A German inquiry into Mounir El Motassadeq, a member of the Hamburg al-Qaeda cell, begins by this date. Although Germany will not reveal details, documents show that by August 1998, El Motassadeq is under surveillance. “The trail soon [leads] to most of the main [Hamburg] participants” in 9/11. Surveillance records El Motassadeq and Mohammed Haydar Zammar, who had already been identified by police as a suspected extremist, as they meet at the Hamburg home of Said Bahaji on August 29, 1998. Files show that investigators are aware of who Bahaji is by this time.(Bahaji will soon move into an apartment with 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta and other al-Qaeda members (see November 1, 1998-February 2001.) German police monitor several other meetings between El Motassadeq and Zammar in the following months. [New York Times, 1/18/2003] El Motassadeq will later be sentenced to 15 years in prison for membership in al-Qaeda (see August 19, 2005).
December 1998-January 8, 1999: Islamist Militants Are Caught Trying to Bring Explosives into Germany
In December 1998, German intelligence finds out that the head of Islamist militant fighters in Bosnia wants to smuggle explosives into southern Germany. On January 8, 1999, German immigration officials find 10 triggers for explosives in a bus. The triggers belong to a courier who is attempting to send them to an Algerian in Freiburg, a town in southern Germany very close to the French border. However, the quick arrest means that German intelligence is unable to follow the courier and find out who his contacts in Germany are. The CIA is very interested in this situation, and heavily investigates Islamist radicals in the Freiburg area. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 12/12/2005] This incident is significant because it runs contrary to the widespread post-9/11 excuse that German intelligence is not that interested in Islamist militants prior to 9/11 because they are not seen as a threat to attack within Germany. For instance, Der Spiegel will write in 2003: “Such missionary fanatics were not considered particularly dangerous at the time. The internal intelligence service relied on the theory that foreign extremists do not commit or prepare attacks in Germany. You don’t spit in the soup that you are eating, says an Arab proverb. The security services believed this also.” [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 2/3/2003]
1999: Germany Gives CIA Intelligence about Hamburg Al-Qaeda Cell Member Zammar
German intelligence passes information about Mohammed Haydar Zammar to the CIA. Zammar is a member of al-Qaeda’s cell in Hamburg, Germany, which includes a few of the future 9/11 hijackers. According to a 2005 Der Spiegel article, the CIA has its own undercover agent in Hamburg, because it is “concerned that Hamburg could be developing into a launching pad for volunteers being sent to Afghanistan to support bin Laden in his cause.” Because of this German intelligence, Zammar makes it “onto the Americans’ internal most-wanted list.” [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 11/21/2005] It is not known exactly when in 1999 Germany gives this information to the CIA, but it gives information on one of the 9/11 hijackers in Hamburg to the CIA in March 1999 (see March 1999). Ironically, around the summer of 1999, the CIA learns that Zammar is in direct contact with a senior al-Qaeda operational coordinator, but it fails to tell German intelligence about this (see Summer 1999).
January 31, 2000 and After: CIA and UAE Officials Fail to Warn German Intelligence about 9/11 Hijacker Jarrah
The CIA and United Arab Emirates (UAE) officials apparently fail to warn German intelligence about future 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah. On January 30, 2000, Jarrah was questioned at Dubai airport in the UAE, and the CIA was involved in a decision to not arrest him (see January 30-31, 2000). But even though Jarrah’s flight from Dubai was tracked to Hamburg, Germany, apparently neither US nor UAE officials warn German intelligence about Jarrah. During Jarrah’s brief detention he confessed that he had just come from Pakistan and Afghanistan, and he had a large number of jihadist propaganda videos in his luggage, leading UAE officials to strongly suspect he had just been to a militant training camp in Afghanistan. He also revealed that he has plans to learn how to fly airplanes in the US. An unnamed top German intelligence official will later say: “If we had been given the information that Jarrah had been to Afghanistan and was planning to go to flight school, we might have asked the Americans whether they thought this was normal.… If they had asked us, ‘Who is this guy who is learning to fly?’ then perhaps there might have been a different outcome.” He will suggest German intelligence might have started monitoring Jarrah, and thus discovered the 9/11 plot. However, this official will complain: “But it was one-way traffic [with the CIA]. You gave information, and you got no response.” The CIA will later deny that it has any knowledge of Jarrah before 9/11. [Vanity Fair, 11/2004] Note that a UAE official claims that the CIA said it would secretly track Jarrah from Dubai airport (see January 30-31, 2000). If this is true, it could explain why neither the UAE nor CIA told Germany about Jarrah.
February 24, 2000: 9/11 Hijacker Atta Returns to Germany Using Monitored Route
9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta returns to Germany from Pakistan using the same monitored route as he traveled on the outward journey (see Late November-Early December 1999). He flies from Karachi to Istanbul, Turkey, where he changes planes for Hamburg. Turkish intelligence discovered that militants use this route to travel between Europe and training camps in Afghanistan in the mid-1990s and alerted Germany to it at that time, causing Germany to launch an investigation into one of Atta’s associates (see 1996). However, it is not known whether the intelligence agencies register Atta’s travel at this time. [Stern, 8/13/2003] Fellow alleged 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah appears to be noticed on his way back to Germany from Afghanistan (see January 30, 2000) and another member of the cell, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, may be monitored in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, at this time (see January 5-8, 2000).
September-October 2000: Hamburg Cell Member Zammar Goes to Afghanistan Training Camp; German Intelligence Soon Finds Out
Mohammed Haydar Zammar, a member of the al-Qaeda cell in Hamburg, Germany, with a few of the future 9/11 hijackers, travels to Afghanistan and meets Osama bin Laden. German intelligence soon learns of the trip, and even gets wiretapped recordings of some of his conversations there. Zammar has been an Islamist militant for a long time, and went to training camps in Afghanistan in 1991 and 1994. Living in Hamburg, he was able to collect about 12,000 Deutsche Marks (approximately $6,000 at the time) for al-Qaeda. In September 2000, he takes the money to Afghanistan. He is able to get a face-to-face meeting with bin Laden, in a training camp near Kandahar. Zammar is still at the training camp in early October, when al-Qaeda bombs the USS Cole in Yemen (see October 12, 2000). He and the others in the camp have a celebration this night. This account is based on a confession Zammar will give to visiting German officials while he is secretly imprisoned in Syria in 2002 (see November 20-22, 2002). It is almost certain Zammar is frequently tortured there. However, Der Spiegel will later claim that German intelligence is able to verify many of the details of this trip on its own, because it receives wiretapped recordings of Zammar’s conversations in Afghanistan from at least one foreign intelligence agency. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 11/21/2005]
Summer 2001: Germany and Other European Countries Are Aware Al-Qaeda Is Planning Major Attack
In 2002, the Washington Post will report, “European officials, including the German authorities, said that while they had indications in the summer of 2001 that al-Qaeda was planning a major attack, they had no specifics on what form it would take, where it would occur, or who, specifically, was involved.” [Washington Post, 6/12/2002] Other details will remain unknown, such as what other European countries besides Germany might know this. Also, it is unclear if this information is passed to the US. However, there will be other reports that in June 2001, German intelligence warns the CIA, Britain, and Israel that Middle Eastern militants are planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack “American and Israeli symbols, which stand out” (see June 2001). British and French intelligence are also said to warn the US about a major al-Qaeda attack in the summer of 2001 (see July 6, 2001, July 16, 2001, Early August 2001, Late August 2001, and September 7, 2001).
June 2001: Germans Warn of Plan to Use Aircraft as Missiles on US and Israeli Symbols
German intelligence warns the CIA, Britain’s intelligence agency, and Israel’s Mossad that Middle Eastern militants are planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack “American and Israeli symbols, which stand out.” A later article quotes unnamed German intelligence sources who state the information was coming from Echelon surveillance technology, and that British intelligence had access to the same warnings. However, there were other informational sources, including specific information and hints given to, but not reported by, Western and Near Eastern news media six months before 9/11. [Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Frankfurt), 9/11/2001; Washington Post, 9/14/2001; Fox News, 5/17/2002] According to a separate account, in the summer of 2001, German officials are aware that al-Qaeda is planning a major attack, but they don’t know the details (see Summer 2001).
Around July 9, 2001: German Authorities Notify Spanish of Bin Al-Shibh’s Trip to Spain
German authorities notify their Spanish counterparts of a trip by Ramzi bin al-Shibh to Spain, where he meets an associate, lead 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta (see July 8-19, 2001). Presumably, the notification is before or soon after the trip, but the original news report merely says, “Despite the fact that the German authorities informed Spain of Ramzi’s trip, the meeting in which the 11 September attacks were finalized was not detected.” Several of bin al-Shibh’s German associates are known to have been under surveillance around this time (see 1996, November 1, 1998-February 2001, and May 22, 2000), and, if the article if correct, this indicates that bin al-Shibh’s movements are also being monitored by German intelligence. Spanish authorities are monitoring some operatives who may interact with Atta and bin al-Shibh in Spain (see Before July 8, 2001 and July 8-19, 2001), but the Spanish apparently do not conduct surveillance of the two men. [BBC Worldwide Monitoring, 12/2/2004]
August 2001: Al-Qaeda Hamburg Cell Member Zammar Appears to Have Foreknowledge of 9/11 Attacks
Al-Qaeda Hamburg cell member Mohammed Haydar Zammar appears to have foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. Ibrahim Diab, a Lebanese national, has recently been recruited into the cell. Diab makes plans to attend an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, and Zammar pays for his travel expenses to the camp. Zammar is generally considered to be the main recruiter for the cell. Diab will later claim that Zammar warns him in August 2001 to leave for the camps as soon as possible because something big is about to happen. [Los Angeles Times, 1/30/2003] In 2002, the Los Angeles Times will report: “Zammar’s bluster matched his size. In almost any discussion, his was the loudest voice and most radical view.… In part because of Zammar’s outspokenness, authorities tend to discount his role in the Sept. 11 plot. They concluded no one would entrust information to a braggart like him.” [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002] Diab’s confession, made public in 2003, would seem to discredit the idea that Zammar was not trusted with knowledge of the 9/11 plot. And since Zammar is monitored for years before 9/11 (see March 1997-Early 2000), it also raises questions about what German intelligence might have learned from monitoring him. Diab will fly out of Germany on September 10, 2001, just one day before the 9/11 attacks (see September 10, 2001). He will attend an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, but be arrested in Pakistan in late October and quickly deported back to Germany. He will confess his activities to German intelligence shortly thereafter, and then be released without charge (see October 29, 2001). [Chicago Tribune, 2/23/2003]
