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Had to share this one, if only because some of the commentariat will remember the David Levine cartoon it references. Here’s the NYTimes‘s mealy-mouthed version, for reference purposes:
During the 1980s and ’90s, the historic alliance between the wealthy monarchy of Saudi Arabia and the country’s powerful clerics emerged as the major financier of international jihad, channeling tens of millions of dollars to Muslim fighters in Afghanistan, Bosnia and elsewhere. Among the project’s major patrons was Prince Salman Bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, who last month became Saudi Arabia’s king.
Some of those fighters later formed Al Qaeda, which declared war on the United States and later mounted major attacks inside Saudi Arabia as well. In the past decade, according to officials of both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations, the Saudi government has become a valuable partner against terrorism, battling Al Qaeda at home and last year joining the American-led coalition against the extremists of the Islamic State.
Yet Saudi Arabia continues to be haunted by what some suspect was a tacit alliance with Al Qaeda in the years before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Those suspicions burst out in the open again this week with the disclosure of a prison deposition of a former Qaeda operative, Zacarias Moussaoui, who claimed that more than a dozen prominent Saudi figures were donors to the terror group and that a Saudi diplomat in Washington discussed with him a plot to shoot down Air Force One.
Saudi officials have staunchly denied those claims, noting that Mr. Moussaoui was a convicted terrorist with a history of mental troubles and little to lose by spreading lies about Saudi officials. On Wednesday, experts on the kingdom also expressed strong doubts about Mr. Moussaoui’s claims…
But Mr. Moussaoui’s sensational allegations have drawn attention in part because far more credible figures, including some members of the national 9/11 Commission, believe the Saudi role in the attacks has never been adequately examined. More broadly, the episode has drawn new attention to Saudi Arabia’s longtime policy of using its oil wealth to try to shape foreign battlefields, currently by backing militants in Syria and Libya, and the reactionary religious ideology that underlies its society.
Throughout the 1980s, Saudi Arabia and the United States were partners in bankrolling the mujahedeen, hailed as freedom fighters by President Ronald Reagan, who were battling the Soviet military in Afghanistan…
Yeah, the Saudi monarchs figured they could “control” the mujahedeen, just like Reagan’s handlers figured they could “control” the contras they were bankrolling. Of course, the only Very Serious American who paid any price for our hemispheric meddling was Bill Casey, if you believe the rumors, since Oliver North has been more than well compensated for his briefly unpleasant role in the aftermath. Presumably the Saudi family members & retainers who got close enough to Osama bin Laden to be tainted are, shall we say, aging out of the public spotlight — everything goes to shit at home, they’ve got safe havens well away from the reach of a bunch of low-rent Wahhabi wannabes.
Chris
This isn’t going to change either. Jihadis are just too precious as an unofficial attack dog to be used against “the Shi’a crescent” (if you’re Saudi) or India (if you’re Pakistani). They’ll backtrack and try to stomp on the groups that get too big and out of control when they get too big and out of control (like al-Qaeda did and Daesh is now doing), but as soon as it’s died down a little, they’re back at it. Because ultimately, Iran/India is the big bogeyman they’re obsessed with, not the jihadis.
srv
Well, if Zacarias Moussaoui says it, it must be true.
I’m sure Osama would have included Zac in all the meetings with Saudi princes, or told him to brief at the DC Embassy. Sure it wasn’t at WTC7? Derp.
We still don’t know today whether the muscle on those planes knew what the targets were.
There’s no doubt there’s a funding trail, but Zac would be the last person in that loop.
Villago Delenda Est
The unholy alliance between the bandit House of Saud and the Wahhabists goes back centuries, and as a result Saudi Arabia is a theocratic absolute monarchy…just the sort of thing Ted Cruz and his father want to impose on this country.
srv
More dogma dribble. Words matter. mujadeens means a lot of things in the context of the 80’s. Which mujadeen, exactly?
There’s no evidence, anywhere, that the US directly funded the salafist Saudis groups in Afghanistan. We probably should have, because they were way more effective against the Soviets than the weekend warriors like Massoud.
EconWatcher
This may be conspiracy-mongering, but I heard at one point that military experts thought it was implausible that the hijackers could have learned to fly the planes as well at they did through the limited flight training they obtained in the U.S. The theory was that the flight training in the US was just a cover, and that they must have already received substantial pilot training before they came to the US (perhaps from the Saudi air force).
I can’t evaluate this, but the way they flew those planes into the towers did seem to show some real skill.
One thing that can be said with some confidence: If US intelligence uncovered evidence of high-level Saudi involvement (say, from some of the more wayward princes), there would have been obvious incentives to suppress it. A war against Saudi Arabia at that time would have destroyed the world economy.
jon
@EconWatcher: So people with the skills to carry out the attacks would get additional and unnecessary training at American flight schools just to leave a trail before performing a terrorist attack? That makes almost zero sense.
I am with you in the We Didn’t Want to Explore Saudi Involvement notion, however. But that’s not just for geo-political Middle East region strategic goals kind of stuff, but also because the GOP didn’t and doesn’t want the idea that the Reagan-era ties to all the various groups in the region explored any further. Iran-Contra was bad enough, Iran-Contra-Afghanistan-New York would have been a shitstorm that couldn’t have been covered up with a few timely pardons.
Marc
In an Anne Laurie thread? Imagine that!
Big Picture Pathologist
@srv:
So you think the women of Afghanistan were better off under the Taliban than if the Soviets had prevailed?
Zinsky
These unelected reptiles would be buried under the sands of the Arabian desert if we hadn’t protected them and their oil interests. And then they turn around and fund and molly-coddle al-Qaeda and other Wahabbist groups who attack us. They are completely untrustworthy and are the best argument for us to move very quickly to green energy like de-centralized solar, wind and geothermal sources of energy.
Manyakitty
Anyone read this analysis yet?
http://fortressamerica.gawker.com/the-case-that-the-saudis-did-9-11-explained-1683728623
pharniel
I always like the theory that the Saudi’s are exporting all that Jihad because otherwise those radical psychopaths might pay attention to how the House of Saud actually lives and object.
It’s a two-fer – you get rid of all your angry young youth who are True Believers and you get a dedicated deniable asset to throw at your enemies. Everything comes up Millhouse and this could never go wrong.
Paul in KY
@pharniel: Excellent conjecture. Getting their young psychos to do their stuff in other countries seems like a plan of theirs.
boatboy_srq
@jon: There’d be worthwhile experience gained by exposure to US flying norms (air traffic control, weather patterns, etc) that would be difficult to simulate elsewhere.
@pharniel: IOW, AQ is the Saudi version of the Foreign Legion? Interesting.
boatboy_srq
@Zinsky: Best argument for non-petro energy independence out there. It makes you wonder whose side the GOTea is on with all the Drill Baby Drill chants: you’d think they’d want the US to husband its petro resources for the day the Saudi fields run dry, and that they’d want to keep dollars from flowing into the coffers of states that have such ugly politics.
kindness
I don’t think that those Saudis who bankrolled the militants thought they could control them. I don’t think they care to do so unless of course those militants attacked within the kingdom itself. I think those bankrolling Saudis share a very conservative and closed view of their version of Islam and I think they agree with the militants that any target that dirties their view of the world is a proper target. That includes us.
I would love to see those 50 pages that were blacked out in the 9/11 report. We know many of the Bush clans business partners won’t look good in it. Bush/Cheney knew who & where the cause of 9/11 was. They chose to ignore it and use the event to ‘remake’ the middle east in a domino scenerio. Bush & Cheney should be in Leavenworth Federal Prison.
kindness
@srv: No evidence that the US funded the Mujahideen during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan? Dude, that is too clueless for you to say such things. Don’t brag about being a fool. We funded them. We gave them stinger missiles for God’s sakes. Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt.
someguy
Nice racist cartoon.
schrodinger's cat
@Chris: Pakistani Jihadi outfits are funded by Wahabi Islam. Pakistan went off the deep end during Zia’s regime, which again directly goes back to the Afghan War. If you remember Pakistan and SA were the only two countries that recognized the Taliban government.
So you can lay the blame for Pakistani descent into hell directly to the Saudi involvement and US encouragement of the most retrograde elements in their society. In Pakistan, it is the army and the ISI instead of the royal family that has been propped by Saudi money and US aid.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
I’m not sure I believe Moussaoui — he doesn’t seem to have been a particularly accurate provider of information in the past, and I’m not sure how much he really knows or understands about internal Saudi politics. I wouldn’t be surprised if bin Laden’s family kept supporting him well beyond when they claimed to have cut ties with him, though.
srv
@kindness: Normally, I’d let your ignorance of history slide, but it’s not ignorance, it’s just plain racism.
There were dozens of groups in Afghanistan and there’s not a rat’s worth of evidence we gave any stingers to OBL. I know, I know, he was brown, so it’s all the same to you.
You’re worse than truthers, they at least have a mental condition.
Chris
@srv:
Because, of course, if we didn’t fund OBL, that means we didn’t fund the mujahidin.
lige
@someguy: How is it a racist cartoon?
Bjacques
I think we did give money to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in those days, but from what I’ve read, OBL bankrolled his own show in Afghanistan.