9/11, A BIOGRAPHY

A Report of a Senior Study

by

Joel C. Thornton

Major: History

Maryville College

Fall, 2015

Date approved , by

Faculty Supervisor

Date approved , by

Division Chair

Abstract

It is important to understand how the world works by asking difficult questions. This thesis explores the question of why the events of 9/11 took place by examining key individuals involved in the masterminding, planning, and carrying out of the attacks.

Through in depth biographical sketches of important individuals like ,

Mohamed bin Laden, Abdullah Azzam, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Mohamed Atta,

Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ziad Jarrah, Marwan al-Shehhi, and Hani Hanjour the road to 9/11 comes to life. Along with biographical details about the individuals involved with 9/11, the thesis takes into account the worldviews and perspectives of the men involved to give as unbiased a picture as possible. This thesis traces the individual lives of these principal individuals as well as examining how their separate lives all came together on a single path culminating in the events that took place on Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001.

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

Introduction 1

Chapter I “A shy kid” 2

Chapter II “No one sacrifices like him” Part I 22 Part II 41

Chapter III “Chaos, chaos” 55

Chapter IV “The planes operation” 77

Conclusion 95

Appendix A 101

Appendix B 104

Bibliography 110

iv

INTRODUCTION

The world is a beautiful, complex place. It is rich with billions of people representing billions of differing perspectives. And, oftentimes people only see the world through their own particular lenses, and sometimes there is nothing wrong with that.

However, seeing the world through perspectives other than your own increases your understanding of the world. This can be very difficult, but what one may find can be extremely fascinating.

Many people’s lives changed on the morning of September 11, 2001 when a group of Islamist martyrs flew commercial airliners into targets on the East Coast of the

Unites States. American Airlines Flight 11, piloted by Mohamed Atta struck the North

Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 in the morning. United Airlines Flight 175, piloted by Marwan al-Shehhi struck the South Tower of the World Trade Center at 9:03 in the morning. American Airlines Flight 77, piloted by Hani Hanjour struck the

Pentagon at 9:37 in the morning. United Airlines Flight 93, piloted by Ziad Jarrah failed to hit its intended target in Washington, D.C., instead crashing in a Shanksville,

Pennsylvania field.

The events of 9/11 were years in the making. As seen through the eyes of the men involved in the masterminding, planning, and execution of the attacks, however, one can see that they were done for very specific reasons. This thesis explores the lives of the

9/11 attackers up to the eve of the attacks, and the views that lay behind their actions.

1

CHAPTER I

“A SHY KID”

Osama bin Laden was the initially inconspicuous, and interesting product of a unique, and ambiguous world. He was born in the city of in the Kingdom of

Saudi Arabia in the Islamic year 1377, or a period between July 1957 and June 1958.

Osama later said that he believed he was born in the Islamic month that corresponds to

January 1958.1 He was the son of Mohamed bin Laden, the family’s patriarch, and a

Syrian woman named Alia Ghanem – one of the many wives Mohamed bin Laden had children with. By the time Mohamed bin Laden finished fathering children, Osama was one of 54, and it is safe to say that Osama lay between number seventeen and twenty-one of Mohamed’s sons.2 Osama’s father was a self-made man who established himself in

Saudi Arabia at a time when al-Saud’s wealth and opulence seemed virtually infinite, just like the crude that waited below them – and of which provided the Saudi royals their massive fortune.

To know and understand who Osama truly was, one needs to know and understand his father, Mohamed. The patriarch of the bin Laden clan was a quintessential case of a hardworking entrepreneur who walked into a life-changing

1 Steve Coll, The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century (New York: Penguin Books, 2009), 74. 2 Ibid., 73-76. 2 opportunity. It is said that Mohamed was born in 1908 in the Hadhramawt region of modern day . It is well-known amongst Saudis that Hadhramis share amongst themselves a reputation for being great entrepreneurs. They are a people who will do anything to get the job done. Nejdis (natives from the Nejd region in Saudi Arabia) had a saying for entrepreneurs like Mohamed bin Laden: “If you want him to be a baker, he’ll be a baker; if you want him to be a road builder, he’ll be a road builder.”3 He truly lived up to that way of life.

He came from a settlement called Wadi Doan which lies at the bottom of a canyon with cliff walls that jut up to 900 feet and higher. Its inhabitants rely on its fertile flood plains that flank a riverbed which rises during rains, feeding the fields with fresh water. It was a tough, unforgiving place to survive. Like many Hadhramis spanning back thousands of years, Mohamed emigrated in search of a livelihood. After a short stint in Ethiopia, Mohamed returned to Wadi Doan. It wasn’t until 1925 that he left again, this time ending up in the port city of along the in Saudi Arabia. It was from there that Mohamed established himself as a trustworthy and reliable man who, over time, became al-Saud’s chief construction contractor.4 Over the next few decades, he built a multi-million dollar construction empire that served directly under Saudi royalty until his death on September 3, 1967.

Needless to say, Osama didn’t grow up with his father readily close at hand.

Mohamed bin Laden divorced Alia, who was fifteen years old at the time of their son’s birth, soon afterwards. With virtually no father and a teenage mother, Alia was all

Osama really had, and vice versa. A childhood neighbor and friend of Osama, Khaled

3 Ibid., 40-41. 4 Ibid., 21-26. 3

Batarfi, said that they clung to one another and were extremely close. He said that when

Osama was a teenager, he “would lie at her feet and caress her,” and that he “wouldn’t sleep if he knew she was upset about something.”5 The relationship he shared with his young mother exemplified the character of young Osama.

However, while his father was still alive Osama was very much a part of the greater web of the that extended across Saudi Arabia and the region.

He, along with other brothers and sisters, competed for their father’s attention and wisdom. Osama said he remembers his father well, and remembers especially reciting poetry to him as a young boy. He looked up to his father and saw him as a role model; someone he wanted to emulate. And, his father was indeed a perfectly suitable person to look up to. Despite not spending much time with his busy father, he learned a lot about him.

At his jobsites, Mohamed would hold councils, or sessions with local Bedouin tribes who saw him as an authority figure. They would go to him for advice, money, or even to ask for help in settling feuds or disputes. His sons and daughters also took part in similar sessions where they went to him for various needs, and wants. He was very influential in the Kingdom, and especially amongst his family. Early on in life, Osama picked up on the idea that his father led by example in everything that he did. He didn’t sit behind a desk or work out of an office even though he was the leader of major construction projects. He was a working man’s working man, for lack of better words.

He got his hands dirty and worked among his men on project sites.

5 Khaled Batarfi, quoted in Coll, Bin Ladens, 137. 4

Extremely importantly, Osama absorbed his father’s philosophy and drive. This would resonate, many years down the path, with Osama himself as he commanded his holy war. In retrospect, it’s fascinating to think that perhaps Osama carried himself in this way because he felt entitled to power since he grew up so wealthy in a family beloved by Saudi royals.

Not a whole lot is known about Osama’s education or upbringing from his birth through the middle 1960s, but what is known reveals, and clarifies quite a bit about his character. Many that knew Osama as a young boy attest to his shyness and quietness.

His mother remembered him as “a shy kid, very nice, very considerate.”6 He seemed to be a reserved and introverted child, just like many children of his age. From summer trips to his mother’s hometown of Latakia, on ’s Mediterranean coast, his relatives recalled that Osama was a very shy and quiet boy who kept to himself, but wasn’t anti- social. He was just a very kind, gentle person who preferred being alone. Despite all this, he loved the outdoors. He loved to swim, hunt, and horseback ride – he especially loved his horses. Back home, according to Batarfi, Osama enjoyed playing soccer and was very well liked by everyone. He also liked to wear outdoor style clothing, and would wear yellow work boots while preferring a Swiss Army watch.

He most likely received steady schooling from an early age as education was a paramount priority of Mohamed for his children – even for his daughters. He also likely received Qur’anic schooling at this time which was typical for boys his age in Saudi

Arabia. Perhaps surprisingly, he was just an average student in school who never stood out for exceptionally high or low grades. Alia recalled that Osama was “not an A

6 Coll, Bin Ladens, 138. 5 student. He would pass exams with average grades. But he was loved and respected by his classmates and neighbors.”7 It seems that, as a very young boy, Osama was just like many other boys his age – nothing stood out of the ordinary.

The death of his father in 1967 seems to have been a significant event, and turning point in young Osama’s life. He was about ten years old when his father died in 1967 in the crash of a private plane that was piloted by one of Mohamed’s American pilots. His family was aware and so, too, was Osama that it was an American who made a mistake while flying (it’s interesting to wonder if this event left a bad taste in Osama’s mouth towards Americans). It is said he was more distant and quieter because of this event. He clearly loved his father and looked up to him. His new family situation was also somewhat odd. After Mohamed divorced Alia, she passed from husband to husband until she settled with Mohamed Al-Attas. Osama was in a peculiar position in that he wasn’t related to any of his new family and he was financially well off, unlike them. He spent a lot of time with his cousins and relatives on his mother’s side in Latakia, Syria on the

Mediterranean coast.

Again, nothing of his early years seems to point to a child destined for violence, or anything out of the ordinary. He seemed like another bin Laden who would grow up and eventually help lead his late father’s construction consortium. The eldest bin Laden,

Salem, was the new family patriarch after Mohamed’s death. He and Osama were not very close, but they were still family. It is said that Salem went to Osama’s school at the time to pick him up after the death of their father. In any case, he was the new patriarch

7 Ibid., 140. 6 and was the one everyone now came to for money and advice just like Mohamed before him. Salem was an extremely adventurous fellow and a stand out character.

Osama was a man of many contrasts just like his surrounding world. The Saudi desert was barren, yet rich with its diverse people and beliefs. The al-Saud regime indulged in extreme opulence, yet supported and professed Wahhabism and Salafism to their subjects. In his early years it seems as though Osama was just trying to find himself and lay out what he thought was an Islamic way of life that adhered to the ways of the

Prophet. In 1971 or 1972 when Osama was in the eighth or ninth grade, he experienced quite an abrupt change. As a young teen, Osama attended Al-Thaghr Model School in

Saudi Arabia. It was a very modern school with a modern curriculum. It wasn’t strictly religious or Qur’anic like many schools for boys in Saudi Arabia. This was where the seeds of Islamist ideology were planted in Osama’s life. It was about this time that he attended Al-Thagr that he began to change – and others could tell.

During that time in the Arab world, it was common for there to be Egyptian and

Syrian teachers in Saudi Arabia who were attracted by the Kingdom’s hospitality. Many of these Egyptians and Syrians were refugees from their home countries where they were part of Islamist organizations like the . Founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna, the Muslim Brotherhood was an anti-western, anti-colonial following that had been created in reaction to the presence of British political and military activity in .

Furthermore, it was created in reaction to Egyptian elites’ cooperative actions with these

British colonial rulers. The movement was a kind of Egyptian Islamic nationalist movement. Al-Banna “found no incompatibility between Egyptian nationalism and

7

Islam.”8 In response to this collaboration with the British by Egyptian elites, al-Banna wanted to reform Egypt through Islam.

Going even further, he argued that the “regeneration of Islam must begin in

Egypt.”9 This ideology would echo through the following generations where it eventually filtered down to Saudi youths from its exiled members.10 One of these

Islamists was a gym teacher at Al-Thaghr Model School at the same time Osama attended. He was an athletic, fit man in his late twenties who had a beard, and “didn’t look like he was religious.” The Syrian gym teacher was on a mission to recruit young, malleable elites into a grassroots Islamic activist group, but disguised it as an afterschool study-club. He told the kids that they would memorize a bit of the Qur’an every time they met and play soccer afterwards, and that over time they would be able to recite the entire Qur’an. The club was made up of a handful of kids from many backgrounds.

Some were athletic; some were not, and many were from wealthy Jeddah families.

The study group started out just as advertised. From two to five o’clock afterschool, the boys would read some verses from the Qur’an, discuss different modes of interpretation and translation, and then be let loose to play soccer. After about a year, the group began to spend more and more time indoors, and shifted from the memorization of

Qur’anic verses to the discussion and interpretation of hadiths, or stories about the life of the Prophet Muhammed. The group continued to transition as the teacher began telling

8 Mohammed Ayoob, The Many Faces of Political Islam (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2011), 66. 9 Ibid. 10 Later on in the 1980s and 1990s, Osama bin Laden developed almost the exact same doctrine. In response to U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia due to the first , and al-Saud’s cooperation with the United States in these matters, bin Laden created his ideas of the “Near Enemy,” and “Far Enemy” which was a fundamental basis for his creation of a global jihad directed against the United States in particular. 8 violent stories. The teacher’s aim at recruiting these impressionable young teenagers became evident with a powerful story as described by a boy who, after hearing the story, made excuses to stop showing up and stopped attending altogether starting the very next day. The story was “about a boy who found God – exactly like us, our age. He wanted to please God and he found that his father was standing in his way. The father was pulling the rug out from under him when he went to pray.”11 The Syrian gym teacher continued with the story about the “righteous boy” or “brave boy” as he reached the story’s climax.

He explained how the boy’s father had a gun, and went through twenty minutes of detailed explanation of the boy making a plan, loading the gun, and finishing with the boy killing his father. The teacher exclaimed, “Lord be praised – Islam was released in that home.”12 The young boy who immediately dropped out explained how the other boys listened in amazement with their eyes wide and jaws dropped. The young boys likely couldn’t see what the Syrian was doing, but it is quite easy to see the underlying meaning to his message.

Osama was one of these young teenage boys who stayed in this group which tried to define a true Islamic way of life influenced, in part, by a Muslim Brotherhood styled political agenda. These teenage boys soon became Islamic activists letting their beards grow out while steadfastly arguing with and urging fellow students and friends toward the importance of restoring true and pure Islamic law and ways of life to the Arab world.

Osama’s friend, Batarfi, said that the group was influenced by the Brotherhood, and that

Osama was very influenced by this philosophy. Batarfi said that Osama began wearing

11 Coll, Bin Ladens, 147. 12 Ibid. 9 long pants to play soccer and made a big deal about others not following suit. He also became much more pious and wouldn’t make eye contact with females.

However, this wasn’t out of the ordinary in the bin Laden family, or in Saudi

Arabia especially. There were other bin Ladens who were pious; it was even expected in such a society for several members of a family to be very religious. It can be compared to the period in medieval Europe where the younger males of noble families were expected to be priests or other overtly religious leaders. This entire phenomenon appears to have been a classic case of an influential Islamic activist secretly recruiting a young group of malleable and impressionable kids, and forming them, over time, into Islamic activists themselves.

This time period, in addition to his father’s death a few years prior, was a life- shaping one in Osama’s early life. Before his time at Al-Thaghr with the Syrian gym teacher, Osama was a typical young boy. He was quiet, an outdoor adventurer, avid soccer player, and horseback rider, and he enjoyed watching American television shows like Bonanza and Fury, a series about a boy and his black stallion horse.13 After his initiation into this Muslim Brotherhood influenced Islamic activist group, Osama changed. Osama himself was conscious of this rebirth, too. Several years later in an interview, Osama dated his own radicalization to the year 1973 during the Yom Kippur

War, referred to in the Arab world as the “October War”.14

13 Lawrence Wright, : Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (New York: Vintage Books, 2006), 86. 14 Bruce Lawrence, : The Statements of Osama Bin Laden (London: Verso, 2005), 31. 10

He interpreted his conversion at the age of fifteen into the Muslim Brotherhood as a “natural passage of a true Muslim.”15 He seemed to genuinely and truthfully believe in this. “As is known,” said Osama, “from birth to fifteen years of age people do not look after themselves, nor are they really aware of great events…If we’re really honest, we find that this section, between the ages of fifteen to twenty-five, is when people are able to wage jihad.”16 Osama’s change could easily be seen through his newfound actions and beliefs. His change became very evident, yet he still showed signs of his “old” self as a young kid.

After his joining of the Muslim Brotherhood, along with fellow friend and classmate Jamal Kashoggi, at Al-Thaghr, Osama stopped watching his favorite cowboy shows, replacing them with news from the Palestinian conflict, during which his mother said he would weep in front of the television in sympathy for Palestinians. Alia also said that he was the same kid, but just very “concerned, sad, and frustrated about the situation in Palestine in particular, and the Arab and in general.”17 Osama became overtly concerned with these matters and tried to bring the attention of his fellow friends and extended family to it, yet none really seemed to care, or be as passionate about it as he was.

There was still no reason for alarm amongst his family as this was Saudi Arabia after all. It was perfectly normal, and expected, for people to be pious. And, Osama lived up to the Salafist, Wahhabi proselytizing that went on in the Kingdom. Salafists were expected to imitate the ways of the Prophet during his lifetime. The Wahhabi

15 Coll, Bin Ladens, 201. 16 Ibid. 17 Wright, Looming Tower, 87. 11 interpretation of Islam literally professes that a true Muslim will follow and model their lives in the image of the Prophet and his early companions from the 7th Century CE. It seemed as though this phenomenon in Saudi Arabia made it easy for Islamic activist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood--inspired one at Al-Thaghr to operate; if so, it is ironic in that al-Saud was adamantly against such Islamic political groups who had the potential to threaten their regime.

There is one story in particular, recalled by Osama’s mother, that reveals his budding extremism. He and his family were all riding from Saudi Arabia to Osama’s mother’s relatives’ home in Latakia, Syria when Osama violently lashed out at their driver who was playing a cassette voicing Egyptian diva Umm Kalthoum. The driver refused to turn it off. Osama sternly told him if he didn’t turn it off, they would turn around and go home. The driver relented. Batarfi, Osama’s longtime childhood friend, said that Osama was “peaceful, but when he was angry, he was frightening.”18 However, at the same time he opposed music, he had organized a group of friends into an a Capella singing group. They sang songs about jihad (internal struggle, not holy war) and recorded their music on tapes that Osama gave to them.

Even when Osama went to play soccer, he would bring along tuna and cheese sandwiches to give to the other players, despite the fact that he was fasting. His commitment to his piety and his generosity earned him respect – so much so that his fellow players followed suit and wore long pants just like Osama did. They did this in - deference to his piety. He remained a quiet and shy personality, and seemed a natural leader through his genuine piety and ambassador-like generosity.19 This generosity in

18 Ibid., 86. 19 Ibid., 87-89. 12 taking care of his friends seemed to be a trait he gained from his late father Mohamed.

This likely went on to serve him well in his later years as head of an international jihadist network.

As Osama approached his college years, he still seemed like an average, albeit very religious, member of the bin Laden family in general. He had a sense of grand adventure and loved going fast. As a teenager in the middle 1970s, in prime adolescence,

Osama was quite the outdoorsman and adrenaline seeker. He enjoyed rock climbing in

Turkey, hunted wild game in Kenya, kept a stable of horses where he would ride and shoot just like in his favorite TV shows, and he loved driving fast – a trait many of

Mohamed’s children shared.

When Osama was about sixteen or seventeen years old, he crashed one of his cars

– a large white American Chrysler – into a ditch. He then went on to drive a Mercedes-

Benz 280S, perhaps something a lawyer or businessman would more likely drive than a young budding teenage Islamic activist.20 This Islamist and outdoor adventurer graduated from Al-Thaghr Model School in Jeddah in 1976. Interestingly, he did not appear in his graduating class’s photograph, as he opposed Western dress and photography – which was new on his list of things he rejected as it was not around during the time of the Prophet’s life.

However, he did have some quite discernable pleasures. Longtime friend Batarfi claimed that Osama married at the young age of seventeen for the sole reason of having legitimate sex. He ended up marrying his first cousin, Najwa Ghanem,21 from his mother’s family from Syria who he had known unveiled, and grown up with during

20 Ibid., 89. 21 Ibid., 90. 13 family vacations in Latakia. Other than sex, Osama enjoyed his cars, work, and the outdoors. Other than that, he was a devout Muslim in a very sincere sense. His seemingly ambivalent nature would soon begin to favor the more extremist side as he progressed through college and eventually through his years in during the

Soviet occupation.

It seemed almost as if Osama bin Laden were several people all at once. He was quite the outdoor enthusiast, and seemed to be a good fellow or companion to spend time with. He was an underground Islamic activist sympathetic to the views and teachings of the Brotherhood. He was a strict, yet loving father. And, he strove to earn a degree from college to help run the family business. Upon graduation from Al-Thaghr, he enrolled at

King Abdulaziz University.22 As someone who had always looked up to his father, and someone who emulated him, it seemed somewhat expected, or natural for bin Laden to be part of the family business under Salem bin Laden.

Many of bin Laden’s half-brothers were seeking to be part of the upper echelons of the family business, and Osama was certainly one of those strivers. Bin Ladens seeking to be part of the business either went down the engineering track or the management track. Osama bin Laden chose the business side where he studied business management and economics at King Abdulaziz University. Bin Laden never completed his studies, or earned a degree of any kind; however, he went on to take a managerial position overseeing various projects in , a most holy site for Muslims, where he seemed to be a positive asset. Walid Al-Khatib, a Palestinian supervisor of bin Laden, recalled that he was “serious for his age, and from the first day, I noticed his interest in

22 Vahab Aghai, Terrorism, an Unconventional Crime (Xlibris Corporation, 2011), 91. 14 small details. We operated heavy equipment, and soon this tall skinny boy was driving them all. His technical ability was impressive.”23 He seemed to be a natural just like his father.

Speaking of fatherhood, bin Laden was a stern patriarch who was wholeheartedly involved in his children’s upbringing. Like his own father, he tried to impart the “lessons about self-reliance, faith, and parsimony.”24 Many of the things the “Lion” instilled in his young pride reflected his evolving worldview. Bin Laden’s strict Wahhabi interpretation made him reject much of anything not present in the life of Muhammed, so it comes to no surprise that he rejected most television including Sesame Street and

Disney cartoons.

His love for the outdoors was where bin Laden’s fatherly essence revealed itself.

He would take his family on desert camping trips where he taught his kids how to really be self-reliant. He taught them how to ride horses, his favorite hobby, as well as shoot guns and hunt animals. He even taught them the skills of sleeping out in the open under the nighttime desert sky and how to stay warm by covering themselves with sand. He was stern in the sense that he drilled into his children the sense that they were privileged and lived in luxury. “He wanted them to grow up tough,” recalled Batarfi.

At the same time, he was a very warm and playful father, especially on his family desert camping trips which seemed to be one of bin Laden’s favorite things to do.25 It is interesting, in retrospect, to wonder how his knowledge of living off the land came to serve him in his later years as an exile in the borderlands of Afghanistan and . In

23 Coll, Bin Ladens, 210. 24 Ibid., 208. 25 Ibid. 15 any case, he was a committed and involved father who was genuinely concerned about his children – just like any good father would be.

While in attendance at King Abdulaziz University, which lay along the Mecca

Road, bin Laden partook in religious studies on top of his degree studies. It was here at the university that the seeds sown at Al-Thaghr were nourished, and fertilized. “I formed a religious charity at school, and we devoted a lot of time to interpreting the Qur’an and jihad,”26 bin Laden later recalled. Through his religious affairs and involvement, he came into contact with other fellow Islamists and mentors. He quickly befriended a fellow

Muslim Brotherhood member named , who could trace his lineage back to the Prophet himself – something that gave him a special standing amongst the umma.

The two young adults became inseparable friends who spent time together on weekend desert excursions as well as discussing the correct path of Islam. This particular time in their lives, when they were around twenty years of age, marked a time of religious and spiritual questioning. “We were trying to understand what Islam has to say about how we eat, who we marry, how we talk. We read Sayyid Qutb. He was the one who most affected our generation,”27 said Osama’s close friend Khalifa. Bin Laden and

Khalifa both read Qutb’s books Milestones and In the Shade of the Quran that would change their lives, especially bin Laden’s.

Once a week at the university the exiled younger brother of Sayyid Qutb,

Mohammad Qutb, would give public lectures. It was at these lectures that bin Laden came into contact with some of the most violent interpretations of Islam in the modern

26 Wright, Looming Tower, 90. 27 Ibid., 91. 16 world. Again, this was at a time when extremist Muslims were in exile in the hospitable kingdom of Saudi Arabia from their volatile homelands of the surrounding Middle East, and especially Egypt where both Sayyid and Mohammad Qutb hailed from. According to some accounts, it was also at the university that bin Laden met Abdullah Azzam, a mentor and father figure who played an influential role with bin Laden in Afghanistan several years later. There is some dispute about this, however. In any case, it was “in these classrooms bin Laden studied the imperatives and nuances of contemporary Islamic jihad.”28

A deep examination into the ideologies and views of the influential subjects in bin

Laden’s life help to reveal his quickening radicalization in the late 1970s through to the

1980s. The concept of “jihad” is very important in Islam. There are as many interpretations of jihad as there are the number of Muslims worldwide. There are two general meanings to this word. There is the internal “struggle,” or “effort” to lead a pure life on the straight path of Islam. This is known as the “greater” jihad (again, what that means is open to interpretation). On the other hand there is the external aspect that requires a Muslim to defend their faith even if it means going to the length of “armed struggle,” or holy war. This is referred to as the “lesser” jihad.

This was very likely a subject that bin Laden and Khalifa discussed with one another supplemented by readings and lectures from a varying degree of radical interpretations. One of the most radical interpretations of jihad, and Islam in general,

28 Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, From the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 (New York: Penguin Books, 2004), 85.

17 came from Sayyid Qutb who influenced many radical Muslims including Osama bin

Laden.

Sayyid Qutb was not always the radical extremist he came to be known as. He was a moderate Muslim who grew up in Egypt and even donned a Western suit and tie.

He traveled to the United States in November 1948 on scholarship. He had an internal dilemma during his voyage: “Should I go to America as any normal student on scholarship, who only eats and sleeps, or should I be special?” he thought to himself.

“Should I hold on to my Islamic beliefs, facing the many sinful temptations, or should I indulge those temptations all around me?”29 He ultimately decided for the latter, and his time in the United States lit a flame that violently raged inside of him, and he returned to

Egypt extremely radicalized.

A large part of this radicalization was due to his observations in America of its discriminatory and racist inclinations to people of color, as well as its relative social and religious tolerance of acting on sexual desires. Religiously, he thought that America was a “spiritual wasteland,”30 and concluded that “materialism was the real American god.31

He carried home with him a message that taught hatred toward the West, and the United

States in particular:

The white man crushes us underfoot while we teach our children about his

civilization, his universal principles and noble objectives…. We are endowing

our children with amazement and respect for the master who tramples our honor

and enslaves us. Let us instead plant the seeds of hatred, disgust, and revenge in

29 Wright, Looming Tower, 9. 30 Ibid., 27. 31 Ibid. 18

the souls of these children. Let us teach these children from the time their nails

are soft that the white man is the enemy of humanity, and that they should

destroy him at the first opportunity.32

His goal was to expose the differences between Islam and the West. He was determined “to show that Islam and modernity were completely incompatible,” and to

“return Islam to its unpolluted origins.”33 Qutb became a fiery member of the underground network of the Muslim Brotherhood who were constantly conspiring to take out Nasser and replace his rule with a true Islamic state.

Just like many extreme Islamists, Qutb had a very narrow, black-and-white view of the world. He divided the world into two groups: there was true, pure Islam, and there was jahiliyya; the camp of believers and of nonbelievers, respectively. He would say his interpretation of Islam was the correct one, and everything else in the world should be condemned.34 Qutb called for “a special group of true Muslims, a righteous vanguard”35 to wage global jihad in the face of all who stood against Islam as they knew and interpreted it.

In the end, Qutb ultimately called for Muslims to rise up and create a true Islamic society. He believed that once one was created, many more would follow. “We need to initiate the movement of Islamic revival in some Muslim country in order to fashion an example that will eventually lead Islam to its destiny of world dominion.”36 Sayyid Qutb truly believed this, and upon his execution in 1966, he stated to his sister, Hamida, that

32 Ibid., 27-28. 33 Ibid., 28. 34 John L. Esposito, Islam: The Straight Path, 4th ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 236-238. 35 Ibid., 238. 36 Wright, Looming Tower, 35. 19

“my words will be stronger if they kill me.”37 This message certainly echoed in the souls of young Muslims, and these teachings went on to inspire ideologies such as the one that fueled Osama bin Laden.

By this time in bin Laden’s life, he was not quite the extreme Islamist, or proponent of terrorism he became known for in the 1990s and 2000s. He was still experimenting with different modes of inquiry into what a true Muslim is, and what a true

Muslim does. His extreme views on the world through a radical Islamic lens developed quite slowly, yet gradually, over the first twenty or so years of his life. Bin Laden was a typical young boy in Saudi Arabia although he came from a father who was extremely wealthy. He enjoyed a childhood not unlike an average child would have enjoyed in the

United States. He had a lot of money in relation to the average Saudi, he enjoyed riding horses and being in the outdoors, he loved soccer, and he was regularly in school.

As a teenager at Al-Thaghr he entered into a Muslim Brotherhood inspired

Islamic activist group where he was greatly influenced. During these early teenage years,

Osama became more aware and focused of his piety as well as with issues in the greater

Muslim world. It was through his connection with the Muslim Brotherhood as well as his time at King Abdulaziz University where he was influenced by the teachings of the Qutb brothers.

At the same time, he was a loving father and family man who genuinely loved, and looked out for his children. These developing years were defined by periods of

“hot,” and “cold” where he seemed radical at one time and normal at another. He was very much the product of his contradictory environment. The next phase of Osama bin

37 Ibid., 36. 20

Laden’s life was defined by the Soviet-Afghan war beginning in 1979. It was during this time in the harsh, ambiguous borderlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan that the transition of bin Laden from a shy kid, to an entrepreneurial jihadi took place.

21

CHAPTER II

“NO ONE SACRIFICES LIKE HIM”

PART I

1979 was a monumental year in the Middle East. The year marked the victory of the Iranian Revolution in which Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini took control, and made

Iran an Islamic State. This massive revolution that took place in inspired countless

Muslims across Islamic lands. It inspired Islamic fundamentalists, and gave them the courage to put their own agendas into action against whoever they claimed oppressed them and their religion. It was also a year that marked a turning point in the life of

Osama bin laden.

Several shocking events occurred within days of each other that were inspired directly by the Iranian Revolution. On November 20, the Grand Mosque in Mecca surrounding the sacred Ka’ba, and where millions of Muslims make pilgrimage every year for the Hajj, was seized by armed Islamists led by Juhaiman Al-Otaibi, claiming that among them was the Mahdi. They believed that this would be the final battle on earth between mortals. It, however, turned out to be unsuccessful for Juhaiman’s men who were killed or later beheaded after capture, following assaults by French and Saudi special operations forces.38 This alarmed al-Saud’s royal regime which was always

38 Coll, Bin Ladens, 222-227 22 aware, and afraid, of religious extremists in its lands. Unfortunately, a storm was on the horizon for the Saudi rulers. A movement had begun in their country known as the sahwa, or “awakening,”39 referring to a revival of Islamist movements in protest against al-Saud’s “un-Islamic” ways – a movement that would gain momentum into the 1990’s with Osama bin Laden leading the vanguard.

Two events in particular, while targeting the United States, reflected a call for a

“global Islamic revolution against the superpowers.”40 On November 5, Iranian students sacked the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Days later, on November 21, the U.S. Embassy in

Islamabad, Pakistan was overrun, and destroyed by rioters of Jamaat-e-Islami, an associate group of the Muslim Brotherhood. There certainly seemed to be something stirring in the air in the Middle East in 1979. Yet, the most shocking event didn’t happen until less than a week before the end of the decade.

On December 24, 1979 the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. The reasons for the invasion were extremely complex. During the 1970s Afghan religious and social leaders were becoming increasingly opposed to KGB--backed Afghan Marxists who had been put in place by the Kremlin after 1973. The Iranian Revolution was also a major threat to the Soviet--backed leadership in Afghanistan as its teachings began to leak across the border through the western Afghanistan town of Herat. In addition, the Soviets feared

Afghanistan would shift from a Soviet sphere of influence to a United States and Western sphere of influence after their head KGB puppet in Afghanistan – Nur Mohammed Taraki

– was gunned down by a suspected CIA plant, Hafizullah Amin.

39 Ibid., 247. 40 Coll, Ghost Wars, 27. 23

Suspecting the worst, as well as being fearful for their “underbelly’s” vulnerability to U.S. nuclear missiles and the possibility of subversion across their southern borders, the Kremlin decided that the best move was to invade Afghanistan.41

While the Western world was celebrating Christmas Eve 1979, the Soviets were beginning their mission of securing communism in the historically tribal, and Islamic lands of Afghanistan as well as to further protect themselves from the United States during the heated Cold War, or so they thought. A decade of war – between the

“Freedom Fighters” of Afghanistan (secretly backed by the CIA) and Soviet troops – had just begun. The ensuing struggle that took place after the initial Soviet invasion became the stomping ground, and classroom, for Osama bin Laden, ultimately inspiring him to become a global wager of jihad.

Osama bin Laden left Saudi Arabia for Pakistan very shortly after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December of 1979, and with no planned agenda set in place, just for his large bank account and philanthropic generosity. He certainly did not set out for this adventure with the formation of ‘al-Qaeda’ in mind, or thoughts of declaring war on the United States of America. Those two realities came later, yet were directly influenced by his time on the borderlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan during the Afghan jihad. He went because it was a calling for him to partake in the struggle against a non-

Muslim people by a godless empire (the Soviet Union was officially atheist).

Exactly when bin Laden first went to Pakistan in response to the invasion is somewhat disputed. Bin Laden himself claimed he arrived before the end of the year. If so, this would have meant within five or six days of the invasion. A journalist who had

41 Ibid., 38-50. 24 first-hand access to al-Qaeda before the , Ahmad Muwaffaq

Zaydan, said Osama arrived “’only two weeks after the invasion.’”42 With this taken into account, it is safe to conclude that he arrived sometime between one or two weeks after the invasion. This act by bin Laden speaks volumes about his character. It takes a special dedication for a person to virtually drop everything that’s going on in his life to do whatever he can to serve a greater cause.

Upon bin Laden’s arrival in Pakistan from Saudi Arabia, he first went to Lahore to meet with numerous influential leaders of the ensuing jihad. Thanks to bin Laden’s late father and the subsequent family reputation in parlors throughout the Muslim world, he was able to meet with such figures as Qazi Hussain Ahmed, who was the leader of the

Jamaat-e-Islami party – the same group associated with the November 21 assault on the

U.S. Embassy in Islamabad – and Afghan military leaders Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and

Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, who along with Jamaat-e-Islami shared similar ideas to those of the

Brotherhood. Bin Laden intended to help these individuals the best way he could. “Not surprisingly, Osama’s first role in the Afghan jihad was to collect and then distribute funds to the mujahedin from Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf countries.”43 This was where bin Laden’s diplomatic generosity, and pocket book could truly shine.

Knowing what Osama did during the first few years of the jihad is paramount to understanding his changing views of the world that surfaced later on. The years that made up the early 1980s of the Afghan jihad were extremely influential for bin Laden, and it taught him much invaluable knowledge that helped in his creation of al-Qaeda, and

42 Ahmad Muwaffaq Zaydan, Usama bin Ladin without Mask: Interviews the Taliban Banned, (Beirut: World Book Publishing, 2003), quoted in , Osama bin Laden (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 49. 43 Michael Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 50.

25 its subsequent operations. These formative years saw Osama traveling throughout, and learning the layouts of Pakistani cities as well key figures and players of the jihad. (It would be interesting to know if this was how bin Laden established ties that enabled his post-9/11 hideout in , Pakistan where he was eventually found and killed by

U.S. forces in May 2011).

Bin Laden used the skills he had inherited from his father and that he learned through managing construction sites for the family’s building empire. He successfully shuttled funds from Saudi Arabia and the encompassing Gulf states to Pakistan, where they filtered into Afghanistan. He also showed great “empathy and generosity toward the wounded and toward refugee Afghans – visiting hospitals for wounded mujahedin and distributing cashews, chocolates, and checks for the families.”44 Osama was very much a man who put his actions where his beliefs were, just like his father.

Bin Laden also had dealings with leading Pakistani generals, businessmen, politicians, and religious scholars, Afghan mujahedin leaders, Pashtun tribesmen, as well as other Muslim leaders and social figures from throughout the Islamic world. All of this sharpened Osama bin Laden in a way that made him more aware of the world and issues around him. Much like a college or university student studying abroad, bin Laden, albeit with much less academic and more hands on experience, became less ignorant, in the sense that he saw the world through other perspectives and became familiarized with various other Muslims who had their own struggles and ways of lives.

There were a small number of influential people in particular with whom bin

Laden had close contact in the early and middle parts of the 1980s and who gave him

44 Ibid. 26 valuable skills that would add to his abilities as future leader of al-Qaeda. Two such had both taught at the same schools that Osama attended earlier on in his life. Ahmed Badeeb had taught biology at Al-Thaghr and had known the young Osama from the school’s religious committee.45 They would work together to serve al-Saud’s interests regarding the Afghan jihad.

Badeeb, over time, had become close to Saudi Arabia’s foreign intelligence chief,

Turki Al-Faisal. Badeeb basically acted as Turki’s courier, taking cash into Pakistan to aid the ongoing war in Afghanistan. Bin Laden did the same thing as Badeeb: “on bin

Laden’s first trip to Pakistan he brought donations to the Lahore offices of Jamaat-e-

Islami…”46 To keep Saudi Arabia’s involvement secret, al-Saud and its General

Intelligence Directorate (GID) funneled cash and arms, through Badeeb, to the Pakistani

ISI which then supplied the Afghan mujahedin (at least in theory).

This was primarily an attempt to keep Saudi involvement in the shadows, but bin

Laden didn’t trust the Pakistani ISI, so he channeled money unilaterally through religious charities and other donations from Saudi Arabia and surrounding Gulf nations to whomever he wanted, ultimately bypassing the ISI. He particularly favored Jamaat-e-

Islami because he believed they would transfer donations to the mujahedin leaders truest to the Muslim Brotherhood’s aims and ideas – Hekmatyar and Rabanni in particular.47

Badeeb agreed with bin Laden in this case, and to develop unilateral relationships – again, in order to bypass the ISI – they invited important Afghan rebel leaders to Mecca and other holy sites lavishly supplying them with cash and other necessities.

45 Coll, Bin Ladens, 249. 46 Coll, Ghost Wars, 86. 47 Sheikh Abdullah Azzam, The Lofty Mountain (London: Azzam Publications), 92. 27

Over the course of two to three years of commuting back and forth between Saudi

Arabia and Pakistan, bin Laden came to have relations with Prince Turki himself and proved to be quite an asset for the Saudi royal family in the Afghan jihad. Bin Laden claimed that he worked in direct alignment with Saudi Arabia’s secret intelligence service. However, according to a November 2001 interview conducted by Jamal

Khashoggi with Turki, bin Laden never “enjoyed any official status.” Turki described bin Laden as “a gentle, enthusiastic young man of few words who didn’t raise his voice while talking.”48 In general, Turki described him as a “nice guy.”49 Despite Turki’s testimony, the United States’ CIA as well as the GID’s Ahmed Badeeb both asserted that bin Laden was much more than Turki had claimed later on. He acted as a somewhat semiofficial liaison between the GID and other Islamist religious networks.50

It does, in fact, seem likely that bin Laden worked with Saudi Arabia’s intelligence services even if he was not an “official” agent. According to Badeeb, bin

Laden worked with Saudi Arabia’s embassy in Islamabad as well as meeting with Saudi

Arabia’s interior minister, Prince Nayef. Through orders by the GID, bin Laden imported his family’s “construction equipment to cut roads to ease arms delivery to the mujahedin, as well as to build hospitals and other facilities.”51 “He was our [GID’s] man,” stated

Badeeb (Turki and other Saudi officials, for understandable reasons in later interviews, possibly didn’t want to acknowledge having worked with Osama bin Laden for fear of damaging the public perception of Saudi-U.S. relations).

48 Jamal Khashoggi, “Osama offered to form arm to challenge Saddam’s forces: Turki,” Arab News (November 7, 2001), http://www.arabnews.com/node/216027 (accessed November 8, 2015). 49 Ibid. 50 Coll, Ghost Wars, 87. 51 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 51. 28

Bin Laden’s dealings with another individual became very much a master- apprentice relationship. This man in particular had a huge impact on bin Laden, and helped shape him into who he would become later on. He was one of the closest mentors he had throughout his entire life.

Abdullah Azzam had taught at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia while bin Laden was in attendance. Azzam was born in a village in the West Bank, and like bin

Laden, was recruited at a young age into the Muslim Brotherhood (the Jordanian branch).

After fighting the Israelis in the 1967 war, he obtained a doctorate from al-Azhar

University in before moving to Saudi Arabia where he became a professor. He was one of those exiled figures who took advantage of Saudi hospitality while being part of underground Islamist activist groups – the Brotherhood in particular. Azzam was very much like Osama in the sense that they both found inspiration in Egyptian radical and

Muslim Brother Sayyid Qutb as well as the mediaeval Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyyah,

“who was probably the first Salafi.”52

Azzam was fired by the Afghan war and thus moved to Pakistan in 1979 where he could aid in the jihad, full time, against the Soviets. He was one of the leading figures in the jihad against the Red Army. In fact, “Azzam was responsible for internationalizing the Islamist struggle against secularism, socialism, and materialism.”53 Although an academic, he was a man who “put his principles into action,”54 taking his ideologies and agenda “to the front lines of Afghanistan during the Afghan-Soviet war, organizing the

52 Abdel Bari Atwan, The Secret History of al Qaeda (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 71. 53 Andrew McGregor, “’Jihad and the Rifle Alone’: ‘Abdullah ‘Azzam and the Islamist Revolution,” The Journal of Conflict Studies 23, no. 2 (2003). 54 Ibid. 29 agency that would evolve into Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda.”55 It cannot be stressed enough how major an influence Abdullah Azzam, an unfamiliar name in the West, had on bin Laden’s life.

As with many things regarding Osama’s life, it is uncertain exactly when the two met. (As mentioned earlier, they may have met during their time at King Abdulaziz

University, but other sources claim it wasn’t until they met each other in Pakistan after the invasion). What is important is that the two knew each other from very early on in the war. Osama bin Laden and Azzam became quick friends through their mutual cause in the Afghan war, over time becoming a partnership. It was “a meeting of money, will and youth, represented by Osama bin Laden, and knowledge, direction and experience, represented by Abdullah Azzam.”56

The “agency” created by Azzam with his son-in-law and Osama, which became the direct antecedent of bin Laden’s al-Qaeda, was called Maktab Khidamat lil-

Mujahideen (MK) which roughly translates into the “Mujadideen Services Office,”57

Naturally, Azzam was MK’s main manager while bin Laden was the financier of operations, which ran at about $300,000 a year. The organization was originally located in an office similar to a guesthouse that cost bin Laden $25,000 per month to rent. When the rent increased in 1985, they decided to build their own dedicated structure.58

The Peshawar based service had several committees – the Administrative

Committee, the Military Committee, the Training Committee, and the Dispatching

Committee, which was “specifically for dispatching caravans of brothers [Arab

55 Ibid. 56 Coll, The Bin Ladens, 253. 57 Azzam, Lofty Mountain, 92. 58 Ibid., 93. 30 volunteers] to Afghanistan.”59 The Mujahideen Services Office’s main task was to house, feed, and equip non-Afghan Muslim volunteers until they were given a role.

Some were assigned to humanitarian efforts, while others were readied as soldiers to be sent to fight with forces commanded by Hekmatyar and others. However, it was quite unorganized in its infancy. This lack of organization was a major reason why bin Laden moved permanently to Peshawar. His move to Pakistan would allow him to help with operations as well as to be closer to Afghanistan, a land he had not yet entered.

Perhaps not so obvious was the fact that MK was an effective propaganda tool, and where bin Laden sharpened his knowledge of how to use media to his advantage.

The Afghan jihad was an impactful event for the Muslim world, and bin Laden’s as well as Azzam’s priority was to keep it prominent in the consciousness of the umma. Osama traveled throughout the Arab and Gulf nations proselytizing in hope of receiving money and young recruits for the jihad. While bin Laden traveled throughout the Middle East,

Azzam ventured as far as the United States for the same purpose. They even deployed their own magazine called Al-Jihad of which they would print up to seventy thousand copies a month.60

Although the time spent working in the MK was valuable, it was the two years after that provided bin Laden the necessary resources and confidence to set out on his own – to wage his own international jihad. In 1986, bin Laden decided to split with

Azzam. The split occurred because of two key, specific reasons. The first was the fact that Azzam favored Ahmed Shah Massoud, whom he saw as the greatest Afghan general in the war. On the other hand, bin Laden favored Pashtun tribal leaders and warriors –

59 Ibid. 60 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 55. 31 the most prominent being Hekmatyar, Sayyaf, and Haqqani. Whereas Azzam wanted to filter more aid to Massoud, bin Laden disagreed and thought it should go to his favored

Afghan leaders.

The second reason for the gradual split stemmed from the issue of what to do with the Arab and other non-Afghan fighters who came for the jihad. Azzam wanted to continue dividing the Arabs and other non-Afghans amongst the various Afghan mujahedin leaders – Hekmatyar, Sayyaf, Yunis Khalis, and Haqqanni. Bin Laden proposed the idea to Azzam of keeping the Arabs together in all-Arab units so that they could all be trained together and deployed as homogeneous Arab units. He thought they could gain experience, and after the Afghan-Soviet war be deployed for jihad all over the world (this became the basic inspiration for starting al-Qaeda). Azzam disagreed with bin Laden in this regard. They remained very close friends, with bin Laden financing

MK until 1988 and still referring to Abdullah Azzam as “’a Mujahid champion.’”61

It was in 1984 that bin Laden began having his original thoughts and plans to set out on his own to create dedicated Arab-only units to be trained inside of Afghanistan at sites built under his guidance. Thanks to bin Laden’s work with the GID, for which he built infrastructure for NGOs and other organizations that helped with the ease of transporting goods and supplies to the mujahedin in Afghanistan, his equipment was already in and around the Afghan-Pakistan borderlands. Furthermore, bin Laden, with his equipment, had built a major training camp for the Islamic Union for the Liberation of

Afghanistan (IULA led by Sayyaf) in the Parichinar area, which is located in the

61 Osama bin Laden, “Remove the Apostate,” Al-Sahab Media Production Organization, September 20, 2007, quoted in Scheuer, Osama bin Laden, 59. 32

“Parrot’s Beak” of Pakistan62 (a protrusion of Pakistani territory into Afghanistan). He constructed caves, tunnels, and other military installations for Haqqani’s forces inside

Afghanistan in the Khost Province. He also helped build at least four other mujahedin training camps inside of Afghanistan near the Pakistan borders. Needless to say, he had much experience with dangerous construction as well as many contacts and alliances with local Pashtun and Afghan leaders.

Bin Laden felt the necessity to have dedicated training camps for Arab-only units:

Due to the strong love of the Afghans for the Arabs, they would treat them as

guests, in that they would not impose any military or combat duties upon them.

However, the Arab men wanted to be Mujahideen, and to do the work of the

Mujahideen: they did not come to Afghanistan as guests. Due to this, I came up

with the idea of forming a place where the Arab brothers could be received and

trained to fight.63

However, bin Laden seemed to have been a bit naïve in this regard. He was correct in that it would have been beneficial for the Afghans to have more numbers in fighting. The problem was that the Afghans often times disagreed with, and even saw the Arabs as a nuisance. On many occasions the Arabs would desecrate and destroy Afghan mujahedin graves for having idols, or shrine-like appearances. The Afghan version of Islam was more rooted in Sufism than the Arabs’ Wahabbi brand of Islam. Therefore, they saw such sites as not truly Islamic. This led to fighting and even killings of Arabs by

62 Coll, Bin Ladens, 290. 63 Azzam, Lofty Mountain, 94. 33

Afghans. Afghan leaders also had trouble with the fact that the Arabs were literally searching for martyrdom – to be killed on the battle field for the cause of jihad. This, the

Afghan mujahedin oftentimes couldn’t understand – “while Afghans certainly are willing to die for God’s cause if necessary, they much prefer to die in bed as very old men.”64

Bin Laden either failed to see it from this perspective or just ignored the fact, and in the latter part of 1985 began operations for building his own infrastructure and training camps in the Jaji area around Khost and Paktia Provinces in Afghanistan (bordering the

“Parrot’s Beak”). “I sought permission from the leader of the Islamic Union for the

Mujahideen of Afghanistan [IULA] in 1404AH [1984], to form a military camp close to the Pak-Afghan border for the brothers to train in.”65 This camp would come to be known as “Al-Masadah al-Ansar,”66 meaning Lion’s Den of the Companions.

Late 1985 saw the beginnings of bin Laden’s building campaign inside of

Afghanistan. This campaign proved to be both rewarding and difficult for bin Laden.

Construction commenced with the building of roads and tunnels for the aid and protection of the Afghan mujahedin around the Jaji area in Eastern Afghanistan. Osama then found a promising, unclaimed section of mountain top that overlooked Soviet and

Afghan communist units in the valley below. There were two reasons it was isolated and unclaimed by both enemy, and friendly forces. First of all, it was extremely exposed, and would become an exceptional target for Soviet artillery and air raids. Secondly, in the

64 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 61. 65 Interview of bin Laden by Arab reporter Isam Diraz in Afghanistan, quoted in Azzam, Lofty Mountain, 95. 66 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 61. 34 winter time, “rain and ice block the roads and prevent supplies from reaching the area.”67

It was above the snow line. To bin Laden it was perfect.

From 1986 through early 1987 bin Laden and his few Arab brothers began the construction of the exclusive Arab camp. However, Soviet artillery and bombing raids proved too dangerous and effective. To respond, they decided to relocate to another suitable location nearby. It was from this, the second location, that the Lion’s Den was born. As the days, weeks, and months continued, so too did the hard construction efforts of bin Laden and his few Arab brothers. It was difficult work high in the mountains above the snowline, and close to the enemy. However, bin Laden truly loved what he was doing, and embraced the struggle:

This period, when we were positioned close to the enemy, was one of the most

beautiful times that we spent in the Jihad, may Allah accept it. We lived in one

tent, built roads and dug trenches. We prayed together, we lived together and we

ate together. We took turns standing guard, but felt extremely lonely because the

place was frightening for both sides–for the enemy, because we overlooked them,

and for us, because it was so isolated and we were so few in number. None of us

was able to venture too far out from the tent because there were many dense

forests around us, and we were very close to the enemy.68

When the first tent was pitched at the Lion’s Den on October 24, 1986, there were just twelve members including bin Laden. These few Arabs had managed to build trenches,

67 Azzam, Lofty Mountain, 96. 68 Ibid., 96-97. 35 tunnels, cave systems, defensive fighting fortifications, anti-aircraft positions, as well as barracks and storage facilities.

However, six months later in April of 1987 the camp had grown to the size of about seventy fighters and included seven or eight actual buildings.69 It was quite an achievement. As the camp continued its expansion, bin Laden had his Arabs trained by either Sayyaf across the border in Pakistan, or by Abu Ubaydah and Abu Hafs (his real name is ), two new additions to bin Laden’s ranks who were Egyptian and had “significant military or paramilitary experience.”70 The trainees also received religious schooling because, after all, the main goal was to produce “’a coordinated and principled [military] group.’”71 This would be one more experience that would lead to bin Laden’s founding of al-Qaeda. But, first came a baptism by fire.

Because of the CIA’s secret war that ultimately provided billions of dollars, also matched dollar-for-dollar by the Saudis, and all other donations from across the world, the Soviets were in a quagmire. In 1987, the Soviets decided to increase their own budget and decided to strike the mujahedin where it would cost them the most. This was in the Afghan-Pakistan borderlands in a specific area, over which major supply routes transported about 60% of all supplies for the jihad. The most important routes consisted of one that ran from Parachinar in the Parrot’s Beak, to Jaji around the Paktia and Khost

Provinces of Eastern Afghanistan – right where Osama bin Laden had his lair. (It’s interesting to note whether or not bin Laden’s earlier efforts of construction with the GID accounted for this large flow of supplies over that specific area).

69 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 62. 70 Ibid. 71 Quoted in Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 62. 36

The time of the Soviet decision to ramp up its fighting in the Afghan-Pakistan borderlands, especially around the Parrot’s Beak area, came at the same time bin Laden, along with his men at the camp, decided to fight their own operation against the enemy

(not because they had intelligence reports and were trying to counter the Soviets, but because they were ready to begin their own engagements against their enemy).

April 17, 1987 marked the beginning of about a week of extremely intense fighting as bin Laden and Soviet troops clashed in battle; this initial conflict was followed by several more weeks of fighting that led into the following month.72 Although barely trained and with little-to-no combat experience, the Arab fighters resisted aerial bombardments that possibly included a Soviet incendiary weapon similar to napalm. Just as extreme, they fought and defended against Soviet special operations units – known, and feared, as Spetsnaz. During intense fire, “the Russians began to retaliate with their

AK-74 Kalakov rifles…the sound of the Kalakov is very distinct from the sound of a

Kalashnikov [AK-47], and it is well known that the Kalakov is used specifically by the

Soviet Special Forces [Spetsnaz].”73

As the Spetsnaz operators raided bin Laden’s camp, the Arabs engaged in close- quarter combat. It even came down to bloody hand-to-hand combat.74 With all the odds stacked against them, bin Laden’s Arab fighters – he amongst them – resisted the aerial and ground assaults; casualties were heavy on both sides. It’s important to note that this was a miniscule event relative to the entire war, and they did not defeat the Soviets; but they did hold their own until the enemy withdrew. Although it was not a major victory –

72 Coll, Bin Ladens, 302. 73 Azzam, Lofty Mountain, 117. 74 Roland Jacquard, In the Name of Osama Bin Laden: Global Terrorism and the Bin Laden Brotherhood (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002), 23. 37 arguably not a victory at all – bin Laden believed that God had saved and guided them in battle, saying later that Muslims would eventually see the Jaji battles as an important event, even victory, in Islamic history.

In the Jaji engagements, bin Laden took part in the actual fighting, and was said to have “fought in this battle like a private”75 by Isam Darraz – a reporter, and eyewitness to the battles. The battles did some very important things for bin Laden: it showed his men that he was dedicated, serious; it reassured him that he had been called to jihad by God; and, importantly, he used it as a marketing ploy to gain momentum for his agenda.

However, bin Laden had a long road ahead of him, as testified by a former officer of the

Pakistani Air Force, who fought with bin Laden in those battles:

In 1987 I participated in the Jaji battle. I was introduced to Abu Abdullah [bin

Laden]. First of all he’s not a genius. He was thirty when I met him. He prayed a

lot, always smiling. As a personality I never thought he would make a place in

history; he is not charismatic. He is not very intelligent, but he is the most

dedicated and self-sacrificing person to a degree that is unparalleled. He would

spend money like water. No one sacrifices like him. [At the time] he did not love

publicity; he used to hide himself.76

This testimony – a snapshot in time of bin Laden – effectively sums up his character and development at the time. Bin Laden was not yet the personality that would come to be known by billions around the world. He was a journeyman of global jihad who had much

75 Peter L. Bergen, The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda’s Leader (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006), 55. 76 Ibid., 55-56. 38 promise and seemingly infinite potential. Not much is known about bin Laden’s unit, or the battles they participated in for the rest of the Soviet-Afghan War.

Once again, as with almost everything surrounding Osama bin Laden and his elusive life, the origins of al-Qaeda and why it was formed remain just as difficult to put a mark on. It is of utmost importance to take into account that there are dozens of explanations of what al-Qaeda is and exactly how, when, and why it was formed; there are many accounts and sources that claim to outline those details; there are many details that are present across several sources; and no individual source can be taken as perfectly accurate. Al-Qaeda’s ambiguity and the difficulty of knowing details about it – its secrecy – speak volumes about it. It was created to be that way, and has done an excellent job.

During August of 1988, the initial meetings that would form al-Qaeda took place in Osama’s Peshawar home with the idea that time, money, training, and sacrifice spent in the Afghan jihad should not go to waste. Bin Laden and his colleagues, in a sense, were just trying to carry over the momentum into a post-war world. “The establishment of al Qaeda was discussed in the home of Osama bin Laden in Peshawar following the departure of the Russians from Afghanistan and the end of the Jihad.”77 The formation of al-Qaeda certainly did not take place over night nor in a haphazard fashion. There were many reasons for its development after the conclusion of the jihad against the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan.

Bin Laden along with Abdullah Azzam had worked diligently and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for their jihad, as seen through the MK, and other subsidiary

77 Ibid. 83. 39 operations. It is true that bin Laden’s al-Qaeda is a direct descendent of the MK ruled by

Azzam. But bin Laden wanted to take a new approach to jihad, building upon Azzam’s organization. As we have seen, he wanted to do what Azzam was against doing – creating and training an Arab militia that could be deployed internationally for jihad that was already taking place in such places as Kashmir and Chechnya. The camp where this training would take place was called al-Qaeda, or “the Base.” Later, the name ‘al-Qaeda’ no longer referred to a physical base where jihadists could be trained, or even necessarily an institution. It was an idea, an inspiration just as much as it was an actual organization.

Out of the Afghan jihad came a new brand of international jihad represented by al-Qaeda.

40

PART II

Some people have even claimed that it doesn’t exist.78 However, this group – what Westerners call “al-Qaeda” – surely exists, based upon substantial evidence. It isn’t exactly a simple physical base, group, or team. It is more of an idea, an intelligent international network with a core leadership, and a reflection of the conscience of its adherents.

On October 20, 2001 bin Laden was interviewed by renowned al-Jazeera reporter,

Taysir Alluni. When Alluni asked him about al-Qaeda, he responded by saying that “the situation is not as the West portrays it: that there exists an “organization” with a specific name, such as “al-Qaeda,” and so on.”79 He explained that the name “al Qaeda” – “The

Base,” – had come from a military training base that “brother” Abu Ubayda al-Banshiri had created to fight against the Soviets, and that the name “al-Qaeda” just grew out of this.

Bin Laden further explained, regarding al-Qaeda, that “we aren’t separated from the umma. We are the children of an umma, and an inseparable part of it…and so we are discussing the conscience of our umma.”80 According to bin Laden, that’s what al-Qaeda is in essence; it is an expression of certain Muslims’ issues about the West as well as

Muslim apostates. (The umma consists of every single Muslim in the world; not every

78 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 71. 79 Lawrence, Messages to the World, 119-120 80 Ibid., 120. 41

Muslim in the world would necessarily endorse bin Laden’s claims; in fact, Muslims who do not endorse his claims might be viewed by bin Laden as apostates themselves). Bin

Laden elaborates on this idea:

These young men that have sacrificed themselves in New York and Washington,

these are the ones that speak the truth about the conscience of our umma, and

they are its living conscience, which sees that it is imperative to take revenge

against the evildoers and transgressors and criminals and terrorists [United

States], who terrorize the true believers [Muslims].81

He has a very one-sided view of the world in this regard. He sees himself, and his umma as waging a defensive jihad against the “evildoers,” and “transgressors” of the world

(especially the United States), and al-Qaeda acts as the vessel for this defensive jihad.

At the inception of al-Qaeda in the late 1980s, it had four main subdivisions. The first basic subdivision was for military purposes. It “would field fighters – as individuals or in small groups – for training, advising, and/or combat purposes to places where local

Islamists were fighting insurgencies”82 while still keeping a veteran training cadre in

Afghanistan to continue the training of non-Afghan Muslims. It is important to note, and quite interesting, that al-Qaeda at this time did not specifically train fighters to attack targets of al-Qaeda leadership’s choosing. At the time, they merely trained advisors and soldiers to be sent to jihads around the world that had already been going on.

81 Ibid. 82 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 73. 42

The second subdivision was an administrative one. This particular administrative branch dealt with the finances – raising and receiving money, and dispensing it. Some of the expenses it met included acquiring weapons, dealing with various logistics matters, and documentation. Investigative journalist Camille Tawil mentioned that nine of the original fifteen founders were administrative experts.83 One of these was the Egyptian

Ayman al-Zawahiri (who is the alleged current leader of al-Qaeda).84

The third subdivision dealt with religious matters. Importantly, it created religious curricula to be taught to its sworn in members as well as the multi-national Muslim trainees who attended their various camps. Perhaps most importantly, this al-Qaeda committee drafted and issued fatwas, or religious decrees.

Al-Qaeda’s fourth subdivision was its media and propaganda wing. This particular branch was heavily influenced by, and built upon Azzam’s and bin Laden’s

MK.

These subdivisions, or departments were all overseen by a Shura Council headed by bin Laden.85 It was indeed a simple, yet highly sophisticated organization with the original idea of assisting, not starting, insurgencies across the Muslim world, in order to make local Islamic jihads, and insurgencies “better trained, financed, and led.”86 The idea was for local jihads to be started and led by Muslim nationals of that particular area.

Then they would help train leaders of those groups, or send non-national al-Qaeda leaders as subordinate advisors to the locals, giving them training and expertise. According to a

83 Ibid. 84 Camille Tawil, Brothers in Arms: The Story of Al-Qa’ida and the Arab Jihadists (London: Saqi Books, 2010), 29. 85 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 73. 86 Ibid., 74. 43 bin Laden and al-Qaeda expert – Michael Scheuer – who oversaw the CIA’s famous bin

Laden unit (code named Alec Station), “al-Qaeda’s method of operation has remained fairly consistent since 1988.” To be completely honest, their method is quite similar to that of the US Army’s Special Forces (Green Berets) who are sent to hotspots around the world to train locals into cohesive guerilla militias where they act as trainers and advisors.

The end of the Afghan-Soviet war created a power vacuum that would inevitably be filled, and the race to seize power was at full speed. The communist regime that was left behind by the Soviets didn’t last long. The most powerful warlords with the most potential included men like Ahmed Shah Massoud, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Haqqani,

Yunis Khalis, and many others. Moreover, Pakistan’s ISI was directly interested in

Afghanistan for its ‘strategic depth.’

Wishfully, bin Laden tried to unite all of the Pashtun tribal warriors with the Tajik

Massoud. He believed that all Muslims must unite in order to defeat their enemies.

However, bin Laden soon found out that defeating a superpower was easier than uniting fellow Muslim warriors into one group. In the end, it was the one-eyed Mullah Omar’s

Taliban who capitalized and claimed authority in Afghanistan – through force, not elections, I must add.

In 1989, bin Laden – still a loyal Saudi – returned home from the Afghan jihad.

The war had taught bin Laden about the necessity for jihad. It taught him that it was a forgotten duty of every Muslim. It deepened and hardened his belief in militant, Salafist jihadism which further narrowed his views allowing him to more easily isolate and determine the enemies of Islam.

44

Upon his return, he continued work for the Bin Laden Company where he constructed roads, tunnels, and buildings for various sites in eastern Saudi Arabia for the

Saudi regime. Although he worked for his family’s construction company, he was still at heart a man who saw himself as a Muslim liberator. At the time parts of Yemen, the true bin Laden homeland, were under Marxist control. He devised plans to use his Arab veterans from the Afghan jihad to rid Yemen of these socialists. However, in the “land of contrasts” – Saudi Arabia – his plans were shot down by the al-Saud royal regime. This deeply angered bin Laden.

This was just the beginning of bin Laden’s growing dissent against the Saudi regime. Over the next few years in the early 1990s, several events took place that led to bin Laden’s hatred for the Saudi royals, and declaration of war on the United States. The first such event was the jailing of two sahwa religious clerics. The sahwa, again, was a religious movement aimed at ending al-Saud corruption and bringing the Kingdom under full Law. “Shaykhs Salman al-Awdah and Safar al-Hawali…sent a ‘Declaration of Demands’ to King Fahd…and a ‘Memorandum of Advice’ to [the] Saudi Grand

Mufti” in 1991 and 1992, respectively. The communiques sent by these Sahwa religious scholars led to their jailing by the Saudi regime leading to further “internal religious dissent.”87 The jailing of these two men angered bin Laden and further motivated him in this Saudi reform effort.

As bin Laden continued his reform campaign inside of Saudi Arabia, he sent a letter to Prince Nayef – the Saudi interior minister – warning him of the potential threat

Saddam Hussain was to Saudi Arabia. Bin Laden predicted an attack on the Kingdom by

87 Ibid. 45

Hussain’s Iraq.88 As history has it, in August 1990 Saddam’s forces invaded neighboring

Kuwait. Bin Laden, at this time still loyal to the Saudis, quickly offered al-Saud himself and his Arab vets to fight Saddam’s tyrannical regime to ward off the threat to the

Kingdom. He was turned down in favor of the United States.

Al-Saud sought religious permission for the American troops to be stationed in the Arab Peninsula, and a fatwa was issued declaring it was acceptable, given the circumstances. Bin Laden couldn’t believe it. He couldn’t get over the fact that the

Kingdom’s grand mufti – its highest religious leader – allowed infidel soldiers into the homeland of Islam, the birthplace of the Prophet Muhammed. Osama did whatever he could to combat this sending letters, issuing his own fatwas, and warning the royals that once the Americans established bases on the Peninsula, they would never leave. Bin

Laden declared that America and the West were the true enemies of Islam.

In 1991 he left Saudi Arabia for Pakistan with the absolute intention of never returning. So began bin Laden’s self-imposed exile that would soon lead him to a permanent settlement in the rugged, mysterious Afghanistan.

He spent about a year in Pakistan as somewhat of a “peace broker.” He continued his efforts to mediate disputes between Afghan leaders – especially between Hekmatyar and Ahmad Shah Massoud. In the mess of the civil war that was taking place in

Afghanistan in the early 1990s, bin Laden’s hatred for the West continued. This had to do with one aspect in particular. After the last Soviet Russian soldier withdrew from

Afghanistan in 1989, the United States along with other Western nations were involved in trying to put in place a secular government in Kabul led by Afghans from many

88 Ibid. 46 backgrounds – sans the ones who actually “carried AK-47s and killed Soviets.”89 This angered bin Laden. Those freedom fighters – mujahedin – were the ones who fought and spilled blood for the liberation of Afghanistan from the iron grip of the Soviets, not the

English-speaking Afghan technocrats, lawyers, sophisticated elitists, and even some communists, who exiled themselves during the war. The latter were the Afghans the

United States and West supported.

After a short time in Pakistan, he ventured to the . Osama saw Sudan as a suitable location for “al-Qaeda to broaden the war on the United States.” It was from its base in the Sudan that bin Laden’s al-Qaeda carried out its first planned attacks fully directed at the United States. The first came in Aden, Yemen in 1992 where they

“bombed US soldiers in transit at the Goldmohur Hotel…killing three people and wounding five.” The second attack came in 1993 in Mogadishu. This was what has become famously known as “Black Hawk Down.”90 The attack was led by Abu Ubaydah al-Banshiri, a close companion of bin Laden himself as well as al-Qaeda’s head military commander.91 These attacks represent al-Qaeda’s international presence and outreach. It is also important to take into consideration how young al-Qaeda was at the time.

The downing of the Black Hawk helicopters in Mogadishu led to the withdrawal of US troops by President Clinton – something that “bin Laden later told me he greatly regretted, for he had been planning to force a war of attrition against them” stated the renowned, London-based Arab reporter, Abdel Bari Atwan. Bin Laden’s plan was to do to the United States what was done to the Soviets in Afghanistan. It was his intention to

89 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 85. 90 Atwan, Secret History of al Qaeda, 48-49. 91 Ibid., 49. 47 lure the United States into some kind of quagmire like the one that the Soviets experienced. He believed this was the best way to defeat the superpower.

In the beginning, bin Laden’s time in Sudan seemed as though it would be extremely fruitful. However, his time in Sudan was disappointing for the entrepreneurial international jihadi. Firstly, bin Laden created several businesses to try and rake in profits to help run al-Qaeda. It was also a time when bin Laden developed relations with the Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri – of whom he knew from Afghanistan – and who would soon become bin Laden’s second-in-command of al-Qaeda.92 He even hired group members as well as various other non-Afghan Muslims who had fought in Afghanistan.

He would send operatives across the Horn of Africa to reconnoiter favorable locations for an al-Qaeda presence. Interestingly, he sent one of his operatives, Khalid Fawwaz, to

Kenya where he set up the cell which would carry out the U.S. embassy bombing in

Nairobi in 1998. He disguised himself by opening an import-export business called

Asma in 1993.93

In Sudan, bin Laden was on his own. All the money it took to run operations and attacks came from himself and his businesses. It seems that his time in Sudan was when his youth and naiveté faded away.94

Bin Laden enjoyed life in Sudan. He settled his family there in modest accommodation, and sent his children to the best schools he could while also hiring private tutors who came to their residence teaching them “world affairs, math, geography, history, and . One of the [tutors] was a Moroccan, whose expertise was religious

92 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 91. 93 Ibid., 90. 94 Ibid., 87. 48 training.”95 He was very involved in their lives, and cared for them. It was in their new home of Khartoum that bin Laden began to see a place that he could settle his family while also waging jihad against the United States. According to some of Osama’s poetry,

Khartoum was his favorite city.

Bin Laden had finally settled down in his new country of residence while maintaining a low profile. However, and quite ironically, a group of takfiris from Al-

Takfir wa al-Hijra tried to assassinate him because they thought he was not “Muslim” enough.96 Death, though it seems, didn’t seem to bother bin Laden. Instead he embraced it while possessing the dream of dying a martyr’s death.

Before bin Laden left Sudan in 1996, he successfully grew al-Qaeda, taking it ever greater heights. He brought much of his core leadership to Sudan while leaving some in Afghanistan to keep up operations. He did this so he could set up camps with the same concept as the ones in the Pak-Afghan borderlands. Al-Qaeda also grew in confidence and in spirit. The attacks on the US military in Mogadishu taught al-Qaeda, as they saw it from their perspective, that the US military wasn’t as strong as people portrayed them to be; they shouldn’t fear them. Bin Laden believed that the “’American soldier was a paper tiger and after a few blows run [sic] in defeat…dragging their corpses and [sic] shameful defeat.’”97

It is quite baffling to see the contrast in bin Laden’s life. On one side, he was an extreme proponent of waging jihad against the United States with the goal of killing his enemy. On the other side, he was a family man who had a genuine love for life and

95 Najwa bin Laden, , and Jean Sasson. : Osama’s Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2009), 111. 96 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 88. 97 Ibid., 90. 49 nature. According to his wife, Nijwa, “since moving to Khartoum, Osama had more time for his children.”98 She said he spent many hours with them teaching them the importance of growing their own plants and vegetables. He even had an innocence about him, as described by Nijwa:

Osama’s favorite undertaking was working the land, growing the best corn and

the biggest sunflowers. He had seriously overworked his mind to discover new

ways of producing the largest sunflowers in the world. Nothing made my

husband happier than showing off his huge sunflowers.”99

Despite his hatred for the West, he still saw the beauty in life that perhaps all human beings share in some way.

As bin Laden’s al-Qaeda and magnificent sunflowers continued to grow in size, so too did his anger against Saudi Arabia. He formed the Advice and Reform Committee

(ARC), based out of London, in hopes to expedite the reformation of his homeland. The

ARC was focused on pointing out the corruption, and un-Islamic ways of al-Saud. He explained that they weren’t using their oil revenues to help the Kingdom’s people; that they were not imposing Sharia Law in the birthplace of the Prophet Mohammed and

Islam; and that their foreign policy was un-Islamic. He specifically called out King Fahd, saying he was a plunderer of the public wealth and the royal family overall were

“servants of the dinar [dollar].”100

98 Najwa bin Laden, Omar bin Laden, and Jean Sasson. Growing Up bin Laden, 96. 99 Ibid., 97. 100 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 95-97. 50

Bin laden wasn’t wrong in some of his appraisals of Saudi Arabia – especially regarding the spending habits of the royal Saudi family on unnecessarily luxurious items.

King Fahd had just recently acquired a completely customized Boeing 747-300 double- decker jumbo jet for $92 million. It contained an elevator, waterfalls, and a five- thousand crystal chandelier, among a myriad of other worldly luxuries. Oh, and just in case they were led astray from their religious devotions by the luxury around them, each room’s ceiling had an electronic compass, linked up with GPS, that perpetually pointed toward Mecca.101

Bin Laden’s ARC was fully committed to ending the then-current Saudi regime.

The royal Saudi family wasn’t alone in his object of anger. He also called out many

Islamic scholars for being quiet and allowing al-Saud to carry on with their un-Islamic agendas and lifestyles. He was especially fired by the fact that a fatwa that allowed for the US military’s presence was still in being observed. He finally concluded that “Islam was under attack by apostates from within and from U.S.-led Crusaders and Jews from without.”102 In other words, there was a near enemy – Saudi Arabia – and a far enemy –

United States – that threatened the existence of Islam. Osama believed his and al-Qaeda only choice was a call for defensive jihad.103

All the publicity bin Laden received from his ARC communiques put him on the

US Government’s radar screen, and got him stripped of his Saudi citizenship. To his surprise, al-Turabi – Sudan’s president – told bin Laden to leave Sudan due to pressure and sanctions placed by the United States because he was being harbored in Sudan. Not

101 Coll, Bin Ladens, 260-263 102 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 99. 103 Ayoob, Many Faces of Political Islam, 142-146. 51 only did he lose millions of dollars in businesses, investments, and loans, he lost his abode. Bin Laden was on the move again, and Afghanistan was the only place that would take him. Now more than ever did bin Laden feel the need to prove himself, and alleviate his humiliation.

On May 18, 1996 Osama bin Laden returned in a small jet to the land of Khorasan in the city of Jalalabad. He was received by all of his Afghan war companions –

Rabbani, Hekmatyar, Yunis Khalis – with open arms. “The depth of affection and respect they showed for bin Laden on his return is significant, and perhaps an early sign that no Afghan Pashtun tribesman – Taliban or not – would surrender bin Laden to his enemies.”104 The Taliban, who were then in control of much of Afghanistan also welcomed bin Laden with warm hearts. A high ranking Taliban member told bin Laden,

“’you are the Muhajarin [the early followers of the Prophet Muhammad] and we are the

Ansar [those who sheltered Muhammad and his followers]…you are not just our guests and we your servants, rather we serve the very ground you walk on’”105 Later on in July of 1996, Mullah Omar himself pledged to protect Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden couldn’t have been in a better place to wage his international jihad. His expulsion from Sudan was likely a blessing in disguise.

On August 23, 1996 Osama bin Laden declared war on the United States of

America. His declaration was published in Al-Quds al-Arabi, a London-based Arab daily newspaper as well as other avenues to get his word out. He saw the United States as the main problem. Bin Laden came to the conclusion that the corruption of al-Saud and the

104 Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 106. 105 Abu Musab al-Suri, “A drama of faith and jihad: The Mujahedin (Arabs-al-Qaida) and Ansar (Afghans- Taleban),” OSC Summary, October 16-17, 2009, quoted in Scheuer, Osama Bin Laden, 106. 52 activities of Islam’s other main enemies – like Israel and tyrannical regimes in the

Muslim world – continued to exist because of United States support for them monetarily, militarily, and politically.106 He now shifted his energies of himself and al-Qaeda toward the puppeteer, not the puppet – to defeat the “near enemy” you must defeat the “far enemy,” bin Laden would likely profess.

Just like any great commander-in-chief, general, or warlord, bin Laden had set forth specific war aims for his jihad against the United States. He laid out three simple and specific war aims. The first was to remove the United States and its influence from as much of the Muslim world as possible. Second was to obliterate Israel and all Muslim tyrannies which were oppressing the Muslim people and lands (expressly al-Saud in

Saudi Arabia). Third was to “settle accounts with the heretical Shia.”107

He believed that the Muslim world could defeat the great superpower of the

United States just like it had the Soviet Union just years before. He saw that an anti-US jihad was absolutely necessary to defend Islam for six specific reasons:

1. The U.S. military and civilian presence in the Prophet’s homeland on the Arabian

Peninsula

2. Washington’s protection and support for tyrannical Muslim governments

3. Washington’s unquestioning and unqualified support for Israel

4. Washington’s support for countries that oppress Muslims, especially Russia, China,

and India

5. U.S. and Western exploitation of Muslim energy resources at below-market prices

6. The U.S. military presence in the Muslim world outside the Arab Peninsula108

106 Ibid., 111. 107 Ibid., 112. 108 Ibid., 112-113. 53

With his three war aims and six reasons for defensive jihad, bin Laden set the scene for his war against the Unites States of America. This declaration of war marked a serious shift in the way bin Laden saw the world. He bypassed all of the immediate threats inside of the Muslim world, and went straight for the “head of the snake.” This simple message would become casus belli for Islamic fundamentalists around the world.

54

CHAPTER III

“CHAOS, CHAOS”

Bin Laden wasn’t the only Muslim in the world concerned with the state of Islam and its place in the world at the time. That fact is obvious. There were millions of concerned Muslims. However, among these millions of concerned Muslims were a select type who had much more extreme views and ideas about how to solve the issues that were taking place in the Muslim world in response to many factors – the West in particular. While bin Laden was evolving during his adolescence, while he was aiding the struggle in Afghanistan, and while he was busy forming a jihad network with international reach, others were seeking ways of getting involved in jihad: forming secret

Islamist groups, discussing and philosophizing about the meaning of jihad and martyrdom, and actively searching for ways to reach “Paradise”. It was bin Laden’s web, the framework that he built, that allowed the “average” extremist to join jihad. In short, bin Laden had made jihad much more accessible.

Following the Afghan-Soviet War, there were thousands of Arab and non-Afghan volunteers who went home to a place of no work, and to people who weren’t as concerned as they were for Islam. Many of these volunteers either returned to

Afghanistan, fought in other jihads in Chechnya or Kashmir, joined domestic Islamist groups, or even formed their own cells or other networks. There were also many

55 concerned Muslims who were too young to fight in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. Many of these Muslims went to the dozens of al-Qaeda sponsored camps already in existence or that were put in place in the late 1980s, when the Soviets left, for the sole purpose of generating a worldwide jihad.

This group of younger Muslims also numbered in the many thousands. There was another phenomenon taking place at the same time, however, and it was just as alarming and powerful – perhaps even more so. This was the extremely rapid radicalization of young, moderate Arabs – some of whom weren’t even religious – into Muslims with a beyond-extreme militant interpretation of Islam. Many of these young Arabs went from relaxed, mainstream views of Islam to seeing jihad and martyrdom as the most important foundations of the religion. They found in martyrdom an express path to Paradise and identified it as the most favored, prized and glorious obligation of Islam.

One group of Arab men in particular who fell into this category of once “normal” men quickly radicalized into martyrdom-seekers came to be known as the members of the

Hamburg Cell. The men of the Hamburg Cell made up the core of the hijackers that piloted the planes into the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center in New

York City, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and the field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001. The story of how these men came to hijack and pilot these airplanes is a long and complex one. It is a story that traces the lives of several men whose paths cross and fuse together into a powerful yet concentrated stream of hatred, determination, and belief.

The core members of what became known as the Hamburg Cell were Mohamed

Atta, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ziad Jarrah, and Marwan al-Shehhi. Each of these men came

56 from separate countries and had distinct and varying backgrounds. At the same time, they were very similar. Most of them were from the peripheries of whatever society they came from, or schools they had attended. Additionally, all except for bin al-Shibh had attended German universities. If anything, they were educated. Over the course of just a few years from the early 1990s until the morning of September 11, 2001, these men transformed with one another from individuals in a foreign, European nation, into a cohesive unit with the ultimate goal of achieving a martyr’s death by flying commercial jet airliners into specific targets in the United States of America.

Mohamed Atta, the supposed leader of the group, was born Mohamed Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta in 1968 in Egypt in its northernmost province, Kafr el-

Sheik, which lies in Egypt’s “breadbasket” – the Delta. This is where the Nile splinters off into a myriad of channels, streams, and tributaries as it seeps its way into the

Mediterranean Sea. Atta was the son of Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta and

Bouthayna Mohamed Mustapha Sheraqi.109 In order to best understand Mohamed Atta, or who and what he became to be, it is of great importance to explore and understand his early life and family background.

Amir, as he was known to by friends and family (Mohamed Atta was the name given to him by the US Government on the visa he obtained in preparation for the attacks that took place on 9/11, and the name he is most commonly known by in the West), showed no signs of radical Islamic ideals, motivations, or views at a young age or even in his early college years, for that matter. Whereas bin Laden’s radicalization process was gradual throughout his lifetime, Atta’s was apparently very sudden. He spent the first

109 Terry McDermott, Perfect Soldiers: The 9/11 Hijackers: Who They Were, Why They Did It (New York: Harper, 2006), 10. 57 two-thirds or so of his life fairly moderately, both in terms of religion as well as every- day life. It was the final decade of his life that saw the most rapid, extreme radicalization, and it occurred exclusively during his life in and exposure to the West.

Atta’s father was from humble roots, much more so than his mother. He was born in a rural part of Egypt on the periphery of civilization. However, by the time of Atta’s birth he was already an established lawyer who had degrees in both civil and Sharia Law.

His mother came from a much different background. “As the daughter of a wealthy farming and trading family, she came from several rungs up the social ladder.”110 Their marriage was an arranged one, and allowed them to be part of Egypt’s prominent, growing middle class.

The patriarchal Mohamed was an extremely private and strict individual who kept his family under his tight control. He was private beyond what is normal in the usually communal culture that Arab families and neighbors share. The father had very few relatives, and established a rather distant relationship, or lack thereof, with Bouthayna’s family. According to Bouthayna’s sister Hamida, those were his wishes.111 They very much kept to themselves.

Hamida said that her family wasn’t particularly religious, and neither was Atta’s family, though they still identified themselves as Muslims. “They were part of the secular generation that grew up in Gamal Abdel Nasser’s Egypt, when the country’s future did not seem as bound to the past as it does today.”112 Atta’s father was an

“austere” man devoted to his law practice which excelled in Kafr el-Sheik. Despite his

110 Ibid. 111 Ibid. 112 Ibid., 11. 58 successes, he wasn’t completely satisfied. “He wanted to be famous” declared his sister- in-law, and so moved his family from Kafr el-Sheik in Egypt’s north to its beautiful, ancient metropolis of Cairo.

This move took place when young Atta was ten years old. His family settled into

Cairo’s middle class. They weren’t the tenants of the poor, cramped quarters of society nor of the sleek, secular, or modern neighborhoods of Cairo’s upper class. Mohamed, the father, leased a rather large and spacious flat occupying an entire floor in an older apartment, “a once grand, now faded, quarter [of Cairo] near the old financial and government centers.”113 The apartments were the leftovers of British colonial rule that officially ended in 1952, and had “lobbies…paved with rich marbles and limestones, but…tiles were chipped and broken with shards swept up into small piles in the corners.”114 It was still a very nice place to live – too expensive for Cairo’s poor; too outdated for the rich.

Mohamed was a frugal man who, although wanting to be part of upper society, spent his money sparingly keeping the family within their means, albeit still quite comfortably. His choice of living in a “faded” neighborhood allowed for a large home in which “all three children [enjoyed] their own rooms, a rarity.”115 He even had enough money to afford the family a quaint Mediterranean vacation home on Egypt’s northern coast. Despite this picture perfect set-up, Mohamed’s children didn’t enjoy any sort of leisurely childhood. His children had absorbed his ambition and passion for working hard.

113 Ibid., 12. 114 Ibid. 115 Ibid. 59

Sadly, and likely to any young child’s detriment, young Atta and his sisters were not allowed to play outside, or hang out with friends – there were no friends. Like any young boy his age would do, however, Atta did whatever he could to make time for companions:

Young Mohamed’s [Atta] room looked out the back of the building, over

rooftops and into a tangle of wires and adjacent windows. Neighbors said he used

his window for clandestine conversations with neighbor boys. This was

playtime.116

One of their neighbors recalled that their walk to school, just 100 meters away from the house, was timed and that if they were not home by a specific time, their father would go out and call for them. They were a closed off family, “like a set of rings interlocked with one another. They didn’t visit and weren’t visited” said their neighbor Mohamed Gamel

Khamees.117 Speaking of their apartment, Khamees noted that “not even the flies entered there…not even the flies.”118

While Atta’s father seemed to be strict with his children when it came to relationships with friends and neighbors, he was even more so with his children’s education. Bouthayna’s sister Hamida said that “it was a house of study. No playing, no entertainment. Just study.”119 And study they did. Mohamed’s children, perhaps to no surprise, were superior students.

116 Ibid., 13. 117 Ibid., 14. 118 Ibid. 119 Ibid., 13. 60

The university system in Egypt, at least in the 1980s, was much different from its

American counterpart. In Egypt, admission to university is based on national tests alone.

From there a student is enrolled, typically, into a five year degree program in which the first year acts as a filter, directing students to different areas of study – whether they like it or not – depending on how they do that first year. Young Atta excelled in his preparatory year and was enrolled into the engineering program, “one of the most venerable and prestigious departments.”120

Even more impressively, Atta was assigned to the architecture program which is reserved for the highest scoring students inside the engineering department. However, it was with architecture that Atta began to have difficulties academically. His close friend at the time, Mohamed Rafei, said he wasn’t very creative and had troubles with the design and creative aspects of architecture, but excelled when it came to the more concrete aspects of the subject. Rafei said “you would recognize him more as an engineer than an architect.”121

While Atta was in attendance at Cairo University the Muslim Brotherhood, with

Egypt as its birthplace, conducted major recruiting campaigns there. However, Atta stayed away from political Islamic activity and largely skipped out on much of the

“Islamic awakening” that took place in the Arab world in the 1980s. His decision to keep out of Brotherhood activism was due in large part to his father, and upbringing. His father wanted his children to have nothing to do with political Islam – he was very much part of the Egyptian secular camp, although a devout Muslim. Instead he encouraged

120 Ibid., 15. 121 Ibid., 15-16. 61

Atta to focus on other things; for instance Atta attended the American University of Cairo to work on his English.

Atta graduated in 1992 in the middle of his class, a rank too low to get him into

Cairo University’s prestigious graduate school. His father drilled into him that in order to be successful he had to receive a doctorate degree. In an October 2001 interview, Atta’s father said “I told him I needed to hear the word ‘doctor’ in front of his name. We told him your sisters are doctors and their husbands are doctors and you are the man of the family.”122 His father urged him to apply for graduate schools abroad, and knew it would be difficult for Atta to do so:

My son is a very sensitive man; he is soft and was extremely attached to his

mother. I almost tricked him to go to Germany to continue his education.

Otherwise, he never wanted to leave Egypt…he didn’t want to go. By pure

coincidence, a friend of mine had visitors from Germany…I invited them to

dinner, and Mohamed was the king of the evening because he spoke German

fluently.123

Just two weeks after, Atta found himself in Hamburg – alone.

In retrospect, it may seem the elder Mohamed made a dire mistake in virtually forcing his son to go to Germany to continue his postgraduate studies, but the fault isn’t his. It was in Germany that the “soft,” and “sensitive” Atta turned into a hard militant

Muslim with the ultimate goal of reaching paradise via suicidal martyrdom. Atta reached

122 Jim Yardley, “Portrait of a Terrorist,” New York Times, October 10, 2001. 123 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 19. 62

Hamburg in the summer of 1992 and lived with the Germans whom he met back home in

Egypt days prior. In a way eerily similar to the life of fellow Egyptian Sayyid Qutb – who was executed in 1966 – Atta, when he left home to study in a Western country, chose to adhere to Islam and not let the temptations of Western culture steer him onto a forbidden path.

Although Atta and his family in Egypt were only moderately Muslim and considered themselves secular by Egyptian standards, their “moderate” practice of religion was far more serious than the religiosity of the majority of Germans.124 Simply put, Atta’s level of religious piety would be considered normal in Egypt, but high in

Germany. His newfound religious piety saw him praying at a mosque five times a day, and restricting himself to a halal diet of no pork and no alcohol.

Like Qutb, Atta had quite a rude awakening to the Western world. The things one might find in a place like Las Vegas, like prostitution, strip clubs, bars, and drugs, were common-place in the city of Hamburg. The Al Quds mosque, where the Hamburg Cell was forged, was in the city’s “red-light district.” Perhaps this constant exposure to such taboo vices kept Atta and his close friends that much more focused on their religion.

However, at the same time, Germany was very accommodating to foreigners and readily provided education and welfare. In the spring on 1993, Atta moved out of the home of the German family, by mutual agreement. The lady he was living with explained how Atta was very close-minded, especially when it came to religion. In one such religious discussion she and Atta had, she explained how Islam’s and Christianity’s roots were somewhat intertwined. He would answer with a “yes,” but quickly state that

124 Ibid., 20. 63

“what is written in the Qur’an is the truth, and, more importantly, the only truth.”125 Atta didn’t seem to be in a place, or country, that he truly wanted to be in – a theme that could be traced throughout his time in the West.

After the agreement to move out of the German family’s home, Atta found himself enrolled at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg (TUHH) in an urban planning program. Here, he stayed in a student housing complex at Centrumshaus on the third floor. He had had problems living with the German family who took him in upon arrival, but at TUHH he was the root of many more problems. According to interviews by author and expert on the Hamburg Cell, Terry McDermott, his former roommates absolutely loathed Atta. They had justification for this, too. Even after borrowing dishes to eat from, he wouldn’t clean them; he never cleaned the bathroom; and he would leave his food in the fridge, uncovered for weeks, affecting the taste of everyone else’s nourishment.

These issues seem somewhat insignificant, and many people around the world suffer the same inconveniences with roommates. However, Atta didn’t just fail to help with chores or fail to have consideration when it came to the refrigerator. It was his personality – “his complete, almost aggressive insularity”126 – that truly bothered his flat mates. A foreigner in an unfamiliar place, Atta seemed to despise his surroundings; and it made him seem depressed. His roommates took him to a movie – Disney’s The Jungle

Book – in which Atta sank down in his chair murmuring, in disgust, “chaos, chaos” due

125 Ibid., 23. 126 Ibid., 25. 64 to the “unruliness” of the crowd before the show even began. This “unruliness” was described by the roommate as “utterly normal conversation.”127

Atta even complained about the act of eating, claiming that “this is boring. Eating is boring.”128 His meals consisted of him boiling potatoes, peeling them, and then mashing them up and forming them into a pile on a plate. He would then “eat his little potato mountain” taking a bite here and there for over a week while it sat, cold, in the fridge. “He was reluctant to any pleasure” said one of his roommates.129 His room was bare, his Qur’an was always at his bedside, and he prayed five times a day no matter where he was. He often wore the same things everyday – most particularly a brown sweater-vest made by his mother, in winter a black leather jacket, and in his apartment a pair of simple blue flip-flops. “Amir [Atta] was so intense that [his] roommate once joked to his friends that he hoped Amir wasn’t back at the apartment making a bomb to blow himself up with.”130

Atta’s environment in a foreign country was taking a toll on him, and this environment was a main factor of his radicalization. Importantly, when Atta went back home to Egypt or any other Arab nation, he was a happy, “normal” individual. For Atta’s dissertation – the preservation of ancient cities in the Middle East – he traveled to

Aleppo, Syria to conduct field research. These research tours back to the Middle East,

Aleppo specifically, were positive for Atta. He wasn’t constrained by the culture or environment in Germany. “Here he was a different person – looser, more talkative,

127 Ibid., 26. 128 Ibid. 129 Ibid. 130 Ibid., 27. 65 animated, at times almost playful.”131 One of Atta’s fellow classmates who was also studying alongside him in Aleppo said he was like “a fish in water.” He was released in this environment.

Atta spoke about his dreams of returning, after graduating, to Egypt so he could

“help build neighborhoods where people could live better lives.”(S29) It’s easy to see that Mohamed Atta was truly a good person when he was home. It was his reaction to the environment in Germany and the West that revealed his evils. Additionally, after a brief stay of several weeks in Egypt as well as going on the Hajj in 1995, Atta returned to

Germany even more fervent and insular than ever before. He would have no friends and no interests other than religion. Religion had become the chief focus of Atta’s life.

After years of very hard work and determination, Atta began to lose interest in his studies. By 1996 he was very near graduating from university, but his newfound passion for Islam took precedence. His return to Germany marked a phase in which Atta began to fade out of the academic sphere he was part of at university only to appear more regularly at Al-Quds, “the most radical mosque in Hamburg,”132 where he was part of a small circle of friends and where he began to teach informal Islamic classes with a political flavor. All he thought about was Islam.

The following years for Atta marked his most drastic radicalization. Those coming years would see Atta deepen his faith, and narrow his interpretation of Islam. He stood out amongst his jihadist brethren as a decision maker, and his friends during the time remember him as “charismatic, intelligent, and persuasive, albeit intolerant of

131 Ibid., 29. 132 Ibid., 34. 66 dissent.”133 He began voicing opinions, beliefs rather, in anti-Semitic and anti-American tones. He went as far as believing in “a global Jewish movement centered in New York

City that supposedly controlled the financial world and the media.”134 His life, during this time, would intersect with others who would come to share the same deep, yet narrow interpretations of Islam, and disgust with the United States.

One of these men became one of his best friends. His name was Ramzi bin al-

Shibh, known to others simply as Omar, a name he adopted because it was the name of the Prophet Muhammad’s successor – the second caliph of Islam. It was also the name he gave to the German authorities upon his arrival in Germany where he sought asylum after he was denied a U.S. visa.135 In a brilliantly clever scheme, Omar convinced the

Germans that he was a university student from Sudan trying to escape persecution and that he had snuck onto a ship to flee. “There is no freedom in Sudan, no human rights, no respect for human beings,”136 Omar declared during his appeal. His application was accepted, and he was put on a waiting list and placed in a temporary camp with fellow seekers.

The scam that Omar pulled was one that many a non-German had implemented, and for a very significant reason:

What asylum seekers wanted most was access to Germany’s generous welfare

apparatus, which would provide them with free health care and money for food

133 The 911 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission On Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (New York: Norton, 2004), 134 Ibid., 161. 135 Ibid. 136 Ramzi bin al-Shibh, German Foreigners Bureau investigative report, quoted in McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 38. 67

and lodging, virtually forever. Gaining asylum would also give them political

status and access to a Europe-wide visa. Asylum, if approved, was a virtual ticket

to a new life.137

In reality, rather than being a Sudanese student escaping persecution via hidden cargo on a ship, Omar was a poor Yemeni with very big dreams. His lifelong aspiration was to study computers in the United States.

Ramzi Muhammad Abdullah bin al-Shibh was born on May 1, 1972 in Ghayl

Bawazir in the Hadramaut region of Yemen.138 As a young boy Ramzi’s father,

Mohammed, moved the family from their home in the farmlands of the southern coastal plains to the more modern city of Sana’a in Yemen’s northwest. The family settled in the working class neighborhood of Hasaba. Sadly, Ramzi’s father died in 1987 when he was just a teenager, and his older brother, Ahmad, was the new patriarch.

Even though Ramzi wasn’t the oldest son, he was the favorite child in the family.

Whenever his siblings would ask their mother why she favored him over anyone else

“she’d just smile”139 and couldn’t say. He was also his uncle’s favorite. Ramzi seemed to have a glowing, jovial, easy personality and was very mischievous yet never got into much trouble because he was so loved by his mother.

Similar to bin Laden, Ramzi was the most religious in his family. He was very active at his local mosque where he would teach the Qur’an to younger children, and he took his religious schooling seriously. During this time in the late 1980s, Yemen was experiencing an influx of radical Islamic energy. This was aided by the fact that Yemen,

137 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 38. 138 911 Commission Report, 161. 139 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 41. 68 over all other Arab nations, contributed the largest number of fighters for the Afghan jihad; and, once the war had ended many Yemenis returned and brought back with them their cultivated Salafist jihadi ideology. Although this phenomenon was taking place,

Ramzi didn’t partake – much like Atta in Egypt just years prior.

Instead, Ramzi was trying to help his older brother support their family. Ramzi took up a job as an administrative clerk – in other words, a messenger boy – for the

International Bank of Yemen.140 While helping to support his family, he was also trying to support himself. According to Ahmed, he was very ambitious and determined, wanting very badly to travel to the United States or Europe to study. The family couldn’t afford to help him out. In the end, Ramzi chose to go to Germany. “He never said why he chose Germany. Ahmed said he thought it was the one place for which he was able to get a visa.”141 Whatever the reason, Germany was where he ended up.

He definitely had some sort of plan, as evidenced by his lies to the German authorities about being a Sudanese asylum seeker. Ultimately, his appeal was denied – no asylum granted. So, he returned home to Yemen, applied for a student visa under his real name – Ramzi bin al-Shibh – and received it. It seems possible that his goal was to establish himself enough so as to obtain a US visa, but due to a number of factors known and unknown, he became focused on Islam instead. When he got back to Germany, legally, he stayed with a shadowy figure by the name of Mohammed bin Naser Belfas

(who also helped him with his initial arrival) who was an attendee of Al Quds. Belfas was a man described by friends as a “lay missionary who made it his task – one called it a

140 911 Commission Report, 161. 141 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 43. 69 mission – to unite the varied ethnicities and sects of Muslims in Germany.”142 Because of this, Belfas had many connections and knew just about everybody.

Al-Shibh somewhat came to emulate the lifestyle of Belfas, “devoting himself entirely to the cause of Islam.”143 It was within weeks of al-Shibh’s arrival in Hamburg that he came to find the Arab community that surrounded Al-Quds. He frequented an

Arab grocery store, a restaurant directly across the street from the mosque, and most likely even attended prayers at Al-Quds itself. It isn’t known exactly how he met Atta, but it is a possibility that they came to know each other through Belfas. Belfas knew Atta through another Egyptian student. At any rate, by the end of 1995 the two activists, young in their career, came to know one another. They soon became fast friends. Omar even shared Atta’s notion of a worldwide Jewish conspiracy, and together the two became more and more entwined with the pursuit of jihad – they saw it as the highest duty of every Muslim.144

These two friends became, ever more, part of a group at Al-Quds with the most violent interpretation of Islam. Beginning in the fall of 1997, Atta had completed everything he needed in order to graduate except for his dissertation. Without notice, he simply vanished from his university and academic life. Instead of writing his dissertation, he, Omar, and others who filtered in and out of the small fundamentalist circle at Al-Quds dedicated all of their time to discussing Islam and its many aspects.

Some of them even met in the back of a bookstore near the mosque to listen to and discuss songs and sermons about jihad. They more deeply than ever discussed the

142 Ibid., 45. 143 Ibid., 46. 144 911 Commission Report, 161. 70 meanings of Qur’anic verses and the significance of jihad and martyrdom. Islam was all they thought about; it was simply all they did.

Another addition to the circle of Al-Quds fundamentalists came in the latter part of 1997 with the introduction of Ziad Jarrah. Jarrah had arrived in Greifswald, Germany in April of 1996.145 Ziad Samir Jarrah was born on the 11th of May 1975 in Mazraa,

Lebanon. He seems to have enjoyed the most relaxed, leisured childhood of any of the other future hijacker-pilots. While his father was a bureaucrat in social service, his mother was a teacher from a wealthy family. Instead of riding around in old, used vehicles like Atta had with his family, the Jarrah’s rode around in Mercedes-Benz’s.

They lived in a densely populated neighborhood that was “just two blocks from the Green Line that divided combatants during ’s long civil war.”146 The family was secular in every sense of the word. Although they identified as Muslims they were not religious at all – “the men [of the family] drank whiskey and the women [of the family] wore short skirts about town and bikinis at the beach.”147 Very interestingly,

Ziad attended private Christian schools, which was more a sign of wealth than of religious belief. As an adolescent and young adult, Ziad was a playboy. His family said he was “more interested in girls than geometry.”148 Although he preferred girls over his studies he was still a smart young man, and, upon graduation from high school, was given the choice to continue his higher education either in Greifswald, Germany or Toronto,

Canada, in both of which places the Jarrahs had relatives.

145 Marc Sageman, Understanding Terror Networks (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), 105. 146 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 50. 147 Ibid. 148 Ibid. 71

Upon his arrival to Germany, Ziad was very much the same – he enjoyed student parties in Germany and drinking beer.149 Also, within a month of arriving he met the love of his life, Aysel Senguen, who would stick to his side – knowing virtually nothing of his activities – until the end. Jarrah’s radicalization process from a non-religious, secular cosmopolitan into a Salafist jihadi was also one that started somewhat gradually and then increased exponentially.

His first taste of a strict interpretation of Islam in Germany likely came from a man by the name of Abdulrachman al-Makhadi, a classmate of Aysel’s in the dentistry program at the University of Greifswald. Makhadi, a Yemeni, took it upon himself to enforce Muslim doctrine, as seen through his own lens, among other Muslim students who were studying at the university. He would pester fellow Muslims to attend prayer with him, at which he would ask for money that would be sent to Palestine’s Hamas.

Jarrah occasionally attended Friday prayers, although for more social reasons than religious ones. He and his friends would often times try and escape to go get some beers, but Makhadi would often keep everyone there until the early hours of Saturday morning, not allowing anyone to go.150 Whether or not Jarrah took any interest in this cannot be known, but his attendance and exposure to Makhadi’s preaching possibly provoked at least some thoughts and questions.

At any rate, Jarrah began to show signs of his radicalization by the end of 1996, mere months after his arrival. On his return back to Germany after winter break, Jarrah wasn’t the young man he had been back in Beirut, or in Germany during his first semester. He began reading publications and brochures in Arabic about jihad, and even

149 911 Commission Report, 163. 150 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 51. 72 discussed the subject of holy war with close friends.151 Strikingly, one of Aysel’s friends mentioned that Ziad said he “didn’t want to leave Earth in a natural way.”152 In early

1997 Jarrah was quickly becoming an Islamic activist with a narrowing interpretation, and early thoughts of martyrdom.

In September that same year, Jarrah moved to Hamburg to study aeronautical engineering at TUHH. This decision seemed to have come out of nowhere, and to

Aysel’s surprise; Jarrah told her it was the only school he was accepted into after completing his basic German language courses. This, however, was false. He was accepted to Greifswald’s dental program and biochemistry program. It seems possible that his decision to go to Hamburg was for reasons relating to his newfound activism.

Makhadi had connections with people at Al-Quds and was going to Hamburg for an internship. Also, one of Jarrah’s good friends, Bashir Musleh, had met some students from Hamburg through a job the previous year and he too was moving there. It seems very likely he wanted to join them. After all, “in Greifswald, there had essentially been one radical Islamist – Makhadi. In Hamburg, there were dozens, maybe hundreds.”153

When he arrived in Hamburg with Musleh, they moved into an apartment with an older student from Sudan named Abbas Tahir who was himself someone “fully immersed in the broad circles of fundamentalist Islam throughout Germany.”154 He would also become sort of a confidant and mentor to Jarrah over the months. It was at Al-Quds that

Jarrah first met Ramzi bin al-Shibh, and began to grow very close with the others in that particular circle of budding Salafi jihadism.

151 911 Commission Report, 163. 152 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 53. 153 Ibid. 154 Ibid. 73

The next significant figure on the path to 9/11 also joined the circle in 1997.

Marwan al-Shehhi, perhaps unsurprisingly, was not the radical he came to be when he first entered Germany to pursue his studies. He was born on the 9th of May 1978 in Ras al-Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates.155 Although the U.A.E. is often known to be a very wealthy country, there are many parts that are poor. The Ras al-Khaimah Emirate was one of those poor areas. Al-Shehhi was from a background more similar to bin al-

Shibh than that of Atta or Jarrah. His home and neighborhood were very modest. He was also from a more religious background than the others as his father was the muezzin

– the one made the call to prayer – at the local mosque which adjoined with their home.

Locals later said that Marwan would make the calls whenever his father couldn’t.

After graduating high school in 1995, Shehhi soon joined the U.A..E army. After his initial training with the army, he was rewarded a scholarship from the army to study in Germany. He arrived in Bonn in the spring of 1996 where he took a German language course, customary for all non-German speaking students who came to study.156

Although he passed all his preparatory classes, he did so in a struggling manner even though he put forth much effort. Sadly, his father passed away in the spring of 1997.

While a young student in Bonn, he attended Friday prayers every week and did his best to “abide by the tenets of Islam.”157 Much like an Atta, or a Qutb, al-Shehhi didn’t participate in the tempting vices easily found in the West, and in German cities.

He annoyed some of his fellow Arab friends in Bonn who sought women and booze by not partaking in such activities. He ate no pork, and drank no alcohol. He even would

155 911 Commission Report, 162. 156 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 55. 157 Ibid., 56. 74 not attend restaurants that served either. He seemed to be somewhat of the outcast among his circle of friends in Bonn. “Rather than relaxing his attitudes as he settle into German life, Shehhi became stricter.”158 Al-Shehhi followed the same trend, as had Atta, al-

Shibh, and Jarrah, that was taking place amongst young, moderate men who were foreigners in a Western country.

He requested of the U.A.E. embassy in Germany that he be able to move to

Hamburg to study, instead of at Bonn. He request was granted and he moved to

Hamburg in early 1998. He moved in with Atta and bin al-Shibh whom he seemed to know upon arrival, and the reasons for this remain unclear.159 His moving in with Atta and bin al-Shibh seemed to catalyze his Islamic fundamentalism. Accordingly, “he was immediately accepted into the Hamburg group, and his personality brightened considerably.”(S56) Whereas he was unhappy in Bonn, he thrived in Hamburg.

According to al-Shehhi’s friends and people who knew him, he was a great person to be around. According to Shahid Nickels, a South African convert to Islam who was familiar with Al-Quds frequenters, Marwan was:

Dreamy, lumbering, slow, docile, slightly spoiled, an easygoing bon vivant and

romantic. He was friendly, always in a good mood, well-educated, humorous,

and sometimes a little clumsy…He never spoke negatively about others and

never used a negative word. He never looked stressed…He radiated a sense of

calm.160

158 Ibid. 159 911 Commission Report, 162. 160 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 54. 75

By the year 1997 the four core members that would make up the Hamburg Cell were settling into their ever-increasing radical lives. Over time, in just a few years for that matter, those four men – Mohamed Atta, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Marwan al-Shehhi, and

Ziad Jarrah – would grow together in their beliefs and desire to wage jihad against those whom they interpreted as enemies of Islam.

76

CHAPTER IV

“THE PLANES OPERATION”

While Atta, Jarrah, bin al-Shibh, and al-Shehhi were going about their lives in

Germany discussing jihad, martyrdom, and the Qur’an, others around the world who shared similar Islamist views were plotting ways in which to attack the United States of

America in its homeland. In short, there were other fundamentalists in the world who had aspirations of attacking the United States at home or its interests abroad, and for various reasons and motivations. Quite interestingly, al-Qaeda, even by the middle to latter part of the 1990s, had succeeded in setting up a structural framework, or web that spanned the globe. With bin Laden at the top of this lattice, various contacts – al-Qaeda affiliated or independent – could pitch ideas and operations of all sizes, shapes, and colors to bin Laden himself. Depending on whether their motives and agendas aligned with bin Laden’s or not, Osama would choose whether to endorse a proposition, which could mean giving them the necessary resources required for such an operation, whatever it may be.

One such proposition was pitched to Osama bin Laden by an entrepreneur of terrorism – Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.161 What Sheikh Mohammed pitched to bin

Laden was what became known amongst al-Qaeda as “the ‘planes operation’”162 and

161 911 Commission Report, 145-154. 162 Ibid., 154. 77 what would materialize into the attacks that took place in the United States on September,

11 2001.

In 1965 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was born to Mohammed Ali Doustin Baluchi and his wife, Halema, who had moved from the Baluchistan region of Pakistan to Kuwait in the early 1950s because of the oil boom.163 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed grew up the smartest of the children in the family. He excelled in school, especially in the sciences.

In 1981, at the age of 16 years old, and shortly after the death of his father, Khalid joined the Muslim Brotherhood. Pan-Arab nationalism had largely failed in the region after the

1967 war against Israel. Religion, oftentimes extreme interpretations, filled the void.

One of Sheikh Mohammed’s older brothers, Zahed, had planned on going to graduate school in the United States. However, because they were Baluchi and not

Kuwaiti, they couldn’t receive government scholarships. Instead, the family decided to send the younger Khalid, using their own funds, because he was extremely intelligent. It also made sense: Khalid always wanted to go to the United States to earn a doctorate anyway.

In 1984, at the age of 19, Sheikh Mohammed was enrolled for classes at Chowan

College in North Carolina. Much like the young activists who studied and lived in

Germany in the 1990s, Khalid followed an Islamic path and associated with fellow

Muslims and Arabs who were at the school. He did not speak out against Americans or the West, but rather kept to himself. After being enrolled in a pre-engineering track for one semester, Khalid transferred to North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State

163 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 108. 78

University in Greensboro, North Carolina. From there he would graduate as a mechanical engineer.

Very interestingly, Khalid’s exposure to the United States, and his interpretations of his experience in America, changed him. However, it wasn’t the United States itself but the nation’s foreign policy support of Israel in the Arab region that bothered him.164

His three brothers, Aref, Zahed, and Abed, had moved to Peshawar to support the Afghan jihad full time. Mohammed, during a summer vacation, had visited to help them out – something not uncommon for Muslim students studying abroad to do when home on vacation. Speaking about Khalid’s evolving radicalization, one of his high school teachers, Dabbous, said that his time in America had caused him to believe that “most

Americans don’t like Arabs and Islam.”165 When his former teacher asked why he thought that Americans felt that way, Sheikh Mohammed said it was because of Israel.

Dabbous told him that this was false and that not all Americans were anti-Arab or anti-

Muslim. “’No,’” Khalid answered him, “’my ideas are very strong. Don’t talk with me again about this matter.’”166

Sheikh Mohammed immediately moved to Pakistan after graduating in December of 1986 to aid with the Afghan-Soviet war. Much like Osama bin Laden, Khalid Sheikh

Mohammed cut his teeth during the Afghan jihad in the 1980s. Khalid Sheikh

Mohammed worked closely with Abdullah Azzam, just as bin Laden had. However,

Sheikh Mohammed and bin Laden did not work together at that time. From 1988 until

164 911 Commission Report, 147. 165 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 117. 166 Sheikh Mohammed’s teacher interviewed by Terry McDermott, quoted in McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 117. 79

1992, Sheikh Mohammed worked for a Sayyaf sponsored NGO that helped with Afghan mujahedeen, and even fought in the Bosnian jihad.

In 1992, Mohammed moved his family from Pakistan to where he worked as an engineer with the Qatari Ministry of Electricity and Water. His “official” international travel as a government employee also coincided with the “furtherance of terrorist activity.”167 He remained in Qatar until 1996 when he fled to Afghanistan to hide from U.S. authorities who were chasing him due to his affiliation to Abdul Basit – also known as – who carried out the bombing in the basement of World

Trade Center Tower 2 in New York City on February 26, 1993 killing seven, including an unborn child.

“Yousef’s instant notoriety as the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing inspired Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to become involved in planning attacks against the United States.”168 Sheikh Mohammed traveled to the with Yousef to begin plotting attacks against the United States. In his first attempt at planning an actual terrorist operation, he and Yousef created the “Manila air, or ‘Bojinka’ plot” as it is now known. The Bojinka plot was a plan to blow up 12 U.S. commercial jumbo jets while they soared over the Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately for them, their plan was put to rest when Yousef was arrested in Islamabad on February 7, 1995 – almost exactly two years after his bombing of the World Trade Center in New York.

As Sheikh Mohammed was settling into his new home of Afghanistan in 1996, so too was bin Laden, who had just exiled himself there from the Sudan. Both were in hiding, and Afghanistan was the perfect place to seek refuge. Although they had fought

167 911 Commission Report, 147. 168 Ibid. 80 against the Soviets during the Afghan jihad, they had never worked closely with one another. However, a meeting between the two in would change that, as well as significantly altering the course of history.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has since “acknowledged that bin Laden likely agreed to meet with him because of the renown of his nephew, Yousef.”169 At this special meeting, Sheikh Mohammed briefed bin Laden as well as his lieutenant and al-Qaeda’s military commander, Muhammad Atef, about the 1993 World Trade Center bombings, the Bojinka plot and several other plots in the works. However, and extremely importantly, he pitched an idea to the two men “for an operation that would involve training pilots who would crash planes into buildings in the United States.”170 That meeting was where the seeds of the 9/11 attacks were given to bin Laden, who had the resources to effectively nurture them.

In very much a mutual symbiotic relationship, Sheikh Mohammed sought out bin

Laden’s al-Qaeda because he knew they had the power, funds, and overall resources to put his ideas into action. And, in general he thought bin Laden would embrace and accept the idea. Bin Laden also had a violent resentment of the United States. Also worth noting is the fact that Mohammed turned down bin Laden’s offer to formally join al-Qaeda. He instead requested to remain independent. He was a terrorist entrepreneur, and he didn’t want all of his eggs in one basket; he still wanted to keep his options diverse.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed claimed to have become convinced of bin Laden’s seriousness and commitment to attacking American soil after the U.S. embassy bombings

169 Ibid., 148-149. 170 Ibid., 149. 81 in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. Sheikh Mohammed then began giving more time and energy to al-Qaeda helping in any way that he could. Bin Laden, “apparently at Atef’s urging, finally decided to give KSM the green light for the 9/11 operation sometime in late 1998 or early 1999.”171 Although he accepted bin Laden’s invitation to move to

Kandahar to work directly with al-Qaeda, he still refused to swear an oath of loyalty to bin Laden.172 It seemed as though he wanted to keep his autonomy no matter how insignificant it might become.

This proposition must have been revolutionary to the ears of bin Laden and Atef.

The original plan – it went through many revisions – was of impressive scale according to later interrogations of its mastermind. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed described an attack of monumental scale:

A total of ten aircraft to be hijacked, nine of which would crash into targets on

both coasts – they included those eventually hit on September 11 plus CIA and

FBI headquarters, nuclear power plants, and the tallest buildings in California

and the state of Washington. KSM himself was to land the tenth plane at a U.S.

airport and, after killing all adult male passengers on board...deliver a speech

excoriating U.S. support for Israel, the Philippines, and repressive governments

in the Arab world.173

171 Ibid. 172 Ibid., 150. 173 Ibid., 154. 82

The original plan was not received too well by bin Laden due to its complexity and intricacy. In short, bin Laden “was not convinced that it was practical.”174 A series of meetings over the spring of 1999 would shape out what would become the planes operation as witnessed on September 11, 2001.

The basic philosophy Sheikh Mohammed possessed while coming up with the planes operation was to strike the United States’ economy. New York City was a primary target because he saw it as the nation’s financial capital. He thought this was the best way to sway Washington’s foreign policy in the Arab world. Instead of using bombs and explosives – which he felt could be problematic based on what he learned from the

1993 World Trade Center bombings – he decided to implement commercial airliners as weapons themselves.175

During the meetings between Sheikh Mohammed, bin Laden, and Atef, they refined the operation. First of all, they narrowed down the targets. According to Sheikh

Mohammed, he wanted to strike the World Trade Center, bin Laden wanted to hit the

White House as well as the Pentagon, and they all wanted to hit the U.S. Capitol. Sheikh

Mohammed, bin Laden, and Atef were the only ones involved in picking these initial targets.176 Early on in the refining process, bin Laden selected four martyrs: Khalid al-

Mihdhar, Nawaf al-Hazmi, Khallad, and Abu Bara al-Yemeni.

Very interestingly, the planes operation nearly came to an end when two of the original four hijackers could not obtain U.S. visas; only Mihdhar and Hazmi, Saudi citizens, successfully obtained U.S. visas. Because of this, they had to “lessen” the

174 Ibid. 175 Ibid., 153. 176 Ibid., 155. 83 impact of the operation. They planned on blending their planes operation with

Mohammed’s earlier Bojinka plot: they would use Mihdhar and Hazmi to fly planes into

U.S. buildings, and implement shoe-bombers on flights to the U.S. originating in East

Asia.177 While this revised plot was underway, a miracle was on the horizon for bin

Laden, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and Atef.

In Germany, Atta, bin al-Shibh, Jarrah, and al-Shehhi were eager and anxious to join the jihad in Chechnya. A small window of opportunity that would change world history opened up one day during a chance meeting on a subway train. According to bin al-Shibh, he and al-Shehhi were approached on a train by a man named Khalid al-Masri.

While on the train, they struck up a conversation about Chechnya and the jihad there.

After this chance meeting, they decided to give Masri a call to express their interest in going to Chechnya to fight. Instead, Masri told them to meet with a man located in

Duisburg, Germany by the name of Abu Musab. Abu Musab turned out to be

Mohamedou Ould Slahi, brother-in-law of one of bin Laden’s lieutenants178 as well as “a significant al Qaeda operative.”179 After being contacted by the Hamburg group, Slahi invited them to come meet with him in Duisburg.

All but Atta journeyed to Duisburg to meet with Slahi. He ultimately convinced the four to travel to Afghanistan because he said it was too difficult and risky to enter into

Chechnya. He told them that “they could train for jihad [in Afghanistan] before traveling onward to Chechnya.”180 He instructed the group to obtain Pakistani visas, and how to

177 Ibid., 156. 178 Sageman, Understanding Terror Networks, 106. 179 911 Commission Report, 165. 180 Ibid., 166. 84 get into Afghanistan. He told them they needed to make their way to the Taliban Office in the city of Quetta where they were to find a man named Umar al-Masri (a code name).

In November 1999 Marwan al-Shehhi was the first to leave Hamburg for

Afghanistan. Just days later Ziad Jarrah, then Mohamed Atta, and lastly Ramzi bin al-

Shibh departed for Afghanistan. Close friends back in Hamburg took care of all their affairs to avoid suspicion, or knowledge of their absence and whereabouts. After being taken from Pakistan over the border into Afghanistan, the men went through al-Qaeda’s military training camps. Here they received basic military training, prayer sessions, classroom instruction, espionage techniques, cell making, bomb making, shooting rockets, and many other methods of warfare.

By the time the Hamburg group arrived in Afghanistan, Sheikh Mohammed and bin Laden’s planes operation had been revised several times. During Ramadan in

December of 1999, bin Laden “asked each of the Hamburg men if they would join ranks with him, pledge their loyalty, and – harder still – accept suicide missions.”181 Whatever went through each of their minds when asked this by bin Laden himself will never be known. What is known was that each of those men had spent years discussing martyrdom. They had debated the issue to its very core. It was something they sought; something they truly wished for. They accepted what bin Laden had asked.

The decision of the Hamburg men to come to Afghanistan could not have come at a more perfect time for Sheikh Mohammed’s and bin Laden’s planes operation. With only two out of the four original would-be hijackers obtaining visas, it likely wasn’t a difficult choice for the lead planners. Better yet, the Hamburg men were highly educated,

181 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 179. 85 spoke several languages – including Atta, who was fluent in English – and had years of experience in Western countries. They would have been seen as a better investment, so to speak, for bin Laden and Mohammed. They would be able to fit in in the United States much more easily, and their experience with higher education would have made them more apt to effectively train as pilots. It was rare to find the perfect combination of Salafi jihadism with extensive experience with Western culture, with a high level of overall combined education, and the aspiration to martyrdom.

Bin Laden sent Atta, Jarrah, and al-Shibh to Mohammed Atef to be briefed on the planes operation. Al-Shehhi, meanwhile, had fallen ill and went home to the United Arab

Emirates. Despite this, his ordering of a pilot-training video marked the “first concrete step toward fling in the entire plot.”182 After the other three received Atef’s briefing, they were sent to meet with Sheikh Mohammed for further instruction. He told them to return to Germany and apply for flight training schools in the United States. Atta remained behind until February 2000. He was chosen by bin Laden to be the group’s leader, and was given more detail, and instruction.

After they returned to Germany, they declared their passports lost to receive new ones. The reason they did this was to hide their travels; they didn’t want to raise any suspicion by having a Pakistani visa in their passport (this was a common tactic). They also applied for U.S visas. Atta, Jarrah, and al-Shehhi successfully obtained a visa. Bin al-Shibh, however, didn’t. He would apply at least four times with all attempts resulting in no visa. He was Yemeni, and the United States didn’t accept Yemeni applicants for fear of them being economic migrants. The two original would-be hijackers chosen by

182 Ibid., 180. 86 bin Laden who didn’t receive U.S. visas were also Yemeni.183 Despite bin al-Shibh’s failed attempts, he became the primary contact between the Hamburg Cell – while they were in the U.S. – and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.184

In early 2000, the successful visa recipients sought out flight training schools and programs. After contacting dozens of different schools, the three men – one by one – set out for America. On May 29 al-Shehhi left Brussels for Newark International, and checked into a New York City Courtyard Marriott on the 30th. He then moved to a Best

Western and waited for the arrival of Atta, flying to Newark International from Prague, five days later.185 The two spent their first weeks in New York where they possibly – and most likely – scouted out their targets: the North and South Towers of the World Trade

Center. On the 27th of June 2000, Jarrah arrived at Newark International, and flew to

Venice, Florida to immediately begin his flight training at the Florida Flight Training

Center.186

Atta and al-Shehhi visited a flight school in Norman, Oklahoma – the Airman

Flight School – which was a “favorite of Al Qaeda trainees…a fact well known to

American security services.”187 However, they didn’t choose to train there, but instead chose to enroll at Huffman Aviation in Florida which was only “a couple hundred feet away” from where Ziad Jarrah chose to take classes: the Florida Flight Training Center.

Despite Atta and al-Shehhi’s close affiliation with Jarrah regarding the planes operation,

“there is no record of anyone seeing them together.”188 This is significant. This evidence

183 Ibid., 193. 184 Ibid., 202. 185 Ibid., 194. 186 911 Commission Report, 224. 187 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 297 n.29. 188 Ibid., 195. 87 showed how dedicated the men were to completing their mission. They were close associates and spent a great deal of time together back in Germany, but didn’t make any contact while in America. That takes a high level of dedication.

While Jarrah rented a room by himself near the training center, Atta and al-Shehhi rented a small home in the town just north of where the flight schools were. The core three did an effective job at blending in as normal men who wanted to become airline pilots. They were clean shaven, wore normal clothing typical of the area, and consciously attempted to conduct themselves in a manner so as to not attract negative attention. Jarrah fit in so well that the president of his flight school, Arne Kruithof, stated

“’he was a friend to all of us.’”189 They did what they needed to do to complete their mission. They spent the next few months dedicated to furthering their flying skills, and lying low.

In August, Jarrah received a single-engine private pilot certificate. To celebrate,

Jarrah “departed on the first of five foreign trips he would take after first entering the

United States.”190 His initial trip back was to spend time with his girlfriend Aysel. She had no idea of his intentions; she thought he was in the United States to fulfill his dream of being a pilot, and to get away from his “old friends.”191 In December 2000, Atta and al-Shehhi completed their initial flight training, and “were awarded license certifications to pilot small, single-engine, commercial aircraft.”192 They were ready, and certified, to begin training on jet airframes. Atta and al-Shehhi spent hours renting small aircraft to

189 Arne Kruithof, quoted in McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 197. 190 911 Commission Report, 224. 191 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 188. 192 Ibid., 197. 88 train and further hone their skillset. They even spent a few hours on a Boeing 727 flight simulator.

Ziad Jarrah was supposed to be accompanied by bin al-Shibh to Florida where they, like Atta and al-Shehhi, would live and train together. Despite his absence due to unsuccessful visa attempts, bin al-Shibh did everything he could to help with the operation. Besides being the coordinator between the pilots and Sheikh Mohammed, he helped support “another possible pilot, Zacarias Moussaoui.”193 However, he and Sheikh

Mohammed both agreed that Moussaoui would be a “last resort.”194 Luckily, they found a suitable fourth pilot in Hani Hanjour.

Hanjour was an interesting addition to the pilot roster. In the 1990s he had planned to become a pilot for the Saudi Airlines. He trained at several flight schools in

Arizona until he obtained a private pilot’s license. Just months later, and with more training, he received a commercial pilot certificate from the Federal Aviation

Administration (FAA) in April 1999. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t get in to the civil aviation school in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia when he returned home. He ended up going to an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan to train (during his time in Arizona, he was in contact with several people known to have extremist Islamic views. It is possible he was influenced by them).195

He was identified as a trained pilot at al-Qaeda’s al-Faruq camp, and was sent to see Sheikh Mohammed in Karachi in the spring of 2000. He likely went through a similar process of meeting with bin Laden and swearing allegiance to him just like Atta,

193 911 Commission Report, 225. 194 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 204. 195 911 Commission Report, 225-226. 89

Jarrah, al-Shehhi, and bin al-Shibh. He would be included as the fourth pilot in the planes operation. After meeting with Sheikh Mohammed, he was sent to Dubai to see Ali

Abdul Aziz Ali – the main coordinator of funds for the operation – to set up a bank account. Hanjour, a Saudi citizen, received his U.S. visa on September 25, and on

December 8 traveled to San Diego.196

He was received by and lived with Nawaf al-Hazmi (one of the original would-be pilots) who was sent to California months prior. Hanjour partook in a refresher course at his old training school, Arizona Aviation, before moving on to simulator “training on a

Boeing 737 at Pan Am International Flight Academy in Mesa”197 in the early part of

2001. Despite his poor English skills, he kept his FAA issued commercial license and continued simulator training. By the end of March 2001, he had completed his initial training and began to make his journey, with Hazmi, to the east coast in anticipation of the muscle hijackers’ arrivals.

While Hanjour was training in Arizona in early 2001, Atta, Jarrah, and al-Shehhi took trips back across the Atlantic, and continued training when they got back. During the end of 2000, and beginning of 2001 the three Hamburg pilots ventured back to

Europe. After visiting Aysel, Jarrah flew to Beirut to see his family and see his sick father. He was back in the U.S by the end of February 2001. Atta traveled to Germany to meet with bin al-Shibh to tell him to notify Sheikh Mohammed and bin Laden that they had all completed flight training and were waiting for further notification of orders.

Meanwhile, al-Shehhi traveled to Morrocco.

196 Ibid., 226. 197 Ibid. 90

After these travels, Atta and al-Shehhi spent time in Norcross, Decatur, and Stone

Mountain, Georgia. While in Georgia they took further training with an instructor on single-engine aircraft out of Lawrenceville. Jarrah also spent some time in Decatur during the middle of March. According to the official 9/11 Commission Report, there is no explanation for their time spent in Georgia (they possibly were adhering to standard operating procedures of al-Qaeda operatives in foreign countries trying to avoid detection by moving around randomly, and periodically). As the summer of 2001 approached, the pilots awaited the arrival of the other hijackers. Hanjour waited with Hazmi in New

Jersey while the Hamburg men waited in Florida.198

The non-pilot hijackers, or hit teams, were to act as brute force when taking over the aircraft. They would be the ones to rush the cockpits, kill the pilots, and establish dominance over the aircraft. Then the suicide pilots could take over flight controls. Most of the members of these hit teams were Saudi Arabian citizens. This was bin Laden’s idea.199 It isn’t certain what his reasoning was for this choice. Obtaining U.S. visas would have been very easy for Saudi citizens so this could have been one reason. Also, because Wahhabi Salafism is common in parts of Saudi Arabia, it wouldn’t have been difficult to find willing applicants to act as hijackers. Perhaps another reason (a likely reason, in my opinion) bin Laden chose mostly Saudi hijackers was to damage U.S.-

Saudi relations. According to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, “they were selected by Al

Qaeda recruiters on the watch for vigorous young men with clean passports and a willingness to die for their beliefs. The Martyrs Battalion…was oversubscribed.”200

198 Ibid., 229-231. 199 McDermott, Perfect Soldiers, 220. 200 Ibid., 219. 91

The muscle hijackers were trained at al-Qaeda camps in hand-to-hand combat for the role of overpowering flight crews. They also apparently knew what their fate was.

They knew they were going to die a martyr’s death. Before leaving Afghanistan for the

United States, they each videotaped their eagerness to become martyrs in the operation.

They entered their “fields of jihad”201 – the United States – through airports in

Washington, D.C, Miami, New York, and Orlando. They all came in pairs; they all departed from Dubai’ and they all came equipped with “cash, credit cards, bank accounts, and some minimal idea of how to dress and behave in the U.S.”202 They were received by one of the four pilots who would act as their leaders. From their arrival until early

September 2001, the hit teams blended into the shadows of the United States’ East Coast.

They even bought gym memberships where they could work out and remain fit for their approaching operation.

As the date of the attack was soon approaching, everything seemed to be in place.

The four pilots – Atta, al-Shehhi, Jarrah, and Hanjour – were ready. The two Saudis

Hazmi and Mihdar, who were bin Laden’s original choice of pilots, had been in the U.S. for over a year and a half and were fully integrated with the four pilots. The thirteen muscle hijackers were in place. They all had obtained local forms of identification (i.e. driver’s licenses) to make purchases of airline tickets easier less suspicious.

On August 29, 2001 Atta called Ramzi bin al-Shibh to confirm the date of attack.

Ramzi summoned Zakariya Essabar to bring the message to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Afghanistan. “Zero hour, as they called it, would be September 11, a Tuesday.”203

201 Ibid., 220. 202 Ibid. 203 Ibid., 229. 92

Everyone involved with the operation, or who had knowledge of the coming attacks, moved into place. They knew it wouldn’t be safe to travel afterwards.

The week before the attacks saw the teams settle into their places in and around

Washington, D.C, Boston, or New Jersey, from where they would be flying. On the night of September 10, 2001 the martyrs prepared themselves for their mission. Atta, for unknown reasons, drove from Boston to Portland, Maine. A handwritten set of

“instructions, admonitions, suggestions, and encouragements” was given out amongst the nineteen men. It was written by Abdul Aziz al-Omari, who went to Maine with Atta.

Instructions for their final night contained fifteen specific points. “Vow to accept death,” it began, and ended by telling them to wash in the morning because “the angels seek forgiveness for you as long as you have prepared ablutions and they pray on your behalf.”204 The pilots and hit teams were well prepared on that last night: mentally with their belief; physically with their training and tools of war.

The early morning of September 11, 2001 is remembered as a particularly clear day in the eastern United States, a perfect day for flying. It was like any other early- autumn morning for many Americans. That, however, would soon change. At 6:00 a.m.,

Mohamed Atta departed Maine on a commuter flight to Boston’s Logan airport. Also that morning, Ziad Jarrah said his final goodbyes to Aysel; Marwan al-Shehhi made his way to Logan; and Hani Hanjour headed to Dulles.

At 7:59 in the morning, American Airlines Flight 11 took off from Boston with

Atta on board. At 8:14 in the morning, United Airlines Flight 175 took off from Boston with al-Shehhi on board. At 8:20 in the morning, American Airlines Flight 77 took off

204 Ibid., 249-251. 93 from Washington, D.C. with Hanjour on board. At 8:42 in the morning, United Airlines

Flight 93 took off from New Jersey with Jarrah on board.

94

CONCLUSION

The attacks that took place on September 11, 2001 ultimately took the lives of

2,997 people, not including the 19 perpetrators who directly carried out the attacks.

These people included men, women, and children from all walks of life. Some were rich, some were poor. Many had children, spouses, parents and dreams. Among them were janitors, flight crews, police officers, fire fighters, lawyers, interns, businessmen and women, security guards, and people of numerous other occupations. What they had in common was that they all likely thought that that Tuesday was going to be just like any other day.

The event that took place on that Tuesday was one that had been decades in the making. It didn’t just appear out of thin air. Instead, it was contingent upon something larger. In part, it was produced from the lives of a few key individuals whose individual paths all intersected with one another’s at a very specific moment, forming into a powerful stream of violence. These were men who came from backgrounds very different from one another yet they all shared something in common.

Above everyone else involved in the masterminding, planning, or carrying out of the attacks there are a select few who deserve the most credit, or blame. Osama bin

Laden, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Mohamed Atta, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ziad Jarrah, and

Marwan al-Shehhi all make that list. All of these men form the basis of the attack.

Sheikh Mohammed was the mastermind, so to speak, in that he was the one who had the main idea in his head when he met with bin Laden. Bin Laden was the piece of the

95 puzzle that allowed for the potential of the proposition to be made into reality – thanks to his al-Qaeda organization and network that had been years in the making. Importantly,

Atta, al-Shibh,205 Jarrah, and al-Shehhi acted as the vanguard to deliver the message to the United States.

It is extremely important to recognize that these few men weren’t the only ones in the world who held beliefs similar to those which made such an event possible. As bin

Laden said (as quoted earlier):

These young men that have sacrificed themselves in New York and Washington,

these are the ones that speak the truth about the conscience of our umma, and

they are its living conscience, which sees that it is imperative to take revenge

against the evildoers and transgressors and criminals and terrorists [United

States], who terrorize the true believers [Muslims].206

They merely delivered a message, albeit planned in secrecy, whose origins stretched back many years. That message was only catalyzed by these men – men who all had dissimilar backgrounds, but extremely homogenous aims.

Osama bin Laden, who was the oldest out of the group, had the most gradual radicalization process. It began at a young age at Al-Thaghr Model School in Saudi

Arabia with his eventual initiation into the Brotherhood. It slowly developed from then until the end of the 1970s when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. During the jihad in the land of Khorasan (i.e. Afghanistan), his radicalization process took a leap. He

205 Although al-Shibh didn’t make the final pilot roster, he was the main coordinator between the planners and attackers. 206 Lawrence, Messages to the World, 120 96 began to focus on what he saw as the un-Islamic ways of al-Saud, too. In the end, his beliefs developed into the idea that in order to reform Saudi Arabia (the “near-enemy”) he needed to defeat the United States (the “far-enemy”). His agenda into the 1990s and beyond focused on attacking and destroying the United States of America.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s process of radicalization was also quite gradual. He, too, joined the Brotherhood at an early age very close to the age bin Laden joined. The defining point at which Sheikh Mohammed began to hold a hatred toward the West, namely the United States, came during his experiences while attending college in

America. It was sparked by his perception that U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East unjustly favored Israel. He believed Americans hated Islam. Just like bin Laden, Sheikh

Mohammed cut his teeth during the Afghan jihad, in which he participated in with association to Abdullah Azzam. He then went on working with his nephew Ramzi

Yousef in planning attacks against the U.S. After Yousef’s arrest, Mohammed eventually found himself in a meeting with bin Laden, who had the means of sponsoring his plans.

Mohamed Atta, Ziad Jarrah, Marwan al-Shehhi, and Ramzi bin al-Shibh were quite different than both bin Laden and Sheikh Mohammed regarding the radicalization process. Whereas bin Laden and Sheikh Mohammed could be described as lifelong, or

“career,” members of the jihad business, the Hamburg group could be described as the

“grunts,” or enlisted ranks of jihad, albeit higher up the ladder than mere “muscle hijackers,” or suicide bombers.

Again, each of these four men from the Hamburg Cell experienced much different radicalization processes than either bin Laden or Sheikh Mohammed. Throughout the first two-thirds or so of their lives, they were seemingly ordinary Muslims. There were

97 differences, however. Whereas Atta was quiet and reserved Jarrah was a partier and a playboy. Despite those variances, they were still quite “normal.” They, in large part, skipped out on or ignored Islamist groups and Islamic activism during their youth. It wasn’t until they left home in the Arab world for higher education in the West – Germany

– that they experienced a radical shift in practice. Their radicalization process was defined by a relatively flat line for the first two-thirds or so of their lives. Then, in the last third all the way until the morning of September 11, they experienced an exponential jump.

Some immense forces were at play in both Western and Middle Eastern lands that made the conditions just right to produce young men with narrow, violent interpretations of an otherwise peaceful religion. At a very general level, there was the shift of power in the world that began during the middle part of the second millennium from domination by Islamic and Eastern empires, to the rapidly increased domination of the world by

Western powers. An even larger part was played by the formation of the “Modern

Middle East” that was created out of the ashes of the First World War. Their deeds can also be traced to the contemporary presence of Western nations in the Middle East which oftentimes seem to value its natural resources higher than its inhabitants.

The citizens of the United States of America were woken up on that Tuesday morning. We were exposed to the reality that there are people in the world who want to attack us, who want to strike fear into us, or who want to destroy us. And many didn’t know why. This thesis has attempted to explain how some of those attackers came to do what they did.

98

APPENDICES

APPENDIX A

GLOSSARY

Fatwa. A formal legal opinion made by a religious authority, or mufti on a matter of

Islamic law.

Jahiliyyah. The period of ignorance in the Arab world before

Islam was revealed. In modern usage it often refers to places of un-Islamic

behavior.

Jihad. “Struggle” or “effort” to make oneself a better Muslim. It is also interpreted as an

armed struggle, armed defense, or “Holy War.”

Jihadists. Muslim militants with radical interpretations of Islam who oftentimes use

violence as a method to carry out their agendas.

Mahdi. A prophesized divinely-guided leader who will come in the future to change the

world into a perfect Islamic society.

Mujahid. (pl. mujahidin) Soldier(s) of God.

Mufti. A religious authority competent enough to issue a fatwa or legal interpretations.

Salafists. Muslims who favor a return to what they see as the Islam of the time of the

first three generations of Muslims. They are known for their narrow interpretation

of the Quran, hadith, and sunna.

Shahid. Martyr.

Sharia. Literally, “the way to the watering hole.” Islamic law that governs all aspects

of Muslim individual and social life.

101

Shura. Literally, “consultation.”

Ulama. Religious-legal scholars of Islam

Umma. Worldwide community of Muslims.

Wahabbism. Fundamentalist, or puritanical Islamic reform movement attributed to the

teachings of Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab from the 18th century. It is the

official ideology of Saudi Arabia.

102

APPENDIX B

PHOTOGRAPHS

Mohamed bin Laden at a construction camp sometime in the 1960s. Born in the Hadhramawt region of Yemen, he traveled to Abdullah Azzam was the Saudi Arabia where he eventually became al- man who introduced bin Saud’s chief construction contractor. Laden to international (Coll, Bin Ladens) jihad. He was assassinated in 1989 and it is not known who did it. (Wright, Looming Tower)

Bin Laden in a Jalalabad cave sometime in 1988. This was around the same time as the founding of al-Qaeda. His time in Afghanistan saw him go from a devout Muslim, albeit with a fundamentalist interpretation, to a wager of global jihad. (Wright, Looming Tower)

104

Mohamed Atta was the leader of Ramzi bin al-Shibh was a the Hamburg men. He was only Yemeni who tried to fake his way moderately religious back home in into Germany as an asylum- Egypt, but became radicalized seeker. He failed to obtain a U.S. during his time in Germany. visa and wasn’t part of the final (nndb.com) pilot roster. He coordinated between the hijackers and planners. (hrw.org)

Marwan al-Shehhi came from a religious Ziad Jarrah seemed the most family in the United Arab Emirates. He unlikely candidate for martyrdom. traveled to Germany to study on a U.A.E. He was known more for his army scholarship. He quickly became a inclination toward girls and parties core member of the Hamburg Cell. in Beirut before becoming (berliner-kourier.de) radicalized in Germany. (al-munadi.blogspot.com)

105

Hani Hanjour was the fourth pilot added to the roster. Although not part of the Hamburg Cell, he was selected at an al- Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan due to his earlier pilot training. (wikipedia.org)

All 19 hijackers involved in the attacks of 9/11. From top left, Hani Hanjour, Mohand al-Shehri, Abdul Aziz al-Omari, Ahmad al-Haznawi, Mohamed Atta, Hamza al-Ghamdi, Ziad Jarrah, Majed Moqed, Khalid al- Mihdhar, Salim al-Hazmi, Nawaf al-Hazmi, Satam al- Suqami, Fayaz Banihammad, Marwan al-Shehhi, Saeed al-Ghamdi, Waleed al-Shehri, Ahmed al-Nami, Wail al-Shehri, and Ahmed al-Ghamdi. (flikr.com) Ramzi Yousef was the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He inspired his uncle, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, to plan attacks against the United States. (investigativereport.org)

106

The world changed on Tuesday morning of September 11, 2001 when the first attacks of that day began. This image shows Tower 2 of the World Trade Center being hit by the aircraft piloted by al- Shehhi. Tower 1, which was hit minutes earlier by Mohamed Atta, is seen engulfed in thick black smoke. (al-munadi.blogspot.com)

Only minutes after the attacks in New York City, the Penatgon in Washington, D.C. was struck by the aircraft piloted by Hani Hanjour. A part of the western wall of the Pentagon that was struck collapsed from the impact and raging fire. (wordpress.com)

The 9/11 attacks ended with the crashing of United 93, piloted by Ziad Jarrah, into a rural field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It failed to strike its inteded target of the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C. (911review.com)

107

Clouds of hot dust and debris billow over New York City’s financial

district in lower . This was the result of the Twin Towers’ collapse less than two hours after they were struck. The majority of people were killed in the World Trade Center attacks. (newenglishreview.org)

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the In 1996, Osama bin Laden declared war mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. He was upon the United States of America. born in Kuwait and became radicalized Five years later, he was able to get his from his exposure in the West. This message across. He was most credited picture was taken after his capture in with the 9/11 attacks and eventually 2003. (9-11comission.gov) killed by U.S. forces on May 1, 2011. (telegraph.co.uk)

108

The attacks that took place on September 11, 2001 claimed the lives of 2,997 victims.

109

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Aghai, Vahab. Terrorism, an Unconventional Crime. Xlibris Corporation, 2011.

Atwan, Abdel Bari. The Secret History of al Qaeda. Berkeley: University of California

Press, 2006.

Ayoob, Mohammed. The Many Faces of Political Islam. Ann Arbor: The University of

Michigan Press, 2011.

Azzam, Sheikh Abdullah. The Lofty Mountain. London: Azzam Publications, 2003.

Bergen, Peter L. Holy War, Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden. New

York: The Free Press, 2001.

Bergen, Peter L. The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda’s Leader.

New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006.

Bin Laden, Najwa, Omar bin Laden, and Jean Sasson. Growing Up bin Laden: Osama’s

Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World. New York: St. Martin’s Press,

2009.

Coll, Steve. Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden,

From the Soviet Invasion to September10, 2001. New York: Penguin Books,

2004.

Coll, Steve. The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century. New York:

Penguin Books, 2009.

110

Esposito, John L. Islam: The Straight Path. 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2011.

Jacquard, Roland. In the Name of Osama Bin Laden: Global Terrorism and the Bin

Laden Brotherhood. Durham: Duke University Press, 2002.

Lawrence, Bruce. Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama Bin Laden. London:

Verso, 2005.

McDermott, Terry. Perfect Soldiers: The 9/11 Hijackers: Who They Were, Why They Did

It. New York: Harper, 2006.

McGregor, Andrew. “’Jihad and the Rifle Alone’: ‘Abdullah ‘Azzam and the Islamist

Revolution.” The Journal of Conflict Studies 23, no. 2 (2003).

Rashid, Ahmed. Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia. 2nd

ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010.

Sageman, Marc. Understanding Terror Networks. Philadelphia: University of

Pennsylvania Press, 2004.

Scheuer, Michael. Osama Bin Laden. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.

Tawil, Camille. Brothers in Arms: The Story of Al-Qa’ida and the Arab Jihadists.

London: Saqi Books, 2010.

The 911 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission On Terrorist

Attacks Upon the United States. New York: Norton, 2004.

Wright, Lawrence. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. New York:

Vintage Books, 2006.

111