There is also the question of what would happen if the United States government actually succeeded in extracting compensation from Saudi Arabia. I suspect the most obvious initial result would be a rise in support for the sort of radical Islamism that led to 9/11 in the first place. The existing Saudi regime may be corrupt, despotic, and generally repulsive, but any likely alternative could be considerably worse. Which is presumably why so many western democracies have supported them one way or another for so long. Or indeed, why the House of Saud got to run the country in the first place.
I would like to think that the U.S. has learned a little about considering wider long-term consequences in the context of the middle east, rather than looking for short term gains of marginal utility. If nothing else has bean learned in the last couple of decades, surely there is some sort of awareness that it is easier to mess things up than to clear the mess up afterwards.
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