A BUZZFLASH EDITOR'S BLOG

BY Mark Karlin

Since shortly after 9/11, BuzzFlash.com and other progressive sites -- as well as many a book -- offered extensive information that appeared to closely link some members of the Saudi Royal family to financing and supporting Al-Qaeda. This was something that the Bush Administration went to great lengths to deny, but their deference to the Saudis (including George W. walking pinky-entwined-with-pinky with Saudi princes, for real) was really all as usual about oil.

Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld -- in particular -- saw 9/11 as an enormous "gift" to rally the public behind first securing American and British access to the Iraqi oil fields and then to the Iranian ones.  In the infamous PNAC document written by the Neo-Cons at the end of the Clinton Administration, they predicted that it would take a cataclysmic event to rally the American public behind the overthrow of Saddam (and rights to Iraqi oil) -- and they got what they wished for in 9/11.

Those who read BuzzFlash in our early years know that we repeatedly harped upon this issue and identified the connection between Cheney's vision of controlling natural resources in the Middle East to feed the beast of American empire and our Afghanistan/Iraq/Iran policies of belligerence and war.

Now the Obama administration has, sadly, taken the place of the Bush Administration in keeping 9/11 family members from revealing the role of the Saudi elite in financially and strategically facilitating Al-Qaeda.  This is taking place in courtroom battles involving a 9/11 family lawsuit against the Saudis that is still going on.

A June 24th New York Times article [1] spills the beans, yet again, but via official government documents leaked to the attorneys for the 9/11 families:

Documents gathered by lawyers for the families of Sept. 11 victims provide new evidence of extensive financial support for Al Qaeda [2] and other extremist groups by members of the Saudi royal family, but the material may never find its way into court because of legal and diplomatic obstacles.

The case has put the Obama administration in the middle of a political and legal dispute, with the Justice Department siding [3] with the Saudis in court last month in seeking to kill further legal action. Adding to the intrigue, classified American intelligence documents related to Saudi finances were leaked anonymously to lawyers for the families. The Justice Department had the lawyers’ copies destroyed and now wants to prevent a judge from even looking at the material.

It was always one of the great betrayals of the American public, dead Iraqi civilians, and our killed and wounded service men and women that the Bush Administration -- and particularly Cheney -- used anti-terrorism as a guise to secure control over oil fields.

Clearly, not only absolving, but actually legally covering up for Saudi financing of terrorism is a deal with the devil: You keep sending us the oil and you can do whatever you want to keep your regime in power, even if it's paying off the terrorists who committed 9/11.

Cheney was a man who thought making deals with the devil was what makes for a pragmatic, successful, muscular foreign policy to ensure that the American empire remains the sole superpower.  So he probably admired the Saudis for knowing how to survive, even if they were supporting the radical extremists who killed Americans and are continuing to try and seize governments in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere.

What's remarkable is that the Obama Administration has continued the Bush Administration policy of squaring off against the American citizens who represent members of families who lost fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters in the 9/11 attacks.

It is not change to continue to mask Saudi Royal family culpability; it is more of the same deadly hypocrisy that got us into the Iraq War in the first place.

A BUZZFLASH EDITOR'S BLOG

Technorati Tags: EditorBlog [4] Saudi Arabia [5] Terrorism [6] Obama Administration [7] 9/11 Families [8]