This failure to act has infuriated U.S. officials and raised new concerns about the controversial figure who has long overseen the country’s security forces: Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz.

After receiving alarming intelligence that Al Qaeda-linked operatives were in the “final stages of planning” for an attack against U.S. interests, U.S. Ambassador Robert Jordan met with senior Interior Ministry officials in late April and strongly urged them to take enhanced security measures at the compounds, including increasing police patrols and positioning armored vehicles to guard the entries, sources said.

But the Saudi response was phlegmatic, at best, even after Jordan followed up with additional requests, U.S. sources say.

“In some cases, they did [enhance security] but only for a day or so,” said one U.S. official. “In other instances, not at all.”

In the wake of Monday’s bombing, in which 34 people died, including seven Americans, Ambassador Jordan diplomatically chastised the Saudis today when asked about the matter on NBC’s “Today” show. “I obviously would have preferred a quicker response to our request for additional security at these compounds,” Jordan said. But privately, the U.S. ambassador is “really feeling betrayed.”

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal today appeared to deny Jordan’s charges, saying he had not received any request from the United States to intensify security measures at the compounds. “But in each time the American Embassy or any other embassy seeks the intensification of security measures, the government fulfills this request,” he said. U.S. officials, however, said Ambassador Jordan made his concerns known to Nayef’s Interior Ministry, not Saud’s Foreign Ministry.

The dispute underscores long-standing U.S. frustrations over Nayef, a virtually unknown figure in the United States, who nonetheless plays a pivotal, if largely problematic, role in the U.S. war on terrorism. An enigmatic and aloof 71-year-old with no formal education, Nayef is widely regarded as one of the most powerful members of the Saudi royal family as a result of his 28-year-long reign over the Saudi security apparatus. His forces at times have shown no compunction about cracking down on internal dissidents and religious minorities, including engaging in arbitrary arrests, torture and beheadings.

But Nayef’s willingness to move forcefully against Al Qaeda and others linked to the group has been erratic, in part out of a stubborn refusal to acknowledge that the terrorist organization even has a presence in the kingdom. “He’s playing his own game,” said one U.S. diplomat. “He’s trying to maintain the illusion that everything is under control.”

At times, that game has taken bizarre turns that have literally enraged U.S. law-enforcement and intelligence officials. After the initial disclosures that 15 of the 19 hijackers who participated in the September 11 terror attacks were Saudi, Nayef dismissed the matter as insignificant and told the Associated Press there were no Al Qaeda cells operating in Saudi Arabia. Asked about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden, he replied: “We have no information, and we have no interest in this subject.”

As recently as last December, Nayef told an Arabic newspaper that he believed that “Jews” were behind the September 11 attacks and blamed the “Zionist-controlled media” for seeking to drive a wedge between the United States and Saudi Arabia. The comments prompted the State Department to issue a formal rebuke to the Saudi government. One official angrily called Nayef “an a–hole.”

What is not fully appreciated, however, is how important Nayef’s ministry is to U.S. efforts to hunt down Qaeda suspects in Saudi Arabia–a mission that is all the more critical now that Monday’s highly coordinated attacks have reignited fears that the terrorist presence in Saudi Arabia may be far more extensive than even some U.S. officials have appreciated. Virtually all U.S. requests for information about terrorist suspects go through Nayef’s ministry and investigative efforts within the kingdom must be conducted by his security police, called the Mabahith, not the FBI.

In some cases, U.S. officials say, Mabahith efforts are hampered by nothing more than sheer incompetence. So it was last Friday when, according to knowledgeable sources, a three-man Saudi surveillance team was monitoring a group of suspected Al Qaeda operatives. For reasons that are still unclear, a gunbattle burst out. The terrorists escaped by switching getaway cars. “They screwed up,” said U.S. intelligence source about the Mabahith surveillance team.

As it turned out, the group under surveillance was almost certainly part of the team that committed Monday’s attacks. When Saudi forces moved into the house, they found a large weapons cache that included 55 hand grenades, 829 pounds of explosives and 2,545 bullets. It was located no more than a few hundred yards from one of the buildings hit in Monday’s bombings.

U.S. intelligence officials believe that the perpetrators are an Al Qaeda-linked group headed by Khaled Jehani, a 29-year-old Saudi militant who, like many of the 9-11 hijackers, is a graduate of the camps in Afghanistan. There is still intense debate over just how large the Qaeda presence is in Saudi Arabia. (Privately, officials have estimated it is 200 to 300 but “we’re going to have to take a hard look at that number now,” one official says.) But at the very least, State Department officials are hoping that the attacks could lead to a shake-up within the Interior Ministry and even Nayef’s resignation–a development that one Saudi opposition leader said today is long overdue.

“He’s had failure after failure–he’s proven useless,” said Ali Ahmed, director of the Saudi Institute, a Washington-based group that is critical of the Saudi government. “He spends most of his time arresting people for their ideas, not fighting terrorism.”

ANOTHER FRUSTRATING SEARCH

Ever since the war on Iraq ended, there has been considerable attention to the often frustrating search by the U.S. military for chemical and biological weapons–the purported primary reason we invaded the country in the first place. There has been far less attention to the hunt for terrorists which, during Secretary of State Powell’s now famous speech to the United Nations last February, was the other reason advanced for getting rid of Saddam Hussein.

As it turns out, the results so far are equally inconclusive. So far, for example, there have been no signs of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian terrorist who ran an Al Qaeda-affiliated group that Powell had asserted had received safe haven in Iraq. But privately, Pentagon officials have been touting the arrest of at least one alleged Zarqawi associate, Abu Muaz. Sources says Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz got excited when he learned recently of Muaz’s apprehension near Baghdad, and at least one official described him as a “high level” and “significant” figure in Zarqawi’s network.

But as with virtually all intelligence issues when it comes to Iraq, there is considerable dispute within the U.S. government about Muaz. He is not wanted by the FBI for any crimes, and U.S. officials are unclear what terrorist acts, if any, he can be linked to. The CIA attaches much less significance to his arrest, describing mysterious Muaz as more a “midlevel operative’ in the Zarqawi network.

And to date, even U.S. military officials acknowledge, he’s the only possible Al Qaeda terrorist who has been located anywhere in Iraq.