Retired NSA director won lucrative consulting deals with Saudis, Japan

Retired Army Gen. Keith Alexander, who led the National Security Agency under Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, secured $2 million in consulting deals with foreign governments after leaving office, including a $700,000 contract to advise Saudi Arabia on cybersecurity after the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, newly released records show.

Alexander’s consulting firm also won a $1.3 million contract from the government of Japan to provide advice on cyber issues, according to additional documents obtained by The Washington Post as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.

Details of those lucrative contracts are among records disclosed by the Pentagon for the first time about retired generals and admirals who have leveraged their military service over the past decade to obtain work from foreign governments. The disclosures by the Pentagon came in response to The Post’s lawsuit and demands from Congress, which has scheduled a hearing on the issue Wednesday.