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Al Qaeda Says It Carried Out September 11th Attacks

Originally, al Qaeda did not admit it had organized the September 11 attacks, and many doubted this. But both Osama bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the September 11 attacks, have confirmed that al Qaeda planned and carried them out.

Most recently, Osama bin Laden stated, in an audiotape released on May 23, 2006, "I was responsible for entrusting the 19 brothers - Allah have mercy upon them - with those raids ...." Bin Laden added, "the participants in September 11th were two groups: pilots and support teams for each pilot in order to control the aircraft."

Earlier, in a videotape broadcast on October 30, 2004, Osama bin Laden unequivocally admitted that he and al Qaeda had planned and directed the September 11 attacks. He stated, "I shall talk to you about the story behind those events (the September 11 attacks) and shall tell you truthfully about the moments in which the decision was taken ...." He confirmed his direction of the details of operational planning, stating, "for the record, we had agreed with the Commander-General Muhammad Atta ... that all operations should be carried out within twenty minutes, before Bush and his administration notice."

The first direct indication of al Qaeda involvement came in a videotape of bin Laden talking to a group of supporters in November 2001, which was obtained by U.S. forces in Afghanistan in late November and released on December 13, 2001. The videotape was clearly intended for internal al Qaeda use and bin Laden appeared fully aware that the tape was being made. Independent scholars verified that the translation released by the U.S. government is accurate.

The videotape shows clearly that bin Laden knew in advance of the attacks. He said:

"We calculated in advance the number of casualties from the enemy who would be killed based on the position of the tower. We calculated that the floors that would be hit would be three or four floors. I was the most optimistic of them all. (...Inaudible...) Due to my experience in this field, I was thinking that the fire from the gas in the plane would melt the iron structure of the building and collapse the area where the plane hit and all the floors above it only. This is all that we had hoped for."

The videotape indicates that five days before the attacks, which occurred on a Tuesday, bin Laden knew the date and time they would occur:

"We had notification since the previous Thursday that the event would take place that day. We had finished our work that day and had the radio on. It was 5:30 p.m. our time [8:00 am in New York and Washington]. ... Immediately, we heard the news that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. We turned the radio station to the news from Washington. The news continued and no mention of the attack until the end. At the end of the newscast, they reported that a plane just hit the World Trade Center. ... After a little while, they announced that another plane had hit the World Trade Center. The brothers who heard the news were overjoyed by it. ..."

Bin Laden knew there would be multiple attacks:

"They were overjoyed when the first plane hit the building, so I said to them: be patient. The difference between the first and the second plane hitting the towers was twenty minutes. And the difference between the first plane and the plane that hit the Pentagon was one hour."

Information about the attacks was a closely held secret, even within al Qaeda. Bin Laden says Al Qaeda's spokesman, Sulaiman abu Ghaith, did not know about the attacks:

Sulayman Abu Guaith: "The TV broadcasted the big event. ... So I went back to the Shaykh (meaning UBL) who was sitting in a room with 50 to 60 people. I tried to tell him about what I saw, but he made gesture with his hands, meaning: 'I know, I know...'"

UBL: "He did not know about the operation. Not everybody knew."

The videotape shows that bin Laden was very familiar with the operational planning for the attacks:

"Muhammad Atta from the Egyptian family (meaning the Al Qaeda Egyptian group), was in charge of the group. ... The brothers, who conducted the operation, all they knew was that they have a martyrdom operation and we asked each of them to go to America but they didn't know anything about the operation, not even one letter. But they were trained and we did not reveal the operation to them until they are there and just before they boarded the planes. ... Those who were trained to fly didn't know the others. One group of people did not know the other group."

Several months later, senior al- Qaeda official Khalid Sheikh Mohammed confirmed that al Qaeda had carried out the attacks. In April 2002, Al-Jazeera reporter Yosri Fouda interviewed Khalid, who proposed the September 11 scheme to bin Laden, and Ramzi Binalshibh, who played a key role in the preparation for 9/11. Fouda asked Khalid if al Qaeda was responsible for the September 11 attacks and Khalid confirmed that it was:

"Fouda summoned every thread of experience, looked Khalid in the eye and asked: ‘Did you do it [the September 11 attacks]?' But Khalid didn't flinch.

‘No filming today,' he declared, ‘and you do not have to worry about a camera or a cameraman for tomorrow. We will provide everything.'

Ramzi added his own detail of the arrangements: ‘You will be going straight from here to your flight whenever we are done.'"

Then, with little fanfare, Khalid got down to business by making an announcement that hit Fouda like a heavyweight punch. "I am the head of the al Qaeda military committee," he said, "and Ramzi is the coordinator of the Holy Tuesday operation. And yes, we did it." [Masterminds of Terror, Yosri Fouda and Nick Fielding (New York: Arcade Publishing, 2003), p. 38.]

The 9/11 Commission Report

The Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, released in 2004, also confirms that al Qaeda planned and executed the attacks, providing many previously unknown details. Its reconstruction of events is based largely on information provided by September 11 planners Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), Ramzi Binalshibh, and others.

Excerpts from the report follow:

Just as KSM was reestablishing himself in Afghanistan in mid-1996, Bin Ladin and his colleagues were also completing their migration from Sudan. Through [Al Qaeda military commander Mohammed] Atef, KSM arranged a meeting with Bin Ladin in Tora Bora .... (p. 148)

... At the meeting, KSM ... presented a proposal for an operation that would involve training pilots who would crash planes into buildings in the United States. This proposal would eventually become the 9/11 operation.

... Bin Ladin listened to KSM's ideas without much comment, but did ask KSM formally to join al Qaeda and move his family to Afghanistan.

KSM declined. He preferred to remain independent ....

... Bin Ladin, 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. (p. 149)

KSM then accepted Bin Ladin's standing invotation to move to Kandahar and work directly with al Qaeda.

... At this point, late 1998 to early 1999, planning for the 9/11 operation began in earnest. (p. 150)

... KSM has insisted to his interrogators that he always contemplated hijacking and crashing large commercial aircraft. Indeed, KSM describes a grandiose original plan: 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 and alerting the media, deliver a speech ....

KSM concedes that this proposal received a lukewarm response from al Qaeda leaders skeptical of its scale and complexity. Although Bin Ladin listened to KSM's proposal, he was not convinced that it was practical.

... KSM acknowledges formally joining al Qaeda, in late 1998 or early 1999, and states that soon afterward, Bin Ladin also made the decision to support his proposal to attack the United States using commercial airplanes as weapons.

... Bin Ladin summoned KSM to Kandahar in March or April 1999 to tell him that al Qaeda would support his proposal. The plot was now referred to within al Qaeda as the "planes operation." (p. 154)

... KSM's original concept of using one of the hijacked planes to make a media statement was scrapped, but Bin Ladin considered the basic idea feasible. Bin Ladin, Atef, and KSM developed an initial list of targets. These included the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon, and the World Trade Center. According to KSM, Bin Ladin wanted to destroy the White House and the Pentagon, KSM wanted to strike the World Trade Center, and all of them wanted to hit the Capitol. No one else was involved in the initial selection of targets.

Bin Ladin also soon selected four individuals to serve as suicide operatives: Khalid al Mihdhar, Nawaf al Hazmi, Khallad, and Abu Bara al Yemeni. (p. 155)

Pages 156-159 of the report provide details on the training of these four initial suicide operatives. Further excerpts:

... Hamzi and Mihdhar ... arrived in Los Angeles on January 15, 2000. (p. 159)

Meanwhile, the next group of al Qaeda operatives destined for the planes operation [the Hamburg group] had just surfaced in Afghanistan. ... The new recruits had come to Afghanistan aspiring to wage johad in Chechnya. But al Qaeda quickly recognized their potential and enlisted them in its anti-U.S. jihad.

... Mohammed Atta, Ramzi Binalshibh, Marwan al Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah would all become key players in the 9/11 conspiracy. (p. 160)

... In March 2000, Atta emailed 31 different U.S. flight schools on behalf of a small group of men from various Arab countries studying in Germany who, while lacking prior training, were interested in learning to fly in the United States.

... Binalshibh proved unable to obtain a visa, a victim of the generalized suspicion that visa applicants from Yemen -- especially young men applying in another country (Binalshibh first applied in Berlin) -- might join the ranks of undocumented aliens seeking work in the United States. (p. 168)

... By late May 2000, two operatives assigned to the planes operation were already in the United States. Three of the four Hamburg cell members would soon arrive. (p. 173)

... Hazmi and Mihdhar came to the United States to larn English, take flying lessons, and become pilots as quickly as possible. They turned out, however, to have no aptitude for English. ... This lack of language skills in turn became an insurmountable barrier to learning how to fly. (p. 221)

... [Flight ] instructors who worked with Hamzi and Mihdhar remember them as poor students who focused on learning to control the aircraft in flight but took no interest in takeoffs or landings. By the end of May 2000, Hamzi and Mihdhar had given up on learning how to fly. (p. 222)

... In the early summer of 2000, the Hamburg group arrived in the United States to begin flight training. (p. 223)

... Unable to participate directly in the operation, Binalshibh instead took on the role of coordinating between KSM and the operatives in the United States. ... one of Binalshibh's first tasks in his new role as plot coordinator was to assist another possible pilot, Zacarias Moussaoui.

In the fall of 2000, KSM had sent Moussaoui to Malaysia for flight training, but Moussaoui did not find a school he liked.

... Confronting training or travel problems with Hamzi, Mihdhar, Binalshibh, and Mossaoui, al Qaeda was looking for another possible pilot candidate. A new recruit with just the right background [Hani Hanjour] conveniently presented himself in Afghanistan. (p. 225)

... According to KSM, Hanjour was sent to him in Karachi for inclusion in the plot after Hanjour was identified in al Qaeda's al Faruq camp as a trained pilot, on the basis of background information he had provided.

... On December 8 [2000], Hanjour traveled to San Diego. (p. 226)

... By the end of 2000, less than six months after their arrival, the three pilots on the East Coast [Atta, Shehhi, and Jarrad] were simulating flights on large jets. (p. 227)

... During the summer and early autumn of 2000, Bin Ladin and senior al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan started selecting the muscle hijackers -- the operatives who would storm the cockpits and control the passengers. (p. 231)

... Bin Ladin, assisted by Atef, personally chose all the future muscle hijackers for the planes operations, primarily between the summer of 2000 and April 2001. Upon choosing a trainee, Bin Ladin would ask him to swear loyalty for a suicide operation. After the selection and oath-swearing, the operative would be sent to KSM for training and the filming of a martyrdom video ....

... [Captured al Qaeda operative] Khallad believes KSM wanted between four and six operatives per plane. KSM states that al Qaeda originally planned to use 25 or 26 hijackers but ended up with only 19.

... [T]he muscle hijackers returned to Afghanistan for special training in late 2000 to early 2001. (p. 235)

... [Al Qaeda trainer] Abu Turab taught the operatives how to conduct hijackings, disarm air marshals, and handle explosives. He also trained them in bodybuilding and provided them with a few basic English words and phrases.

According to KSM, Aby Turab even had the trainees butcher a sheep and a camel with a knife to prepare to use knives during the hijackings. ... According to KSM, the muscle did not learn the full details -- including the plan to hijack planes and fly them into buildings -- before reaching the United States. (p. 236)

... By the end of June [2001], 14 of the 15 muscle hijackers had crossed the Atlantic. (p. 237)

... [In a July 2001 meeting in Spain,] Binalshibh says he told Atta that Bin Ladin wanted the attacks carried out as soon as possible. ... Binalshibh advised Atta that Bin Ladin had directed that the other operatives not be informed of the date until the last minute. Atta was to provide Binalshibh with advance notice of at least a week or two so that Binalshibh could travel to Afghanistan and report the date personally to Bin Ladin.

As to targets, Atta understood Bib Ladin's interest in striking the White House. Atta said he thought this target was too difficult, but had tasked Hamzi and Hanjour to evaluate its feasibility and was awaiting their answer. Atta said that those two operatives had rented small aircraft and flown reconnaissance flights near the Pentagon. Atta explained that Hanjour was assigned to attack the Pentagon, Jarrah the Capitol, and that both Atta and Shehhi would hit the World Trade Center. If any pilot could not reach his intended target, he was to crash the plane. If Atta could not strike the World Trade Center, he planned to crash his aircraft directly into the streets of New York. (p. 244)

... Atta told Binalshibh he wanted to select planes departing on long flights because they would be full of fuel, and that he wanted to hijack Boeing aircraft because he believed them easier to fly than Airbus aircraft, which he understood had an autopilot feature that did not allow them to be crashed into the ground. (p. 245)

... On August 3 [2001], ... Atta and Binalshibh discussed several matters, such as the best way for the operatives to purchase plane tickets and the assignment of muscle hijackers to individual teams. Atta and Binalshibhalso revisited the question of whether to terget the White House. They discussed targets in coded language, pretending to be students discussing various field fo strudy" "architecture" referred to the World Trade Center, "arts" the Pentagon, "law" the Capitol, and "politics" the White House.

Binalshibh reminded Atta that Bin Ladin wanted to target the White House. Atta again cautioned that this would be difficult. When Binalshibh persisted, Atta agreed to include the White House but suggested they keep the Capitol as an alternate target in case the White House proved too difficult. Atta also suggested that the attacks would not happen until after the first week in September, when Congress reconvened. (p. 248)

... Through August, the hijackers kept busy with their gym training and the pilots took frequent practice runs on small rented aircraft. The operatives also began to make purchases suggesting that their planning was coming to an end. In mid-August, for example, they bought small knives that may actually have been used in the attacks. On August 22, moreover, Jarrah attempted to purchase four GPS [global positioning system] units from a pilot shop in Miami. He was able to buy only one unit, which he picked up a few days later when he also purchased three aeronautical charts.

... All 19 [plane] tickets were booked and purchased between August 25 and September 5. (p. 249)

... According to KSM, in late August, when the operation was fully planned, Bin Ladin formally notified the al Qaeda Shura Council that a major attack against the United States would take place in the coming weeks. When some council members objected, Bin Ladin countered that Mullah Omar lacked authority to prevent al Qaeda from conducting jihad outside Afghanistan. Though most of the Shura Council reportedly disagreed, Bin Ladin persisted. The attacks went forward.

... In the days just before 9/11, the hijackers returned leftover funds to al Qaeda and assembled in their departure cities. They sent the excess funds by wire transfer to Hawsawi in the UAE, about $26,000 altogether. (p. 252)