2. “like a father…this sentiment”: FO 141/1094, January 14, 1946. “Praise be…in my territory”: Ibid. “My honor”: DOS 59/7212 Dhahran to Washington, June 14, 1946. “You drink…your colleagues”: Van der Meulen, The Wells of Ibn Saud, p. 15.
3. What Abdulaziz told Philby: Howarth, The Desert King, p. 127. “The Saudi state…and enemies”: A History of Saudi Arabia, op. cit., pp. 9, 80.
4. One American diplomat in Jeddah estimated in a cable dated April 3, 1950, that there were “not more than 2,000 slaves” in the kingdom and that Abdulaziz owned “some 200.” A second American diplomat, on October 2, 1951, quoted a “reliable” estimate of 50,000 slaves in Saudi Arabia. Those numbers would seem to provide a very rough boundary of the population; the inherent difficulty of such estimates was compounded by the ambiguous position of many slaves in Saudi households, where some enjoyed considerable status and were indistinguishable from free servants.
5. Quoted in “The House of Saud,” Algeria Productions, 2004.
6. “Here we are…be modern”: “Travels to Arabia,” op. cit. Negotiating with Islamic scholars about radio knobs: Arabia Phoenix, op. cit., pp. 96–97. Royal garage of 250 cars in 1927: Holden and Johns, The House of Saud, p. 106.
7. Philby’s degree and service: “Travels to Arabia,” op. cit. “stocky, bearded…out of step”: Howarth, The Desert King, pp. 100–101. Baboons: Ibid., p. 179.
8. Philby’s contract: A History of Saudi Arabia, op. cit., p. 92. The SOCAL contract: Lippman, Inside the Mirage, p. 16.
9. Telephone interview with Tim Barger, March 7, 2006. Barger recorded some of his father’s recollections for a private oral history project; he later worked in Jeddah, where he became acquainted with Salem Bin Laden. American report, 1935: DOS 59 “The Bin Ladin Construction Empire,” Jeddah to Washington, September 25, 1967.
10. Quoted in Abdulrahman Alangari, “Mataqat Qasr Alhokm: The Development of the 20th Century.”
11. Materials at the surviving portions of the palace, which houses the King Abdulaziz Foundation, report that construction began in 1934 and ended in 1939. The Saudi historian Madawi Al-Rasheed writes that the palace was started in 1936 “out of the first cheque paid by the oil company” and was finished in 1937. A History of Saudi Arabia, p. 93.
12. “had a vision…the royalty”: Interview with Mohamed Ashmawi, November 26, 2005 (RS). “many royal orders”: “Mohamed bin Awad Binladen: From a Building Laborer to the Owner of the Biggest Construction Company in the Middle East,” Transport & Communications magazine, August 2002. The profile in this magazine, which appears to draw upon information supplied by the Bin Laden family, lists Atiaqua Palace, Naseriyah Palace, Mather Palace, the Guest Palace, the Government Palace, Al-Hamra Palace, and the Mansour Buildings as some of Mohamed’s projects in Riyadh, although no dates are given. “always available…bring one hundred”: Interview with Fahd Al-Semmari, director of research at the King Abdulaziz Foundation in Riyadh, February 9, 2005. He is also the source of the saying about entrepreneurial Yemenis.
13. The figures of $38 million and $13 million are from DOS 59/7207 Murray to Acheson, January 27, 1945. This is the oft-quoted memo laying out American strategy in Saudi Arabia for decades to come; the December 22, 1944, memo quoted here, “A strong…airfields,” is from 59/7211 and probably was an earlier draft by Murray.
14. Bronson, Thicker Than Oil, p. 14.
15. DOS 59/7209 Jeddah to Washington, December 27, 1948.
16. Export figures: The House of Saud, pp. 125, 151. Al-Khozam description and history: Author’s visit, February 20, 2005.
17. Stegner in Inside the Mirage, p. 30. “phenomenal building boom…materials”: DOS 59/7210 Jeddah to Secretary of State, March 26, 1949.
18. Interview with Hassan Mahowil Mahmoud Al-Aesa, August 10, 2005.
19. Bin Mahfouz biography is from www.binmahfouz.info, the family’s official Web site, and from the author’s visit to Khraiker, March 17, 2007. Naming compact between Bin Laden and Bin Mahfouz is from an interview with a person close to the Bin Laden family. Documents submitted to an American court by the Bin Ladens in a civil lawsuit show that Aysha was born during the Hijra year 1362, which corresponded almost exactly to the Georgian calendar year of 1943. Salem’s Hijra birth year is not given. A longtime friend and employee of Salem’s, Bengt Johansson, said that Salem’s passport read that he was born in 1946, but that Salem said that his true birth year was probably 1944 or 1945.
20. Interview with Al-Aesa, op. cit.
21. Debts of $20 million and $40 million is from a conversation held by an American diplomat with Sayyid Hussain Al-Attas, a Hadhrami banker in Jeddah DOS 59/7211, August 16, 1949. The $250,000 kitchen and $600,000 trip to Paris: 59/7212, July 30, 1949, citing a conversation with a Bechtel Corporation executive. “construction projects…enormous family”: FO 371/82638 “Annual Review for 1949.”
3. SILENT PARTNERS
1. Suleiman’s biography: Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, p. 88. “frail little man…in his soul”: Holden and Johns, The House of Saud, p. 107. “knew no fatigue…money and whisky”: van der Meulen, The Wells of Ibn Saud, pp. 189–90.
2. “reputed to be a silent partner”: Department of State 59, “The Bin Ladin Construction Empire,” Jeddah to Washington, September 25, 1967. Suleiman’s palace cost $3 million: DOS 59/5467 Jeddah to Washington, April 12, 1953. Bahareth was Suleiman’s secretary: DOS 59/5471 Jeddah to Washington, October 4, 1953.
3. “sizeable…shipments”: DOS 59/7207 Jeddah to Washington, December 29, 1949. “rampant graft…so long as the King lived”: DOS 59/7211 Jeddah to Washington, September 6, 1946, quoting the British minister in Jeddah.
4. Pilgrim transport business: Long, The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, p. 100. Dammam hotel with theater and bar: DOS 59/5468 Jeddah to Washington, December 18, 1950. “one of the wealthiest…fat government contracts”: DOS 59/7214 Jeddah to Washington, August 14, 1946. Stopped the water project: DOS 59/7209 Jeddah to Washington, August 16, 1946. “hitting the bottle…increasing rate”: DOS 59/7210 Jeddah to Washington, July 12, 1949.
5. King demanding wedding gifts, treasury empty: FO 371/82664 Jeddah to London, January 12, 1950. “not particularly…for his arrival”: FO 370/82639 Jeddah to London, January 3, 1950.
6. DOS 59/5469 Jeddah to Washington, July 7, 1951. The budget announced that summer provided for 21 million riyals to the Ministry of Health, and about 109 million riyals on “palaces, princes, Riyadh.”
7. Digging Faisal’s garden: DOS 59/5471 “Memorandum of Conversation,” October 25, 1951. “the headaches…the advantages”: DOS 59/57/D/298/7 “Memorandum of Conversation,” June 14, 1950.
8. King to Taif: DOS 59/5469 Jeddah to Washington, July 26, 1951.
9. “always together”: Interview with Ahmed Fathalla, April 23, 2006 (RS). Bin Laden’s work on Mecca water project: DOS 59/5467 Jeddah to Washington, April 17, 1951, and FO 371/82657 Jeddah to London, “Jeddah Monthly Economic Reports,” July and August 1950.