Monday, October 13, 2003
This Joel Mowbray piece on the State Department relationship with the Saudis is a good read.
It's puzzling to me that Ambassador Joseph Wilson's status as a paid agent of Saudi Arabia through the Saudi-backed Middle East Institute doesn't get more attention. I suppose it's so common, and the people who are in the "Who cares about Wilson/Plame" would rather not bring the entire boring subject up at all, and the people who think the "scandal" is a scandal want to get off of Wilson as an issue, so no one has any real incentive to bring it up. Besides, it'd be unseemly to be seen as smearing the guy at this point wouldn't it?
Foggy Bottom's Friends - Why is the State Department so cozy with the Saudis?
Also at MEI: David Mack, former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates and deputy assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs; Richard Parker, former ambassador to Algeria, Lebanon, and Morocco; William Eagleton, former ambassador to Syria; Joseph C. Wilson, career foreign-service office and former deputy chief of mission in Baghdad; David Ransom, former ambassador to Bahrain and former deputy chief of Mission in Yemen, the United Arab Emirates and Syria; and Michael Sterner, former ambassador to the UAE and deputy assistant secretary of Near Eastern affairs.
For Meridian and MEI, at least, the House of Saud is not the only government entity lining up to fund them; Foggy Bottom is as well. Meridian does significant amounts of work with State, particularly in coordinating the International Visitors Program, which determines the individuals and groups invited--and not invited--to Washington for a chance to curry favor with State officials in person. MEI last year was slated to handle a conference of Iraqi dissidents--which was going to exclude the umbrella organization of pro-democracy groups, the Iraqi National Congress--in London. (The conference was cancelled after public outcry over MEI's role.) The grant for holding the conference was a staggering $5 million--more than three times MEI's annual budget.
The money, the favors, and State's affinity for Saudi elites over the decades have all helped contribute to the "special relationship" between State and the House of Saud. Notes Hudson Institute senior fellow Laurent Murawiec, "This is a relationship that has been cemented by 40 years of money, power, and political favors that goes much deeper than most people realize."
