THIS FAR AND NO FURTHER
A Timeline of Events Surrounding the Radical Right's Attempt to Subvert American Democracy
Written and Compiled by Black Max
The Events Preceding 9/11
Page Two: 1995-1996
1995
- Sometime during the year, the CIA issues a classified National Intelligence Estimate warning that Islamic extremists likely would strike on US soil at landmarks in Washington or New York, or through the airline industry, according to intelligence officials. In 1997, the CIA will update its estimate to include Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda as specific threats for these attacks. In April 2004, CIA officials will disclose this information in an attempt to counter Bush administration charges that the CIA did not provide warnings of possible terrorist threats to US targets before the attacks of 9/11. The report specifically warns that civil aviation, Washington landmarks such as the White House and Capitol and buildings on Wall Street were at the greatest risk of a domestic terror attack by Muslim extremists, according to a senior CIA official. Deputy CIA Director John McLaughlin will testify in April 2004 before the 9/11 commission that by early 1996 his agency had developed enough concern about bin Laden to create a special unit to focus on him. "We were very focused on this issue,"McLaughlin says. (CBS)
"Operation Bojinka
- January: Operation Bojinka: As part of an investigation into a planned attempt on the life of Pope John Paul, an abortive plan to hijack a dozen airplanes and either explode them over the Pacific or ram them into various American targets is uncovered by Philippine intelligence. Yousef and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed are two of the plot's major planners. Another of the masterminds, Abdul Hakim Murad, had undergone flight training in the US. "Murad's idea is that he will board any American commercial aircraft pretending to be an ordinary passenger, then he will hijack said aircraft, control its cockpit and dive it at the CIA headquarters," one Filipino police report says. Other police reports connect the terrorists to al-Qaeda and the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, and state that another bombing of the WTC was in the works as part of the plot, "which called for the hijacking of US-bound commercial airliners from the Philippines, Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore and then crash them into key structures in the United States. The World Trade Center, the White House, the Pentagon, the Transamerica Tower, and the Sears Tower were among prominent structures that had been identified in the plans that...had [been] decoded. ...What is strange is that the United States agencies that took possession of the evidence...obviously did not take Project Bojinka seriously." The operation is far enough along that specific flights have been selected, and Murad has chosen to be the suicide pilot who will strike the CIA HQ. Murad received his flight training in the US. After the 2001 WTC attacks, Condoleezza Rice will claim that no one had ever dreamed that such an operation could take place. A Philippine intelligence agent exclaimed after the 9/11 attacks, "It's Bojinka," and later said, "We told the Americans everything about Bojinka. Why didn't they pay attention?" In an interview after 9/11, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed will claim that the 9/11 attacks were a refinement and resurrection of Bojinka. (CCR, CNN/Killtown, From the Wilderness)
Map of planned Bojinka routes
- February: A second al-Qaeda plot to assassinate Clinton is aborted when Clinton cancels his trip to Pakistan, where the attempt was to take place. (CCR)
- March: Belgian investigators find a CD-ROM of an al-Qaeda terrorist manual and begin translating it a few months later. Versions of the manual circulate widely and are seized by the police all over Europe. A former CIA official claims the CIA does not obtain a copy of the manual until the end of 1999: "The truth is, they missed for years the largest terrorist guide ever written." The CIA claims that the manual isn't that important, and that it had copies for years in any case. (CCR)
- Spring: After the discovery of the Operation Bojinka plot, a letter written by the terrorists who planned the failed 1993 WTC bombing is found on a computer disk in the Philippines. This letter warns that future attacks would be more precise and they would continue to target the WTC if their demands were not met. This letter was never sent, but its contents are revealed in 1998 congressional testimony. The Manila police chief also reports discovering a statement from bin Laden around this time that although they failed to blow up the WTC in 1993, "on the second attempt they would be successful." Despite these and subsequent warnings, security at the Twin Towers will never be improved to any significant degree. (CCR)
- April: A Time magazine article outlines a number of spectacularly destructive terrorist scenarios. Senator Sam Nunn outlines a scenario in which terrorists destroy the US Capitol Building by crashing a radio controlled airplane into it. "Its not far-fetched," he says. The idea originated in Tom Clancy's book Debt of Honor, published in August 1994. High-ranking al-Qaeda leaders later claim that Flight 93's target was the Capitol Building. (CCR)
- November: A pair of truck bombs kill five Americans and two Indians in a US-operated Saudi National Guard training center in Riyadh. Evidence links al-Qaeda to the bombing, and US investigators begin thinking of Osama bin Laden as a full-blown terrorist leader instead of merely a financier. (CCR)
1996
- An abortive attempt on the life of Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi is made by a Libyan terrorist group that takes its orders from al-Qaeda. A number of terrorists and innocent bystanders are killed. Evidence later surfaces that British MI-6 paid al-Qaeda $160,000 to fund the attempt. David Shayler, a member of MI-5, reveals the news of British involvement and is sent to jail, while the British press is forbidden to discuss the charges. While the British government has attempted ever since to cloak their involvement with al-Qaeda, it is well known that both British and American intelligence agencies are not averse to working with al-Qaeda for their mutual benefit. (CCR)
"Grand Alliance" between al-Qaeda and Saudi Arabia begins
- This is the year that al-Qaeda begins receiving massive amounts of funding from Saudi Arabia. One US official terms it the "Grand Alliance," and it is certain that with the new funding, al-Qaeda is able to significantly step up its operations. NSA agents characterize the Saudis as hopelessly corrupt, frightened officials who pay enormous sums to al-Qaeda and other terrorists to keep the groups from operating on their own soil. Neither the Clinton nor the Bush administrations are willing to confront this grim reality. (CCR)
- January: US intelligence gets information concerning a planned suicide attack by individuals connected with Shaykh Omar Adb al-Rahman and a key al-Qaeda operative. The plan is to fly from Afghanistan to the US and attack the White House. (CCR)
- January-May: Nearly all of the major planners of Operation Bojinka, including Ramzi Yousef, are found and arrested, with the notable exception of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. He flees to Qatar in the Persian Gulf, where he lives openly using his real name, enjoying the patronage of Abdallah bin Khalid al-Thani, Qatar's Interior Minister and a member of the royal family. (Had Qatar, a putative American ally, turned Mohammed over to US authorities instead of sheltering him and later tipping him off and aiding his escape, it's likely that the 9/11 attack would have never happened.) In January 1996, Mohammed is indicted in the US for his role in the 1993 WTC bombing, and in the same month the US determines his location in Qatar. FBI Director Louis Freeh sends a letter to the Qatari government asking for permission to send a team after him. One of Freeh's diplomatic notes states that Mohammed was involved in a conspiracy to "bomb US airliners" and is believed to be "in the process of manufacturing an explosive device." Qatar confirms that Mohammed is there and is making an explosive, but they delay in handing him over. After waiting several months, a high-level meeting takes place in Washington to consider a commando raid to seize him. But the raid is deemed too risky, and another letter is sent to the Qatari government instead. One person at the meeting later states, "If we had gone in and nabbed this guy, or just cut his head off, the Qatari government would not have complained a bit. Everyone around the table for their own reasons refused to go after someone who fundamentally threatened American interests...."
- Around May 1996, Mohammed's patron Abdallah bin Khalid al-Thani makes sure that Mohammed and four others are given blank passports and a chance to escape. Qatar's police chief later says the other men include Ayman al-Zawahiri and Mohammed Atef, al-Qaeda's number two and number three leaders respectively. In late 1997 former CIA agent Robert Baer learns how the Qataris helped Mohammed escape and passes the information to the CIA, but they appear uninterested. Bin Laden twice visits al-Thani in Qatar. After leaving Qatar, Mohammed takes part in many terrorist acts, including the 1998 US embassy bombings, the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, and others. (CCR, Strategic News Service/Smalla, Seymour Hersh)
Sudan makes possibly bogus offer to extradite bin Laden to US
- March: The Sudan offers to extradite Osama bin Laden to the US or anywhere the US designates. It is unclear whether the Sudan's offer is legitimate or not, but one version has it that the US chooses not to extradite bin Laden because it feels there isn't enough legal evidence to charge him with a crime. Saudi Arabia is mentioned as a possibility, but the Saudis refuse to cooperate with US requests to take him. The US eventually insists that bin Laden be expelled from Sudan and go anywhere except Somalia. One CIA agent declares, "We kidnap minor drug czars and bring them back in burlap bags. Somebody didn't want this to happen." Bin Laden leaves under pressure two months later. CIA Director Tenet later denies Sudan made any offers to hand over bin Laden. In April, the US again refuses to accept Sudanese intelligence files on bin Laden and his operations. According to one person involved in the negotiations, negotiations were progressing well when another, unnamed US agency intervened and negated the transaction. "I've never seen a brick wall like that before," said the negotiator in a later interview. The Sudanese offer the material to British intelligence and are again rebuffed. Sudanese officials declare the offer remained open until after 9/11, when US intelligence finally accepted the material. CIA and FBI officials later acknowledge that the Sudan material is virtually worthless. (Project Censored, Joe Conason)
- May 18: Sudan expels bin Laden at the request of the US and Saudi Arabia. Bin Laden and al-Qaeda then move to Afghanistan, taking all of their money, resources and personnel. Bin Laden flies there in a C-130 transport plane with an entourage of about 150 men, women and children. The US knows in advance that bin Laden is going to Afghanistan, but does nothing to stop him. Elfatih Erwa, Sudan's minister of state for defense at the time, later says in an interview: "We warned [the US]. In Sudan, bin Laden and his money were under our control. But we knew that if he went to Afghanistan no one could control him. The US didn't care; they just didn't want him in Somalia. It's crazy." (CCR)
Khobar Towers bombing
- June: Terrorists explode a bomb in the Khobar Towers, a building that is part of a US military base in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. 19 American servicemen die and 500 Americans and Saudis are injured. The US Justice Department and the FBI both complain about the lack of Saudi cooperation in the subsequent investigation. 14 people, many with ties to a Saudi branch of the terrorist group Hizbollah, are eventually indicted by the Saudis, declared guilty, and executed, without letting the FBI talk to them. Some observers characterize the Khobar Towers bombing as a warning to the Saudis to either contribute more money fast or suffer more bombings. In 1998, Osama bin Laden admits to masterminding the attack. The bin Laden family is awarded the contract to rebuild the installation. (CCR)
- July-August: Extraordinary measures are taken at the site of the Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, to protect against terrorist bombings. Particular emphasis is given to protecting against the possibility of a small airplane being hijacked and crashed into an installation. (CCR, Killtown)
- August: Osama bin Laden issues a fatwa, or religious decree, authorizing attacks on Western targets. Before this, bin Laden was seen as nothing more than a financier for Islamic terrorists; the fatwa proves that he is also a terrorist leader. (CCR)
- October: US authorities learn of an abortive attempt by Iranian terrorists to hijack a Japanese plane over Israel and crash it into Tel Aviv. While the attempt was never made, it is yet another example of terrorists planning to hijack planes and use them in suicide attacks. (CCR)
Pentagon conducts simulated airline crash into Pentagon
- October 24: The Pentagon conducts a mock plane crash into the Pentagon. "Contingency planning Pentagon MASCAL exercise simulates scenarios in preparing for emergencies. The fire and smoke from the downed passenger aircraft billows from the Pentagon courtyard. Defense Protective Services Police seal the crash site. Army medics, nurses and doctors scramble to organize aid. An Arlington Fire Department chief dispatches his equipment to the affected areas. On Oct. 24, there was a mock terrorist incident at the Pentagon Metro stop and a construction accident to name just some of the scenarios that were practiced to better prepare local agencies for real incidents." (MDW/Killtown)
- November: Tom Clancy publishes Executive Orders, a novel in which Japanese terrorists hijack an airliner and fly it into the Capital Building. (Killtown)
1996-1998
- In early 1996, a friend gives bin Laden a satellite phone. The phone is used by both bin Laden and his military commander Muhammad Atef to direct al-Qaeda's operations. But its use is discontinued two months after a US missile strike against his camps, when an unnamed senior official boasts that the US can track his movements through the use of the phone. Records show "Britain was at the heart of the terrorist's planning for his worldwide campaign of murder and destruction," since 260 calls were made to 27 phone numbers in Britain. The other countries called were Yemen (over 200 calls), Sudan (131), Iran (106), Azerbaijan (67), Pakistan (59), Saudi Arabia (57), a ship in the Indian Ocean (13), US (6), Italy (6), Malaysia (4) and Senegal (2). "The most surprising omission is Iraq, with not a single call recorded." These phone calls, while traced and recorded, were apparently never used to target either bin Laden or the people he called. (CCR)
