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It is not officially known that the Saudi government provided support to the hijackers through Embassy officials and known agents. The currently accepted story

It is not officially known that the Saudi government provided support to the hijackers through Embassy officials and known agents. The currently accepted story is that the Saudi government has always tried to protect the US, has never been in cahoots with Osama bin Laden (at least after he became a terrorist) or Al Queda, and is just kind of unfortunate to have some crazies live on its soil. If this is true, it is actually a very big deal and would make a significant difference in Saudi US relations, in fact in the relations between Saudi Arabia and most free countries, and it would also allow for the victims of many terrorist attacks to actually sue the Saudi government.

nl 4y ago
It's not a smoking gun to say that some people at the Saudi embassy helped Saudi nationals settle in the US, even if 18 months later those Saudi nationals went on to commit terrorist acts. For example: > Bayoumi’s final call to al-Sudairy at the Saudi embassy came on February 7, 2000, after the hijackers were fully settled in the same apartment complex where Bayoumi lived. It'd be interesting to know how many other non-terrorist people went through a simialr process.
bayesian_horse 4y ago
As far as I understood it was that individuals paid or employed by the Saudi government supported the would-be attackers. That is a far cry from "The Saudi government provided support", especially if you imply that this support was intentional. Also as far as I understand it, in Saudi Arabia the public sector is rather large and so the chance that Saudi nationals are involved in the government in some way or other is quite high already.
RC_ITR 4y ago
I think the huge missing piece in all this is that bin Landen is an heir to what is still one of SA’s largest companies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Binladin_Group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Binladin_Group Impossible to imply that had no hand in government officials’ willingness to help Osama (even if he was an “outcast”).
mysockpuppet_07 4y ago
It’s easy to forget that a central job of the Embassy was to support Saudis going to school and they had been providing this service formally and informally for many years and to many people -- the vast majority of whom went back to their community with an expanded outlook on life influenced by the tolerance and social freedoms of spending some formative years in the west. If the Embassy didn't know these guys were terrorists (due to the for-eyes-only information stovepipes which affected the FBI just as much) then they would treat them just the same as any Saudi in the USA -- on-board them into the US (advice on accommodation/where the mosques are/where they serve hallal food/introduce to other Arabs in the community/play cards/etc), then check up on their situation from time to time. And then try to hide the fact they had any contact at all after the passports turned up in the wreckage. Not saying it’s impossible for any specific bad actor collusion by some individual(s)/institution(s) with overlapping goals - just that proof there was Embassy contact and some support for these terrorists is not conclusive evidence because the same could be said for several hundred thousand non-terrorists.
- lamontcg 4y ago
  It sounds like they wound up working with a "salafi fanatic" in the Saudi consulate in LA though. At the very least it sounds like extremists had infiltrated into government positions and some of them provided critical assistance. I'm not sure how much this changes the story that we already knew though. There's no evidence that anyone high up in the Saudi government was involved in plotting. The fact that their government could be riddled with religious fanatics isn't terribly surprising.
raincom 4y ago
I don’t think these “crazies” employed by the Saudi govt constitute a small percentage. That’s why we shouldn’t call them crazies, as a large section of Saudi bureaucracy supports Salafis. The king of Saudi can’t eradicate them, as they are not 50 crazies working, but they are thousands of salafist sympathizers. Once Saudi started wallowing in Petrodollars, the Saudi state and its foundations exported their preachers to countries where Muslims and others lived peacefully for a large extent, only to stir up.

nl 4y ago

It's not a smoking gun to say that some people at the Saudi embassy helped Saudi nationals settle in the US, even if 18 months later those Saudi nationals went on to commit terrorist acts. For example: > Bayoumi’s final call to al-Sudairy at the Saudi embassy came on February 7, 2000, after the hijackers were fully settled in the same apartment complex where Bayoumi lived. It'd be interesting to know how many other non-terrorist people went through a simialr process.

bayesian_horse 4y ago

As far as I understood it was that individuals paid or employed by the Saudi government supported the would-be attackers. That is a far cry from "The Saudi government provided support", especially if you imply that this support was intentional. Also as far as I understand it, in Saudi Arabia the public sector is rather large and so the chance that Saudi nationals are involved in the government in some way or other is quite high already.

RC_ITR 4y ago

I think the huge missing piece in all this is that bin Landen is an heir to what is still one of SA’s largest companies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Binladin_Group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Binladin_Group Impossible to imply that had no hand in government officials’ willingness to help Osama (even if he was an “outcast”).

mysockpuppet_07 4y ago

It’s easy to forget that a central job of the Embassy was to support Saudis going to school and they had been providing this service formally and informally for many years and to many people -- the vast majority of whom went back to their community with an expanded outlook on life influenced by the tolerance and social freedoms of spending some formative years in the west. If the Embassy didn't know these guys were terrorists (due to the for-eyes-only information stovepipes which affected the FBI just as much) then they would treat them just the same as any Saudi in the USA -- on-board them into the US (advice on accommodation/where the mosques are/where they serve hallal food/introduce to other Arabs in the community/play cards/etc), then check up on their situation from time to time. And then try to hide the fact they had any contact at all after the passports turned up in the wreckage. Not saying it’s impossible for any specific bad actor collusion by some individual(s)/institution(s) with overlapping goals - just that proof there was Embassy contact and some support for these terrorists is not conclusive evidence because the same could be said for several hundred thousand non-terrorists.

lamontcg 4y ago
It sounds like they wound up working with a "salafi fanatic" in the Saudi consulate in LA though. At the very least it sounds like extremists had infiltrated into government positions and some of them provided critical assistance. I'm not sure how much this changes the story that we already knew though. There's no evidence that anyone high up in the Saudi government was involved in plotting. The fact that their government could be riddled with religious fanatics isn't terribly surprising.

raincom 4y ago

I don’t think these “crazies” employed by the Saudi govt constitute a small percentage. That’s why we shouldn’t call them crazies, as a large section of Saudi bureaucracy supports Salafis. The king of Saudi can’t eradicate them, as they are not 50 crazies working, but they are thousands of salafist sympathizers. Once Saudi started wallowing in Petrodollars, the Saudi state and its foundations exported their preachers to countries where Muslims and others lived peacefully for a large extent, only to stir up.