Saudis' Lack of Followthrough Drawing More Fire (updated)

An excellent story in today's "LA Times," reprinted elsewhere without registration, adds fuel to the gathering sentiment among Washington policymakers in the Executive Branch and on Capitol Hill that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia won't keep its past promises to stop the funding of terrorism and anti-Western propaganda outside the country. The first sentence says it all: "Although Saudi Arabia has cracked down on militants within its borders, the kingdom has not met its promises to help prevent the spread of terrorism or curb the flow of money from Saudis to terrorist cells around the world, U.S. intelligence, diplomatic and other officials say."

This issue is a continuing focus of our efforts here, and none of us think the Saudis have done enough. Steven Emerson and other witnesses provided details of the KSA's lack of followthrough during the November 8, 2005 hearing by the Senate Judiciary Committee. During that hearing, Senators of both parties, including those on opposite sides of virtually every domestic political issue, forcefully criticized the KSA and promised legislative action unless it kept its past promises. (UPDATE: You can read the transcript of the hearing - first panel with Treasury Department testifying, and second panel with Steve and others testifying.) Olivier Guitta recently posted about a column in the Arab press criticizing the KSA. Doug Farah has posted often about the Saudis' lack of progress, most recently here. I've posted about the 4-year delay in the Saudis' establishing a financial intelligence unit to track terrorist financing and assist our intel community. The unit supposedly opened only this past September with a surprising lack of notice by the KSA, but the LAT article notes the Saudis still haven't imposed oversight of its charities' activities overseas.

The article also makes the point that Saudis are still streaming into Iraq: "U.S. military officials confirm an aggressive role by Saudi fighters in the insurgency in Iraq, where over the past year they reportedly accounted for more than half of all Arab jihadists killed." This has been the focus of many of Evan Kohlmann's posts in the past year (here and here), in the face of information put forth by Anthony Cordesman and other Saudi proxies.

We will not stop the spread of Islamist radicalism unless the Saudis' prevent the spread of radical Islamism from within the country and unless we hold the Saudis accountable for their unkept promises.