Bandar bin Sultan (born 2 March 1949) is a member of the House of Saud and was Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States from 1983 to 2005. From 2005 to 29 January 2015 he served as secretary general of the National Security Council, and was director general of the Saudi Intelligence Agency from 2012 to 2014. On 1 July 2014 he was appointed King Abdullah's special envoy which lasted until 29 January 2015.

Bandar was born on 2 March 1949 in Taif. By his own account, and according to Western think tanks, his actual date of birth is later. He had reportedly altered his birthday (overstated his age) to enter the Royal Saudi Air Force while a teen.

Bandar's mother, Khiziran, was a slave from Ethiopia, and the concubine of his father, Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz. Both of Bandar's parents were very young at the time of his birth; indeed, Khiziran was hardly sixteen, and was working as a maid in the palace when she first came in contact with the Prince. The royal family provided Khiziran with a generous monthly pension after Bandar was born, but told her to take her child and live with her own family.

Bandar thus spent his early years in a non-royal milieu, living with his mother and aunt, and had little contact with his father until he was about eight years old. By this time, the royal family relented and invited Khiziran to bring Bandar with her and live in the palace with Prince Sultan's mother, the recently widowed Hassa Al Sudairi, who was a powerful figure in her own right as the mother of the Sudairi Seven.

Bandar graduated from the Royal Air Force College Cranwell in 1968. He received additional training at Maxwell Air Force Base and the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. He is a trained pilot and has flown numerous fighter aircraft. Bandar's military career ended in 1977 after he crash-landed his jet and suffered a severe back injury. Afterward, he received a master's degree in International Public Policy at the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies.

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