Replies

Thanks for the link. However, it doesn't square with your implication that Bush was protecting them for some nefarious reason nor is your statement true that they were allowed to leave while all planes were grounded.

"In the first days after the terror attacks on New York and Washington, Saudi Arabia supervised the urgent evacuation of 24 members of Osama bin Laden's extended family from the United States, fearing that they might be subjected to violence," the New York Times reported on Sept. 30, 2001.

In his first interview after the attacks, Prince Bandar told the Times that private planes carrying the kingdom's deputy defense minister and the governor of Mecca, both members of the royal family, were grounded - initially caught up in the FBI dragnet. Both planes were loaded up with bin Laden relatives and allowed to leave when airports reopened three days later.....

"The F.B.I., informed of the flight by the F.A.A., searched the family's luggage and briefly interviewed those without diplomatic passports, and watched the bin Ladens depart," he wrote.

You're right about that article. I posted it without having read it carefully. I am still under the impression that the FBI searched the luggage and conducted interviews at the airport and the flight was allowed to take off. Not three days later. As for Prince Bandar's claim that the family "might be subjected to violence"... I still think we might have wanted to talk to them a little more closely. We've protected people before.

But I definetly admit that I misrepresented that article.