With the topic of Saudi Arabia's involvement in the Sept 11 attack on everyone's lips, if certainly not those of president Obama who is currently in Riyadh where he is meeting with members of Saudi royalty in what may be his last trip to the Saudi nation as US president, many have been clamoring for the information in the suddenly notorious "28-pages" (following the recent 60 Minutes episode) to be released to the public so the US population can finally relegate all those "conspiracy theories" surrounding the real perpetrator behind the Sept 11 terrorist attack to the "conspiracy fact" pile.
It won't have to wait that long.
As The Times writes today, new evidence has come to light of a definitive link between Saudi Arabian officials and the 9/11 terrorist attacks "further raising tensions as President Obama travels to the kingdom."
According to the report, Ghassan Al-Sharbi, a Saudi who became an al-Qa’ida bomb maker, is believed to have taken flying lessons with some of the 9/11 hijackers in Arizona but did not take part in the attacks on New York and the Pentagon that killed 3,000 people in 2001.
He was captured in Pakistan in 2002 and has since been held at Guantanamo Bay. According to a US memo, known as document 17, written in 2003 and quietly declassified last year, the FBI learnt that he had buried a cache of papers shortly before he was captured.
Think of "Document 17" as a mini version of the "28 pages" whose content has yet to be revealed. The document was written by two US investigators examining the possible roles of foreign governments in the attacks.
One detail leapt out at the FBI agents from the papers that Sharbi had tried to hide: his US flight certificate was in an envelope from the Saudi embassy in Washington.
A car pulls into the Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington, AP Photo
And there is your smoking gun, which has been fully available to the US government for the pat 13 years. It should have also been available to the American public.
Understandably, Brian McGlinchey, the activist who uncovered document 17, asked a simple question: "The envelope points to the fundamental question hanging over us today: to what extent was the 9/11 plot facilitated by individuals at the highest levels of the Saudi government?"
Here is the problem. As the Times puts it, "president Obama is expected to meet on Wednesday with King Salman, whose kingdom is under pressure from low oil prices, an emboldened Iran and Washington’s tougher stance. The Saudi government threatened last week to dump $750 billion in US Treasury securities and other American assets if congress passes a bill that would clear a path for the families of 9/11 victims to file lawsuits against the kingdom."
In other words, Obama will not ask any questions of King Salman, let alone the "fundamental" one.
So perhaps it is time to get a president who will ask the question: Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, the Democratic presidential candidates, backed the bill, which Mr Obama has signaled he will veto. Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, the leading Republicans in the race, have warned Saudi Arabia that its relationship with the US must change. “Friends do not fund jihadists that are seeking to murder us,” Mr Cruz said.
Sp even as all of Obama's potential replacements have at least promised to investigate further, we wonder: just why is Obama so terrified of the US public getting access to the truth?
If he is so worried about the Saudi liquidation threat, he shouldn't be: after all the Fed would be deliriously happy at the opportunity to monetize another $750 billion in assets and inject three-quarters of a trillion in fresh "reserves" aka liquidity into the system.
Meanwhile, Obama has other problems: the US president also faces calls to release a redacted 28-page portion of a joint congressional report on the 9/11 attacks, produced in 2002 and thought to link senior Saudi figures to the plot. He suggested on Monday that a decision was imminent.
We are confident his "decision" in this matter will be to likewise prevent the truth from emerging, because as Congressman Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, said: "I had to stop every couple of pages ... to rearrange my understanding of history." No further comment necessary.
Meanwhile the lies go on.
Bob Graham, a former chairman of the US senate intelligence committee, has alleged that Saudi Arabia was the principal financier of 9/11. “The effect of withholding [the pages] has been to embolden Saudi Arabia to be a continuing source of financial and human terror resources,” he said.
Document 17, written by Dana Lesemann and Michael Jacobson, will deepen suspicions. Ms Lesemann is said to have been sacked from the 9/11 commission after she circumvented her boss to access the 28 pages.
Mr Jacobson was the principal author of the 28 pages, and document 17 hints at his suspicions. "How aggressively has the US government investigated possible ties between the Saudi government and/or royal family and the September 11th attacks?" it asks.
The answer: not at all. It's about time the American people asked why not.