in direct contravention of the United Nations
accords."28
Chossudovsky next draws the handcuffs tighter around the wrists of both
bin
Laden and the CIA:
During September and October [1994],
there has been a stream of
"Afghan" Mujahideen ... covertly landed in Ploce, Croatia
...
Confirmed by British military sources, the task of arming and training of
the KLA had been entrusted in 1998 to the US Defence
Intelligence Agency (DIA) and Britain's secret intelligence service
MI6 ... Bin Laden had visited Albania himself ... It is important to
note that the KLA was basically an Albanian ethnic Army and that it
has been documented that Albanian organized crime elements are
both powerful and well respected in the region, even by their Italian
counterparts. Also, remember that it was heroin grown in Afghanistan
that was passing through the KLA's hands that was funding a great many Islamic terrorist organizations
all over Europe and
Asia. 29
Chossudovsky documented that some of bin Laden's most
trusted operatives
even participated in the fighting. "Another link to bin Laden is the fact
that the brother of a leader in an Egyptian jihad organization and also a
military commander of Osama bin Laden, was leading an elite KLA unit during the
Kosovo
conflict." 30
Further corroboration came in a May 1999 story
in the Washington Times.
Citing intelligence reports presumably obtained from US agencies,
reporter Jerry
Seper wrote:
The intelligence reports document
what is described as a "link"
between bin Laden, the fugitive Saudi including a common staging
area in Tropoje, Albania, a center for Islamic terrorists. The reports
said bin Laden's organization, known as al Qaeda, has both trained
and financially supported the KLA ...
Jane's International Defense Review, a highly respected British
journal, reported in February that documents found last year on the
body of a KLA member showed that he had escorted several volunteers into Kosovo, including more than a dozen Saudi Arabians. 31
It is important to remember that the NATO commander in charge of all operations in the region was 2003-2004 Democratic presidential hopeful
Wesley Clark
at a time when NATO was supporting the KLA.
Chechnya
One 9/11 researcher drew compelling links between Osama bin Laden and
Chechnya, where Muslim separatists remain a formidable thorn in the side
of Russian President Vladimir Putin:
1n his 28 September interview [with a pro-Taliban newspaper], bin
Laden is quoted as follows: "I can go from Indonesia to Algeria, Kabul
to Chechnya, Bosnia to Sudan, and Burma to Kashmir," he said.
"This is not a question of my survival. This is the question of the survival of jihad (holy war)."
"Wherever required, I will be there."
This amounts to a confession that bin Laden has been involved
with the very terrorists that the US has sponsored, for example in
Chechnya, Bosnia, Macedonia, Algeria, and Indonesia, and also with
the KLA whom the US government has sponsored in attacking
Serbia. 32
Chossudovsky again expanded on and illuminated the secret and
mutually
beneficial relationship between Osama bin Laden and the CIA:
With regard to Chechnya, the main rebel leaders Shamil Basayev and
Al Khattab were trained and indoctrinated in CIA sponsored camps in
Afghanistan and Pakistan. According to Yossef Bodansky, director
of the US Congress's Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional
Warfare, the war in Chechnya had been planned during a secret summit of Hezbollah
International held in 1996 in Mogadishu, Somalia.
The summit was attended by Osama bin Laden and high-ranking
Iranian and Pakistani intelligence officers. In this regard, the involvement of Pakistan's ISI in Chechnya "goes far beyond supplying the
Chechens with weapons and expertise: the ISI and its radical Islamic
proxies are actually calling the shots in this war."
Russia's main pipeline route transits
through Chechnya and
Dagestan. Despite Washington's perfunctory condemnation of
Islamic terrorism, the indirect beneficiaries of the Chechen war are
the Anglo-American oil conglomerates which are vying for control
over oil resources and pipeline corridors out of the Caspian Sea basin.
The two main Chechen rebel armies (respectively) led by
Commander Shamil Basayev and Emir Khattab) estimated at 35,000 strong were supported by Pakistan's ISI, which also played a key
role
in organizing and training the Chechen rebel army [emphasis
added]. 33
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
Great Britain -- one of the major players supporting the KLA in Kosovo
-- also
maintained secret relationships with bin Laden and al Qaeda that served
its interests. In 1996 Britain's exterior intelligence service, MI6,
actually
funded and
worked with al Qaeda in a plot to assassinate and overthrow Libya's
Muammar
Qaddafy. Details of the relationship emerged after a British domestic
intelligence
(MI5) officer, David Shayler, went public with documents detailing the
relationship between Britain and bin Laden.
In November, 2002 and in the wake of
9/11 -- as Shayler's trial brought the
case to public attention, the British government invoked measures of the
State
Security Act to hide embarrassing information.
The government's efforts
even went
so far as the issuance of a "D" notice by Prime Minister Tony Blair requiring
that
previously published news stories on the case be withdrawn and removed
from
public websites.
A remaining story in Britain's
Observer suggests the degree to
which the British (and indeed, the US) government is exposed by the
facts' emergence. It reported, "The Libyan al Qaeda cell included Anas al-Liby, who
remains
on the US government's most-wanted list with a reward of $25 million for
his capture. He is warned for his involvement in the African embassy bombings.
Al- Liby
was with bin Laden in Sudan before the latter returned to Afghanistan in
1996.
Astonishingly, despite suspicions that he was a high-level al Qaeda
operative, [Anas] al-Liby was given political asylum in Britain and
lived in Manchester until May of 2000 when he eluded a police raid on
his house and fled abroad. The raid discovered a 180-page al
Qaeda "manual for jihad" containing instructions for terrorist
attacks. 34
Much of the information revealed by Shayler, who has reportedly been
sentenced to six months for violating secrecy oaths, was confirmed by
French authors
Brisard and Dasquie, who noted in Forbidden Truth that the first real
Interpol
warned notice for Osama bin Laden came not from the US but from another
so-called terrorist leader, Muammar Qaddafy, in 1994. At the time, bin
Laden was
wanted for the murder of two German intelligence agents in Libya, and
Qaddafy's
actions suggested that he had found common ground with some Western
governments on the issue of Saudi Arabia's most wanted son.
Since the attacks of 9/11 Libya has rarely been mentioned as a state
sponsor of terrorism and has recently "cleaned up its act" as US oil companies
have secured
new Libyan contracts. Qaddafy, the terrorist du jour of the 1980s, is
now respectable.
All this seemingly nonsensical behavior, rendering more incredible the
now dicredited US charges that Saddam Hussein was an ally of Osama bin Laden,
is
explained by information given to me by an influential investment banker
shortly
after the arracks of 9/11. That information indicated that Qaddafy had
recently
signed an oil lease with Texas oil magnates Nelson and Bunker Hunt, good
friends
of the Bush family.
Britain's dealings with Osama bin Laden have extended
to allowing him to visit
their country while he was a wanted man. As I noted in 1998, "the French
Internet
publication Indigo reported that bin Laden had been a London guest of
British
Intelligence as recently as 1996, and his treasurer recently defected to
the Saudis as
different factions shifted alliances for new campaigns in the Middle
East. If Osama
travels to London and has businesses in the Caymans and Geneva, how
difficult
can he be to find?" 35
Unsurprisingly, a November 2002 UPI story by Arnaud de Borchgrave indicated not only that
the Pakistani ISI had helped Osama bin Laden escape from Afghanistan but also that the American government had deliberately paid
little attention to offers from an Afghan warlord to pinpoint and capture
the
alleged
mastermind of 9/11. De Borchgrave reported that Deputy Secretary of
Defense
Paul Wolfowitz took down the name of the warlord -- who had communicated
directly with the reporter -- and promised to look into the matter, and
that nothing ever came of it. De Borchgrave became frustrated.
Could it be that the intelligence community, already overburdened by
the requirements of the coming war on Iraq and the war on terror, is
not too interested in a 'we've got Osama alive' melodrama that might
detract from the current 'get Hussein' priority objective? 36
While de Borchgrave worried about terror attacks if bin Laden were
captured,
I chuckled at the thought of frightened officials in Washington worrying
over the
possibility that bin Laden might one day talk.
With this perspective it is possible
to take a rational look at the
actual state of
affairs in Saudi Arabia in light of the controversy over the 28 censored
pages of the
House-Senate 9/11 intelligence report that reportedly focus on it.
George W. Bush
refuses to declassify this section of the report while what are reported
to be its contents are conveniently leaked throughout the mainstream American press. I
tend to think that the 28 pages, as originally reported, have more to do
with
advance warnings of the attacks from foreign governments than they do with Saudi
Arabia.
One must remember that Saudi Arabia is the
ultimate prize in the war for
oil.
That's because, to paraphrase convicted bank robber Willie Horton, "It's
where the
oil is."
Excerpted and updated from the
August 2002 issue of From The Wilderness:
Saudi Arabia: The Sarajevo of the 21st Century
The global horrors of World War I ("the war
to end all wars")
began with the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand in
Sarajevo in 1914. The apocalyptic war of the 21st century may have
begun with a $1 trillion lawsuit filed in the United States by 9/11 victims' families against Saudi Arabian banks and members of the Saudi
royal family. In what may be the opening salvos of a financial and
energy apocalypse, the Financial Times reported that wealthy Saudi
investors had begun a run on their US banking deposits that may have taken as much as $200 billion out of US banks. These massive
withdrawals -- carved off of an estimated $750 billion total in Saudi US
investments -- occurred within days of the August 15 filing of the
suit.
Ironically, the principal attorneys in the suit are all political
insiders; one of them is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
You might think they would have thought of this beforehand.
There are two basic questions to ask about Saudi Arabia. Why was
Saudi Arabia not a focus of US action and serious media attention in the immediate aftermath of
September 11, even though there were so
many obvious connections? And why is Saudi Arabia now so prominently a focus of
what is apparently government-approved US
animosity? One thing is obvious: the deployment of US military personnel in the region for the invasion of Iraq is also a convenient
placement of resources for what may be a one-two punch to take over
a tottering kingdom that owns 25 percent of all the oil on the planet
at the same time that Saddam Hussein is removed from power in a country that
controls another 11 percent. together, the two countries
-- which appear not to have peaked in production capacity just yet,
and which are the only two nations capable of an immediate increase
in output -- possess 36 percent of the world's known oil. [FTW
became the first news service to report on the possibility of Saudi
Arabia's having peaked in May 2003. This was more than a year before
the possibility was raised in the New York Times.]
The Saudi situation is complicated by much of Saudi Arabia's
wealth being invested in US financial markets; its sudden loss could
devastate the US economy. But Bush brinksmanship -- an understatement -- is making possible a scenario where Saudis long loyal
to
the US markets cut off their own arm in a coyote-like effort to free
themselves from a trap that threatens the stability both of their kingdom and of the global economy.
Osama bin Laden is a Saudi. Fifteen
of the 9/11 hijackers (according to their passports] were Saudi. There has been an obvious and
clear financial trail showing Saudi support for al Qaeda. In fact, as
has
recently been noted by French author and former intelligence officer
Jean-Charles Brisard in his Forbidden Truth,
the financial support network of al Qaeda is a virtual cut-and-paste reincarnation of BCCI, a
Pakistani bank known for terrorist, drug, and CIA connections in the
1980s. One of BCCI's former executives, Khaled bin Mahfouz,
remains the banker for the Saudi royal family today.
After months of strenuous and repeated assertions by the Bush
administration that Saudi Arabia was a key ally in the war on terror,
that they were loyal and trusted partners in US-led efforts, someone
has suddenly turned on the tap for anti-Saudi propaganda, and the
mainstream media outlets are eating it up.
On June 20 (2002) the Jang Group of newspapers in Dubai reported that al Qaeda networks were active in Saudi Arabia. This followed
a June 18 announcement that a Group linked to al Qaeda had been
arrested inside the kingdom and charged with planning attacks on
Saudi government installations.
On July 18 the BBC reported that Saudi Prince Nayef bin Sultan
bin Fawwaz Al-Shaalan had been indicted by a Miami court on
charges of having smuggled 1,980 kilos of cocaine on his private jet in
1999.
On July 28, Britain's Observer
released a story that quickly spread
around the world. It was headlined, "Britons left in jail amid fears
that
Saudi Arabia could fall to al Qaeda." The lead paragraphs read, "Saudi
Arabia is teetering on the brink of collapse, fuelling Foreign Office
fears of an extremist takeover of one of the West's key allies in the
war
on terror."
Anti-government demonstrations have swept the desert
kingdom in the past months in protest at the pro- American
stance of the de facto ruler, Prince Abdullah.
At the same time, Whitehall officials are concerned that
Abdullah could face a palace coup from elements within the royal family sympathetic
to al Qaeda.
Saudi sources said the Pentagon had recently sponsored a
secret conference to look at options if the royal family fell ...
Anti-Abdullah elements within the Saudi government are
also thought to have colluded in a wave of bomb attacks on Western
targets by Islamic terrorists. 37
After finally mentioning the apparently unimportant subject of
the
headline -- the fact that several Britons had been jailed on bootlegging charges -- the story concluded with
the statement that feuding
between factions in the Saudi court was going to increase with the
death of King Fahd who was unstable in a Swiss hospital.
The story ended by quoting Saudi dissident Dr. Saad al-Fagih who
declared, "There is now an undeclared war between the factions in the
Saudi royal family."
On the same day a lengthy essay on Saudi Arabia in the Asia Times
by Ehsan Ahrari observed, "It is interesting to note that [Prince]
Sultan is believed to be a preferred US candidate for the Saudi
throne." Abdullah is the crown prince, not Sultan.
On July 29 Stratfor, an intelligence reporting and analysis service,
reported that a feud was brewing between Saudi Arabia and neighboring Qatar over Qatar's willingness
to openly support the US
invasion of Iraq. Qatar is nearly sinking under the weight of pre-deployed military equipment and has a brand new state-of-the-art US
Air Force Base.
On July 30 the suggestions that internecine warfare had erupted
in Saudi Arabia were given credence by an Agence France Presse report
describing the recent deaths of three Saudi princes in eight days.
Prince Fahd bin Turki died of thirst in the desert on July 30. Prince
Sultan bin Faisal died in a car crash on July 23, and Prince Ahmed bin
Salman died the day before of a heart attack.
On August 1 the World Tribune reported that Saudi Arabia, which
has been acquiring long-range ballistic missiles had also, according to
reports confirmed by US officials, been attempting to acquire nuclear
weapons from Pakistan -- which has been well documented to have
heavy concentrations of al Qaeda supporters within all parts of its
government.
On that same day, Saudi dissident Dr. al-Fagih appeared on the
Australian Broadcasting Corporation program Lateline and offered
some startling revelations:
Prince Abdullah who is supposed to be the next in charge,
the next King, would not accept to appoint Prince Sultan as
Crown Prince, and Prince Sultan insists that he should be the
next in line for Abdullah to be [king].
Al-Fagih predicted the imminent death of the ailing King
Fahd and noted, "That's why probably the foreign office have [sic]
expected some major thing happening in the next few weeks ...
"I mean, Prince Abdullah is in charge of the national guard,
and Prince Sultan is in charge of the army, and either one will use his
own force to fight the other to fight for power. Now they
will use all elements of the population, of the society ..."
[including a large portion of the population that supports al
Qaeda and radical Islamic fundamentalism].
Al-Fagih said that there was a psychological barrier in the country
because all information is so thoroughly controlled, and the regime
maintains the appearance of complete control. Almost all Saudis dislike
the corrupt regime for a multitude of differing reasons. But, said the
medical doctor who once served with Osama bin Laden in the Afghan
war against Soviet occupation, "Once this psychological barrier is broken, either by a dispute of the
royal family, or by a financial
collapse,
you would expect a major act by the people against the regime."
Al-Fagih also noted that in general the dislike of
the Saudi people
for the US was immense because of its unremitting support of Israel and
also because the US had maintained a military presence on Saudi soil
long after the end of the Gulf War.
Just five days later on August 6, the
Washington Post reported that
a month earlier on July 10, a top Pentagon advisory Group had received a
briefing from Rand Corp. analyst Laurent Murawiec
describing Saudi Arabia as an enemy of the US and threatening
seizure of its oil fields and financial assets if it did not stop
supporting terrorism. The Pentagon Group that received the briefing, the Defense
Policy Board, is headed by renowned hawk Richard Perle. [Perle resigned
from the board in February 2004 amidst growing controversy over his hawkish views and personal financial relations with firms
seeking government contracts.] Although high-level Bush administration figures like Colin Powell downplayed the briefing's significance,
it received heavy-handed media play for several days. Subsequent
reports stated that Vice President Dick Cheney's staff had "embraced"
the report.
On August 7 Saudi Arabia made clear and unequivocal public
pronouncements that it would not allow its soil to be used for an invasion of Iraq.
On August 14 Reuters reported that King Fahd, who had just
been moved to Spain, was in failing health and possibly near death.
On August 15 amid massive daylong publicity, a 15-count, $1 trillion lawsuit was filed against various Saudi interests for liability in
the
9/11 attacks. Included among the defendants were the Saudi Binladin
Group of companies (previously connected through the Carlyle Group to Bush family finances),
three Saudi princes, seven banks, eight
Islamic
foundations, a number of charities, and the government of Sudan.
The three Saudi princes are Turki Faisal al Saud, Prince Sultan bin
Abdul Aziz (same as above), and Prince Mohamed al- Faisal.
This new suit eclipsed three earlier suits, largely ignored by the
major media, filed by victim families charging various degrees of liability and/or complicity by the US government. The key lawyers in
the case have a history of close affiliation with the Republican Party,
the Bush family, and/or the Council on Foreign Relations. Media coverage
of the suits continued through the weekend ending August 18.
What gives?
Following The Money
The instability in Saudi Arabia may well be just the end result of
internal decay and rot. But the consequences and implications of
Saudi Arabia's current crisis are deeper once one examines the financial threat that Saudi chaos might unleash.
Like that of the United States, the Saudi economy is in tatters, and
like the US economy it needs only one thing to keep it afloat -- cash.
Saudi Arabia, for all of its wealth, actually began borrowing money to
meet budget deficits and finance economic development in 1993. 38 It
says something about the level of corruption that a nation with as
much wealth and income as Saudi Arabia found its treasury running
low. Yes, oil prices change things. But the implication is that the
Saudi elites are lining their own pockets to the detriment of the long-term
financial stability of their country -- as happens in the United States,
it seems.
The Saudi government rightly fears US military success in Iraq. A
first inevitable consequence would be serious anti- American protests
from the Saudi population. The second inevitable consequence would
be an almost immediate increase in Iraqi oil production, [Iraq's out-of-control insurgency and the continuing sabotage of infrastructure
have prevented this], generating a price reduction that might break
the back of OPEC and dramatically reduce oil income. Seeing that
the US economy is on the brink of collapse, the Bush administration,
facing a potentially disastrous 2004 presidential election, must do
whatever it takes to keep itself in power.
For this administration, so
predominantly populated by oil men (and woman),
cheap oil is the obvious first choice; in other words, oil is not only the actual issue, it's
also the one to which the public relations and electioneering skills of
this particular regime gravitate in the face of electoral trouble. By
focusing their policy efforts on the energy issue -- while pursuing a
profligate, oil-dependent, war-driven future -- they are addressing
exactly the right thing in the most wrong way possible. Without significant capital investment in any alternatives, oil remains king.
Where the oil is, there will be war.
Saudi Arabia seems to have seen this coming for some time.
In
April 2002 the Saudi government announced that it was considering
privatizing parts of Aramco, the Saudi national oil company, and selling off some of Aramco's operations
to Exxon, BP-Amoco, Shell, and other major companies. Though little has
been disclosed since the early announcements, this move would benefit
the Saudis in two big ways. First, it would give Western companies an
equity stake in the
stability of the monarchy, making it difficult for the US to consider
bombing or imposing embargos upon operations owned by Western
companies. Secondly, it would generate large amounts of cash to off-set declining economic growth, rising unemployment, and declining
per capita income, according to Stratfor on April 29, 2002.
The oil-based standoff is mirrored by what is effectively a much
more successful financial deterrent -- the Saudis' ability to wreck the
US financial markets should they see their situation become utterly desperate.
Owning the American Dream
It is impossible to quantify exactly the Saudi holdings in
the US economy. But anecdotal evidence is compelling. The New York Times
reported on August 11, "An adviser to the Saudi royal family made a
telling point about Saudi elites. He said an estimated $600 billion to
$700 billion in Saudi money was invested outside the kingdom, a vast
majority of it in the United States or in United States-related investments." The BBC has estimated Saudi US investment at $750 billion.
Adnan Khashoggi, perhaps the best-known
Saudi billionaire, controls his investments through Ultimate Holdings Ltd. and in Genesis
Intermedia, which was reported to have been connected to suspicious
stock trades around the time of the September 11 attacks. (No linkage has been made
between these trades and the attacks themselves). The rest of his
private US holdings are administered through his daughter's name from
offices in Tampa, Florida, not far from where
many of the hijackers received flight training at both private schools
and US military installations.
Khashoggi is a longtime financial player, deeply connected
to the
Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s and also to BCCI. But Khashoggi
doesn't even make the Forbes list of the richest people in the world.
One Saudi who does is Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, who ranks as the
fourth richest man on the planet with an estimated net worth of
$21.5 billion (Alwaleed is also an investor in and reported client of
the Carlyle Group). 39
Some of Alwaleed's holdings and recent acquisitions include:
-
The single largest sharehold
in CitiGroup, the teetering US financial giant, which is reported to have a derivatives bubble of more than $12 trillion and has reportedly sought recent
emergency assistance from the Federal Reserve. Alwaleed's
shareholding in CitiGroup remains near the $10 billion mark.
The BCCI scandal was not the last instance where the prohibited foreign ownership of US banks was an issue that
touched Saudi interests. Prince Alwaleed's heavy stake in CitiGroup
was concealed from 1991 until recently by the Carlyle Group, which, acting as a virtual cutout, disguised Alwaleed's heavy investment in the bank. 40
-
Alwaleed also owns, according
to an August 9, 2002 story in the Guardian, three percent of the total shares of Newscorp (FOX), making him the second-largest shareholder behind Rupert Murdoch.
-
Alwaleed's other significant holdings
include Apple Computer, Priceline, the Four Seasons Hotels, Planet Hollywood, Saks, and Euro Disney.
-
Alwaleed also sits on the
Carlyle Group's board of directors.
-
Alwaleed alone is in a
position to pull the plug on the US economy. But, of course, he would cost himself billions
to do it, and this is not a likely scenario because he has long been a pro-democratic US supporter.
This applies to the rest of Saudi-held assets in
the US, just as surely
as it applies to Alwaleed's. Taken as a whole, the dollar-denominated
wealth of the Saudi royals is so large that its sudden withdrawal from
the American economy would be devastating to America. And it
would entail very serious financial losses for the Saudi investors, who
would find themselves with a mountain of dollars whose value they
had just decimated, backed by the full faith and credit of the tooth
fairy. So the dreaded Saudi money-withdrawal is in nobody's near-term interest and
it does not happen. It keeps right on not
happening, and will presumably continue to not happen for a long
time to come.
But this assumes, of course, that the Saudi monarchy remains a
stable political entity; that the US economy does not implode under
its own debt-load; that no major, protracted regional conflict occurs;
and that the US therefore remains the most profitable place for Saudi
investment. Bur if the US economy fails? If the Euro becomes stronger
than the dollar?
The Bush administration's unilateral and illegal commitment
to an
Iraqi invasion brings all three essentials into question. The August 20
(2002) report from the Financial Times suggests that the Saudis are, at
minimum, firing a clear warning shot across the bow of the USS
"Bush" ... 41
Only two points of my analysis have proven incorrect. The now obvious
guerilla war in Iraq and the deterioration of Iraqi oil infrastructure have
prevented any
real surge in Iraqi oil production. This fact alone would make Saudi
Arabia and
smaller swing producers in West Africa more important to US short-term
needs.
Second, King Fahd remains on life support in Spain. I can only conclude
that his
death will come at a time more convenient to US objectives, perhaps
after the
inauguration of a new president.
According to an investment banker in the author's acquaintance who is
well
versed in Middle Eastern and oil finance, two capital streams emerged in
the prelude to the invasion of Iraq. One was a stream of Saudi capital
being returned to that country from the US. The second was a stream of Saudi flight
capital fleeing to the US, being sent by an elite group who expected to soon be living
here in
exile, after the fall of the monarchy and the partition of the country.
Peter Dale Scott, reaching the same
conclusions earlier, wrote:
The kingdom is now a key battlefield in the conflict between America
and its allies and the forces of extremist Islam. It is a conflict that
is
now threatening to tear Saudi Arabia apart. Revolution is in the air.
The Western community (in Saudi Arabia] is living in fear. It has
become the target of a series of bomb attacks, carried out by al Qaeda-linked
terrorists who want to drive all non-Muslims out of the Arabian
Peninsula. But the terrified Westerners have received little help from
the Saudi authorities.
The US may hope that it can weaken
royal support for anti-American protests by its war preparations in the Middle East, including
the timely regrouping of US forces from Saudi Arabia to neighboring
Qatar. Alternatively, it may have to use them. 42
Additional entries from the Thompson
timeline add the necessary pieces to
confirm that the movements and activities of Osama bin Laden and his
family are
desired outcomes rather than effects of collective stupidity.
1996: FBI investigators are
prevented from carrying out an investigation into two relatives of bin Laden. The FBI wanted
to learn more =about Abdullah bin Laden, "because of his relationship with the
=World Assembly of Muslim Youth [WAMY] -- a suspected terrorist
organization." Abdullah was the US director of WAMY and lived with
his brother Omar in Falls Church, a town just outside
Washington. The coding on the document, marked secret, indicate the case involved espionage, murder, and national security. WAMY
has their offices at 5613 Leesburg Pike. Remarkably, four of the 9/11
hijackers later are listed as having lived at 5913 Leesburg Pike, at the
same time the two bin Laden brothers were there. WAMY has not
been put on a list of terrorist organizations in the US, but it has been
banned in Pakistan. A high-placed intelligence official tells the
Guardian: "there were always constraints on investigating the Saudis.
There were particular investigations that were effectively killed." An
unnamed US source says to the BBC, "There is a hidden agenda at the very highest levels of our government." [BBC Newsnight,
11/6/01; Guardian, 11/7/01]
July 12, 2001: Bin Laden supposedly
meets with CIA agent
Larry Mitchell in the Dubai hospital on this day, possibly others.
Mitchell reportedly lives in Dubai as an Arab specialist under the
cover of being a consular agent. The CIA and the Dubai hospital
deny the story; Le Figaro and Radio France International stand by
it. [Le Figaro, 10/31/01; Radio France International, 11/1/01] The
Guardian claims that the two organizations that broke the story, Le
Figaro and Radio France International, got their information from
French intelligence, "which is keen to reveal the ambiguous role of
the CIA, and to restrain Washington from extending the war to Iraq
and elsewhere." The Guardian adds that during his stay bin Laden
is also visited by a second CIA officer, "several members of his family and Saudi personalities," including Prince Turki al Faisal, then
head of Saudi intelligence. [Guardian, 11/1/01] At the very least,
doesn't this show bin Laden was never estranged from much of his
family?
The story in Le Figaro caused a
great international uproar, including fierce personal attacks on me for having publicized it. If
true, it establishes that just two
months before 9/11, one of the most wanted men on the planet was
exchanging information -- personally -- with CIA personnel. In light of
what has been
revealed in this chapter, one thing can safely be stated with
confidence: The historical context of the relations between the bin Ladens, the Bushes, and
US
economic interests certainly makes the Le Figaro stories plausible.
September 13-19, 2001: Members of
bin Laden's family and important Saudis are flown out of the US. The New York Times explains,
"The young members of the bin Laden clan were driven or flown
under FBI supervision to a secret assembly point in Texas and then to
Washington from where they left the country on a private charter plane
when airports reopened three days after the attacks." If you read carefully, note they are flown
to Texas and Washington before the national
air ban is lifted -- the fact of flights during this ban is now unfortunately widely called an urban legend. [New York Times, 9/30/01] There
have been conflicting reports as to whether the FBI interviewed them
before they left the country. Osama bin Laden's half brother Abdullah
bin Laden stated that even a month later his only contact with the FBI
was a brief phone call. (Boston Globe, 9/21/01; New Yorker, 11/5/01]
It turns out that the flights did
occur, and according to former National
Security aide Richard Clarke, in his testimony before the Kean
Commission, the orders possibly came from "The White House." 43
Paul Thompson's timeline adds more
details of the special flights:
September 13, 2001: Confirmation
that bin Ladens and Saudis did
fly during the no-fly ban and left the country before they could be
properly questioned comes from a Tampa Tribune article. A Lear jet takes
off from Tampa, Florida, while a ban on all non-military flights
in the US is still in effect. It carries a Saudi Arabian prince, the son
of
the Saudi defense minister, as well as the son of a Saudi army commander, and flies
to Lexington, Kentucky, where the Saudis own
racehorses. They then fly a private 747 out of the country. Multiple
747s with Arabic lettering on their sides are already there, suggesting
another secret assembly point. Intriguingly, the Tampa flight left from
a private Raytheon hangar. (Tampa Tribune, 10/5/01]
October 27, 2001: The bin Laden
family divests from the Carlyle Group around this time, in light of public
controversy surrounding
the family after the 9/11 attacks. (Washington Post, 10/27/01]
October 14, 2001: The Boston Herald
reports: "Three banks
allegedly used by Osama bin Laden to distribute money to his global
terrorism network have well-established ties to a prince in Saudi
Arabia's royal family, several billionaire Saudi bankers, and the governments of
Kuwait and Dubai. One of the banks, Al-Shamal Islamic Bank in the Sudan,
was controlled directly by Osama bin Laden, according to a
1996 US State Department, report." A regional expert states, "I
think we underestimate bin Laden. He comes from the highest levels of
Saudi society and he has supporters at all levels of Saudi Arabia."
[Boston Herald, 10/14/01]
Two of the three banks referred to
above are not included in President George W. Bush's crackdown on
terrorist financing after the attacks. Both of the banks had
played financing roles in W's Harken energy deals in the region. 44
A final note on the unwillingness of
the US government to take advantage of
numerous opportunities to neutralize bin Laden: Apparently several of
the offers came directly from the Taliban. The Village Voices James
Ridgeway wrote:
[Niece of former CIA Director
Richard Helms and Taliban Lobbyist
Laila] Helms described one incident after another in which, she
claimed, the Taliban agreed to give up bin Laden to the US, only to
be rebuffed by the State Department. On one occasion, she said, the
Taliban agreed to give the US coordinates for his campsite, leaving
enough time so the Yanks could whack al Qaeda's leader with a missile before he moved. The proposal, she claims, was nixed. 45
Before going to Pakistan let's
revisit one of the most important quotes in The
Grand Chessboard by Zbigniew Brzezinski:
Two basic steps are thus required:
first, to identify the geostrategically dynamic Eurasian states that have the power
to cause a potentially
important shift in the international distribution of power and to decipher the central external goals of their respective political elites and
the likely consequences of their seeking to attain them; second, to formulate specific US policies
to offset, co-opt, and/or control the
above. 46
As with Russia, the political elites
in Saudi Arabia are either created or defined
by American money and influence. As the US used the Mafia in Russia to
destabilize and neutralize that country, so too it appears it has done in
Saudi Arabia with al Qaeda. That country, with 25 percent of the oil on the planet,
has only
existed since 1931. What arguable overriding loyalty to their country
exists for
those Saudis whose billions depend upon the Empire? If the performance
of the
Russian oligarchs is any standard, then the malignant Iraq war and the
increasingly
serious stirrings of Islamic protest might lead to a collapse in Saudi
Arabia within a year or two that would play right into America's hands. Then the
biggest prize
of all will have been safely secured before the world even understands
what has
happened. That prize will be secured whether the Bush regime endures in
power
or not because all the pieces are in place. The only delays as of this
writing are the
2004 presidential election and the US military posture that has been
seriously
weakened as a result of massive Iraqi uprisings and the withdrawal of troops by
many nations of the Bush coalition who no longer have the stomach for
the carnage and the animosity created by US policy in occupied Iraq.
Skeptics will point to the fact that
on April 29, 2003, the Pentagon announced that it was beginning to
remove American military personnel and aircraft from
Saudi Arabia to nearby bases in Qatar, Kuwait, and Dubai. They might
assert that
this shows that the US has no intention of military action against Saudi
Arabia. I
would contend, on the other hand, that if the kingdom becomes unstable,
having military resources out of the country, but close enough to launch
immediate attacks, is a way of protecting them from sabotage or attack if the
anti-American
sentiment felt by most of the Saudi populace is unleashed. That
eventuality arrived
in 2004 as the state department ordered an evacuation of Saudi Arabia,
and bombs
blew apart Saudi police facilities.
As for Osama bin Laden, he will not
be caught or killed until two things happen: He has outlived his usefulness as an enemy at a time when the
United States
need no longer fear economic reprisals; and Israel has emerged as the de
facto global manager of all economic interests in the Middle East. Neither is a
certainty.
As Caesar might say, "It's the way
things work."
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