Working with al Qaida: How the USA, Saudi Arabia, the Persian Gulf monarchies, and Pakistan supported al Qaida and the 9/11 plot
It has been proven that the Bush Administration and other governments knew at least the basic outline of the 9/11 attack in advance, that the Administration benefited from the attack and sabotaged the inquiry into how this improbable plot could have succeeded, and that incompetence and/or active sabotage crippled anti-terrorism investigations beforehand. The respected Jane's Intelligence Review attributed 9/11 to "a political decision not to act against bin Laden," not failure of the intelligence services (10/5/01). But there is even evidence that the government helped train the alleged hijackers (see the 9/11 complicity article in the winter 2006 issue of Alliance! and one from 10/3/01, online at www.allianceml.com/AllianceIssues/Alliance-44-WTC.htm).
The last article in this series left out many details about how the US government is shielding the support its allies give to al Qaida. The government reportedly still communicates with its Cold War ally, the Sunni Muslim fundamentalist Osama bin Laden. The bin Laden family and Saudi royals are tied up with the US capitalist elite and the Bush family, financially and personally. Saudi, Gulf state, and Pakistani officials support and fund al Qaida (including the 9/11 plot), and the Administration is blocking substantial investigation into this. Clinton and George W. Bush refused to pursue opportunities to capture or extrajudicially assassinate bin Laden and other al Qaida officials, while they tried to illegally assassinate other world leaders and alleged terrorists, before and even after 9/11. The evidence indicates that Israel knew al Qaida's plans and attempted to infiltrate the network. Along with shadowing the future hijackers, in the US, Israel also attempted to foil anti-drug investigations targeting the Israeli mafia and infiltrate military bases around the country.
Combining this history with the upcoming 9/11 'nuts and bolts' article, on reasons to wonder how at least four airliners could be hijacked and successfully used to bring down steel framed buildings, there are many indications that Bush & Co. engineered 9/11 to further their goals. At the least, the US is shielding its reactionary allies, who have aided al Qaida, showing how hollow Bush's "Global War on Terror" really is, while tearing apart Afghanistan (with few ties to the 9/11 plot) and Iraq (apparently totally uninvolved in 9/11).
US ally Osama bin Laden and the formation of al Qaida
The bin Ladens' first business was in construction, started in 1931 (as was the Saudi state), and by the 60's it was the largest private contractor in the world. The family owns the Saudi Investment Company (SICO), which brought in profits of $3-5 billion dollars and had about 35,000 employees as of 2001. SICO is based in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia where many of the alleged hijackers received their visas to come to the USA, and has subsidiaries in Curacao and elsewhere in the Dutch Antilles, the Cayman Islands, and the Isle d'Islay, and many lower level subsidiaries based in the UK, including the Attock Oil Company (from Michael C. Ruppert's Crossing the Rubicon, parts of which are online at www.fromthewilderness.com). Another major part of their financial empire is the Saudi BinLadin Group, thought to have a value of $36 billion dollars in 2001. The bin Ladens now invest in many industries, such as oil, and own Iridium LLC's 73 satellites, originally developed by Motorola for global cell phone communication. The bin Ladens built US military facilities in Saudi Arabia, such as the Khobar Towers, which al Qaida attacked with a truck bomb in 1996, and tunnels along the Afghanistan's border with Pakistan, used by fundamentalists against the Soviets in the 80's and now against the US. The president of the Middle East Policy Council (which received money from the bin Ladens) told the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) that "If there were ever any company closely connected to the US and its presence in Saudi Arabia, it's the Saudi BinladinGroup" (9/28-29/01).
The family believes in Wahhabism, the fundamentalist Sunni brand of Islam that the Saudi royal family ascribes to and propagates. A United Press International (UPI) article characterizes bin Laden's attitudes as mirroring those of his hometown of Jiddah: "extremely clannish and intensely conservative in their adherence to strict forms of Islam" (cited by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, in his book The War on Freedom). Osama bin Laden capably headed the family business during the 70's, and added to his already considerable inheritance ($300 million dollars at age 10 from his father, Salem bin Laden).
In 1979 Soviet forces entered Afghanistan, supposedly to aid the revolutionary government, facing opponents already being funded by the US in Operation Cyclone (see the analysis of the Afghan civil wars at www.allianceml.com/AllianceIssues/ALLIANCE45AFGHANISTAN.html). The US gave $6-20 billion dollars in money, supplies, and training to the counterrevolutionary forces between 1978 and the fall of the Afghan government in 1992, starting with $500 million dollars under Carter. About 100,000 Islamists went to Pakistan between 1982 and 1992, and 60,000 of them went to fundamentalist schools there. The bin Ladens reportedly were very supportive of the Afghan guerillas and in 1984 Osama bin Laden left Saudi Arabia for Peshawar, Pakistan, a key city near the border with Afghanistan. There he aided the Maktab al-Khidamar, a front for delivering foreign aid to the mujahideen fighting the Afghan government and Soviet forces. According to Tariq Ali, writing in the New Statesman, bin Laden was serving as a liaison, because Pakistan wanted a Saudi royal to lead the mujahideen, but no prince volunteered. Bin Laden reportedly had a key role in the use of opium profits, supported by the US, to fund the resistance. According to John K. Cooley, an ABC News reporter and specialist in Middle Eastern affairs, the bin Laden company built the mujahideen tunnel complex along Afghanistan's Pakistani border under a multi-billion dollar CIA contract (cited by Ahmed). Bin Laden also allied with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, one of the most reactionary fundamentalist warlords to rise out of the Afghan civil wars, and now fighting the US - NATO occupation of Afghanistan. Bin Laden was not a master tactician, but he became a mujahideen leader and created the basis for al Qaida, and developed ties with many Arab countries and Pakistan, which apparently still exist today. The USSR withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, eventually abandoning its client government to face the foreign funded and armed mujahideen alone.
Bin Laden also left, returning to Saudi Arabia to lead the family business. The Saudi government withheld his passport, to discourage his ties with foreign Islamists. When Iraq invaded Kuwait, bin Laden advocated asking former mujahideen to help defend Saudi Arabia from a feared Iraqi invasion. Instead the government allowed the US military to enter the country, "infidels," enraging bin Laden. The outlines of the genesis of al Qaida are relatively well-known, but the connections the US and its allies keep with al Qaida are much less publicized, and endanger the safety of the American people and the world.
According to Michel Chossudovsky, a professor at the University of Ottawa (see www.globalresearch.ca), the US used the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) to facilitate drug trade-funded operations that destabilized the USSR and Yugoslavia. By 1994 the US aided the Bosnian Muslims in the Yugoslav civil wars, and veterans of the Afghan war were infiltrating through Ploce, Croatia. In 1998 the Defense Intelligence Agency and the British MI6 began training the Kosovo Liberation Army. Reportedly bin Laden even visited Albania. One of his military subordinates and a brother of an Egyptian Islamist leader, led one top KLA unit. In 1998 the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a partner of al Qaida, said, three days before the August 7th African embassy bombings, that it would retaliate for the arrest of three of its members who were fighting in Albania. In 1999 the Washington Times reported that Islamists were entering through Tropoje, Albania, and that al Qaida was funding and training the KLA. By this time al Qaida had already been tied to several attacks against the US and American citizens.
Al Qaida also supported Chechen Islamists, and Chechnya and nearby areas of Russia are major pipeline routes, thus the war probably aided US interests in preventing Russia from exploiting Central Asian energy supplies. Yossef Bodansky, director of Congress' Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, alleges that the Chechen uprising was planned at the 1996 Hezbollah International summit in Mogadishu, Somalia, which included bin Laden and top Pakistani and Iranian intelligence officials. According to Chossudovsky, the ISI was heavily involved in creating and training the main two Chechen guerilla groups. In light of some Americans' belief in a monolithic Islam, it should be noted that theocratic Iran and Hezbollah are Shiite Muslim, while al Qaida and the Taliban are Sunni.
Corporate government and the bin Laden family
The Bush family and the Carlyle Group
The Bushes and their allies are very connected to the bin Laden family, the Saudi royals, and others who are also connected to al Qaida. The Carlyle Group is a private investment corporation in Washington worth $12 billion dollars, with stakes in at least 164 businesses, and is heavily involved in military contracts. A big part of its business is buying out companies in the US military industrial complex, such as aerospace businesses. Frank Carlucci (Carlyle's CEO until January 2000, when he was replaced by former IBM chair Louis Gerstner), a secretary of defense under Reagan, James Baker, George H.W. Bush's secretary of state and co-chair of the Iraq Study Group, Richard Darman, a Republican Party official and aide to Reagan, Adnan Khashoggi (a Saudi billionaire connected to Iran-Contra and the BCCI scandal), and Alwaleed Bin Talal (a Saudi prince) are among Carlyle's directors. George H.W. Bush helped Carlyle negotiate in the Middle East (along with former British Prime Minister John Major) and the Republic of Korea prior to G.W. Bush's ascension to the presidency, he is the top adviser of Carlyle's Asian Partners account, and Carlyle let him buy into the business. Other prominent advisers include former Filipino President Fidel Ramos, a former Thai prime minister, and former leaders of the German Bundesbank, and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Bush senior met with the bin Ladens in 1998 and 2000 and possibly other times. George W. Bush has many ties to Carlyle himself and the Executive Director of the Center for Public Integrity, Charles Lewis, told the Village Voice that "Carlyle is as deeply wired into the current administration as they can possibly be" (cited by Ahmed). The conservative government accountability group Judicial Watch found through Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests that former Defense Secrectary Rumsfeld early on discussed reorganizing the Department of Defense (DoD) with Carlucci and William Perry, of Carlyle.
The bin Ladens gave $2 million dollars to the Carlyle Partners II Fund in 1995. The Fund has $1.3 billion dollars and concluded 29 deals, including several with aerospace corporations. $1.3 million dollars have been paid back to the bin Laden family and Carlyle expected to pay a 40% annualized return on the investment. A "foreign financier with ties to the Bin Laden family" told the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) (September 27, 2001) that the bin Laden's had much larger connections to Carlyle. Supposedly the bin Ladens divested from Carlyle around October 27, 2001 because of the publicity. The bin Ladens also received two visits from Forbes, Inc., chaired by Caspar Weinberger, Reagan's secretary of defense, pardoned by Bush senior in 1989 for Iran-Contra crimes.
Other Carlyle board members have shady connections. Deputy Secretary of Defense Richard Armitage, involved in the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame and allegedly threatening the Taliban with war, is a Bush family friend and connected to drug smuggling, according to Ruppert. He was a gung-ho Navy SEAL during Vietnam. He resigned as assistant secretary of defense under Reagan as indictments approached for alleged involvement in Iran-Contra. George H.W. sent Armitage to aid the reversion to capitalism in Russia, where he allegedly had connections to the mafia. In the early 90's he was also sent to Albania, around the time the Albanian Kosovar Kosovo Liberation Army was forming in Yugoslavia. Armitage and former Carlyle CEO Carlucci are both on the Middle East Policy Council, which receives funds from the bin Laden family.
According to the BBC, there are about $750 billion dollars in Saudi investments in the USA. Adnan Khashoggi is one of the many Saudi capitalists with extensive overseas investments. Khashoggi is a relatively minor player, not even on the Forbes list of the richest of the rich. Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal is listed, the fourth richest man in the world, with an estimated $21.5 billion dollars in net worth. Allegedly he is a client and investor of Carlyle. Since 1991 Carlyle served to hid the fact that Alwaleed is the largest shareholder in Citigroup, with almost $10 billion dollars in shares. According to the Guardian newspaper, Alwaleed is the second largest shareholder (after Australian reactionary magnate Ruppert Murdoch) in Newscorp, the owner of Fox News, having 3% of the shares. He also owns "significant holdings" in Apple Computer, Priceline, Four Seasons Hotels, Planet Hollywood, Saks, and Euro Disney.
More on W. and his associates
George W. Bush's Arbusto Energy received $50,000 dollars in 1976 from James R. Bath, an investment banker in Texas and the only US agent of Osama bin Laden's brother Salem, for 5% of Arbusto's stock. It has been suggested that the investment money was Salem's. Bath has been implicated in the Savings & Loan Scandal and Iran-Contra. In 1992 the FBI investigated him for allegedly bribing the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.
A French intelligence report revealed by Public Broadcasting Service's (PBS') Frontline news program discussed the possibility that Salem bin Laden might have been involved in covert meetings between American and Iranian delegates in Paris in October 1980, possibly related to the continuation of the hostage crisis until after the US presidential election, which reduced Carter's popularity going into the election. According to the French document, Salem bin Laden is one of former Saudi King Fahd's two closest friends. The New Yorker (November 5, 2001) and Frontline (2001) report that Salem bin Laden helped transfer $34 million dollars from Saudi Arabia to the counterrevolutionary Nicaraguan Contras later in the 80's.
Several partners of the Bush family were involved in the Bank of Commerce and Credit International (BCCI), the primary launderer of money for the CIA, facilitating the transfer of money in Iran-Contra and to terrorists in Afghanistan during the 80's, as well as being involved in the weapons trade. Pakistan's ISI was well-connected to the BCCI as well. BCCI was created by Pakistani finance capitalist Agha Hasan Abedi in 1992 in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to escape nationalization in Pakistan (this is summarized in Criminology by Robert Winslow and Sheldon Zhang). Legally BCCI was based in Luxembourg and the Cayman Islands to escape regulation and it took control of the US General Financial Bank, which became the First American Bank. It was able to operate in Pakistan after the military coup of General Muhammed Zia ul-Haq. When BCCI collapsed in the 80's, its clients lost $10 billion dollars, which a former district attorney of Manhattan called the "largest bank fraud in world financial history" (from an In These Times magazine article by Wayne Madsen). In October 2001 French intelligence claimed that bin Laden's financial network mirrors the structure and personnel of BCCI, which was the largest bank in the Muslim world. A "senior U.S. investigator" told the Washington Post (WP) (2/17/02) that "BCCI was the mother and father of terrorist financing operations." A specialist in these illegal transactions told the Los Angeles Times (LAT) (1/20/02) that the "BCCI did dirty work for every major terrorist service in the world." Seventy-seven percent of BCCI was owned by Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the ruler Abu Dhabi, the most powerful Emirate.
In 1988 Salem bin Laden died (being replaced as bin Laden leader by Bakr bin Laden). James Bath partnered with Khalid bin Mahfouz, a prominent Saudi banker and a former chief of BCCI, having owned 20% of its stock. Bath operated bin Mahfouz's affairs in Houston and joined with bin Mahfouz and BCCI and Binladin Group-connected banker Gaith Pharaon. Bin Mahfouz was charged with attempting to give at least $3 million dollars to al-Qaida fronts in Saudi Arabia through his National Commercial Bank in '99 (according to USA Today) and that year the Saudis prevented a direct contribution to bin Laden (according to ABC News). Abdul Rahman bin Mahfouz, the son of Khalid bin Mahfouz, is on the board of the Blessed Relief charity, charged with being an al Qaida front by the US Treasury Department in October 1999. Bin Mahfouz's sister is married to Osama bin Laden and bin Mahfouz has numerous business ties to the Binladin Group.
Bush senior became President in 1988, and at the same time a group of Saudis, especially bin Laden's father, Salem bin Laden, and Khaled bin Mahfouz, bought stock in Bush junior's 1986 successor to Arbusto, the Harken Energy Corporation. In 1987 Harken began to fail, whereupon Sheik Abdullah Taha Baksh, a Saudi partner of Pharaon and a client of bin Mahfouz, bought 17.6% of Harken's shares. Ruppert reports that three times family connections saved G.W. Bush from corporate failure. At the time Harken was only active in Texas, but in 1988 it received a Persian Gulf contract and became successful. June 22, 1990 Bush sold out as Harken was failing, but before the signals were spoken of openly.
In the early 90's the younger Bush was given a post on the board of a Carlyle subsidiary. He was a stockowner and board member in Carlyle company Caterair, a provider of food service for airlines. Bush was allegedly paid $15,000 dollars a year in addition to $1000 dollars per meeting, for a total of about $75,000 a year. Carlyle was a top contributor to Bush's gubernatorial campaign in '94. The endowment of the University of Texas voted March 1, 1995 to let the Carlyle Group manage investments worth $10 million dollars. At the time Bush was the governor of Texas and a senior trustee of the University.
December 4, 2001 the Treasury Department froze the assets of the biggest Muslim charity in the USA, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, which has strong ties to Bush and possibly the 9/11 plot. Reportedly the FBI and the Treasury Department prevented National Coordinator for Counterterrorism Richard Clarke from raiding the foundation 5-6 years earlier. Its legal representative is Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Field. Consider the involvement of three of the law company's partners: George R. Salem directed Bush's 2000 Arab-American campaign, Barnett A. "Sandy" Kress advised Bush on education system changes on a volunteer basis, from within the White House, and James C. Langdon is a close Texas friend of Bush. Bin Mahfouz and Saudi capitalist Mohammed Hussain Al-Amoudi have also been clients of the company.
Interestingly, Holy Land is connected to, and has an office across the road from, the InfoCom Corporation in Richardson, Texas (close to Dallas), which was extensively searched by the Joint Terrorism Taskforce days before 9/11. Bank One closed InfoCom's checking accounts, holding about $13 million dollars, a week before 9/11. Ghassan Elashi is the chair of Holy Land and vice president of InfoCom and was arrested later, along with his brothers Basman, Bayan, and Hazim. InfoCom hosted about 500 Arab websites, including Al Jazeera's. Holy Land and the Global Relief Foundation Inc. (also in Richardson) were suspected of ties to Palestinian resistance groups as well. Richardson is close to Garland, where a 5th grade student told a teacher on 9/10 that WWIII would start the next day, and he wasn't the only kid who had more warning than the Bush Administration admits to having.
In building pipelines in Afghanistan the bin Laden family formed a joint venture with Bredero Shaw, Inc. (formerly H.P. Price), owned by Halliburton, which Cheney headed until 2000, when he quit to run for office, receiving $33 million in Halliburton shares and a $20 million dollar severance. Cheney still gets over $160,000 dollars a year from Halliburton, despite claiming in September 2003 to be without "financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't now for over three years" (cited in The Book on Bush).
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