US Intelligence obtains information that Iraq has formed a suicide pilot unit that it plans to use against British and US forces in the Persian Gulf. The CIA comments that this report is highly unlikely and is probably disinformation. [US Congress, 7/24/2003 
]
February 1999-September 11, 2001: Hollywood Action Movie Planned, Based on Terrorist Plot to Blow Up the World Trade Center
Production begins on Nosebleed, a major action-comedy movie based around a terrorist plot to blow up the World Trade Center, which will star the well-known martial artist and actor Jackie Chan. In the proposed movie, Chan will play a window washer at the WTC who uncovers a terrorist plot to bomb the Twin Towers. Chan’s character teams up with a waitress who works at Windows on the World, the restaurant at the top of the North Tower, to thwart the plot. [Variety, 2/7/1999; Variety, 10/3/2000; Entertainment Weekly, 9/24/2001] The script, originally written in 1999 and subsequently developed, includes one of the terrorists explaining why the WTC should be destroyed. The terrorist says: “It represents capitalism. It represents freedom. It represents everything America is about. And to bring those two buildings down would bring America to its knees.” [Entertainment Weekly, 9/24/2001; Village Voice, 12/4/2001]
‘Die Hard 2’ Director in Talks to Work on Film – In February 1999, film studio New Line Cinema pays $600,000 to take on Nosebleed, which it is estimated will cost $50 million to $60 million to make. [Variety, 2/7/1999; Variety, 5/24/2001] In May 2000, it is reported that Renny Harlin is in talks to direct the film. [Guardian, 5/26/2000] Harlin previously directed action movies such as Die Hard 2, Cliffhanger, and The Long Kiss Goodnight. [New York Times, 6/18/1997; Deseret News, 7/28/1999] Then, in spring 2001, Hollywood production company MGM takes over the film from New Line. [Variety, 5/24/2001; Hollywood (.com), 6/9/2001]
Executives Find Storyline Implausible – The screenplay for Nosebleed is being written by Stu Zicherman and Raven Metzner. Zicherman and Metzner came up with the storyline for the film, which they then took to management company Blue Train Entertainment, where it was developed for Chan. [Variety, 2/7/1999] In August 2001, the two writers meet with MGM executives to discuss possible rewrites of the script. Zicherman will later recall: “[W]e actually talked about changing the plot. Incredibly, some of the executives thought a re-bombing of the World Trade Center was implausible.” [Entertainment Weekly, 9/24/2001]
Movie Canceled after 9/11 – A scene for the movie is originally scheduled to be filmed at the top of one of the Twin Towers at 7:00 a.m. on September 11, but the filming is canceled because the script for that scene is late to arrive (see 7:00 a.m. September 11, 2001). [ABC News, 9/19/2001; Empire, 9/19/2001] MGM will cancel work on Nosebleed in response to the 9/11 attacks. Nosebleed is one of a number of movies and television dramas featuring storylines about terrorism that are canceled or rewritten following the attacks (see (January 1998-2001); June-September 11, 2001; Before Before September 11, 2001; September 13, 2001; September 27, 2001; November 17, 2001). [Baltimore Sun, 9/16/2001; ABC News, 9/25/2001; Village Voice, 12/4/2001] Although news reports before 9/11 state that the terrorists’ intended target in Nosebleed is the WTC, some reports after 9/11 will say, apparently incorrectly, that either the Statue of Liberty or the Empire State Building is the target. [USA Today, 9/12/2001; Los Angeles Times, 9/14/2001; New York Post, 9/15/2001; Daily Telegraph, 9/17/2001; Wired, 7/18/2012]
February 1999: Clinton Rewrites Memo for CIA, Removing Language Allowing Agency to Use Northern Alliance to Kill Bin Laden
President Bill Clinton rewrites a memo authorizing the CIA to use the Northern Alliance in an operation to assassinate Osama bin Laden. This memo follows another one signed by Clinton the previous year that allowed the agency to use a group of tribal fighters to kill bin Laden (see December 24, 1998). The draft February memo contains similar language to the earlier one, but applies to the Northern Alliance, not just the tribal assets. However, Clinton himself deletes the wording authorizing an operation to simply kill bin Laden. Clinton will later tell the 9/11 Commission that he does not recall why he gives the CIA permission to kill bin Laden through the tribal assets, but not through the Northern Alliance. [Shenon, 2008, pp. 360]
February 1999: Bin Laden Strengthens Ties with Philippine Militant Group
Western intelligence monitors a series of phone calls in which bin Laden asks the leader of a Philippine militant group to set up more training camps that al-Qaeda can use. Bin Laden is said to call Hashim Salamat, the leader of Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). There are reports that al-Qaeda started funding and using MILF training camps in 1995. But apparently bin Laden successfully asks for more camps because the movement of militants into Afghanistan has grown increasingly difficult since the African embassy bombings in 1998 (see 10:35-10:39 a.m., August 7, 1998). [CNS News, 9/19/2002; CNN, 10/28/2002; Asia Times, 10/30/2003] The same month, Salamat claims in a BBC interview that the MILF has received money from bin Laden, but says that it has only been for humanitarian purposes. [New York Times, 2/11/1999; Asia Times, 10/30/2003]
February 1999: Possible Missed Opportunity to Capture or Kill Bin Laden in Afghanistan
The US apparently misses an opportunity to capture or kill Osama bin Laden. In a 2008 book, Michael Scheuer, head of the CIA’s bin Laden unit until mid-1999, will list a number of missed opportunities to get bin Laden (see May 1998-May 1999). He will briefly mention a “military attack opportunity” at the governor’s residence in the Afghan town of Herat during this month. This is separate from an opportunity to get bin Laden at a bird hunting camp in the same month, which he also lists (see February 11, 1999). But nothing more is known about this opportunity and the 9/11 Commission will not mention it. [Scheuer, 2008, pp. 284]
February 1999: CIA Apparently Confused over Authority to Assassinate Bin Laden
Following the issue of another directive governing a set of operations against Osama bin Laden, the CIA is said to become confused over whether it can mount an operation to assassinate him. In December, President Bill Clinton authorized the CIA to kill bin Laden using a group of tribal leaders in Afghanistan (see December 24, 1998), but a few weeks later he issued another memo governing relations between the CIA and the Northern Alliance that did not contain authorization to kill bin Laden (see February 1999). The CIA will later say that the reason it does not take advantage of the authorization to kill him using the tribal leaders is because it is confused by the second memo. The CIA’s inspector general will comment: “Given the law, executive order, and past problems with covert action programs, CIA managers refused to take advantage of the ambiguities that did exist.” The 9/11 Commission will also say that “the limits of the available authority were not tested.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 133; Central Intelligence Agency, 6/2005, pp. xxi ]
February 1999: Radical Imam Abu Hamza Openly Calls on Followers to Down Aircraft over London; British Authorities Take No Action
Abu Hamza al-Masri, a leading radical imam who informs for the British authorities (see Early 1997), tells a rally of Islamist extremists in London that they should attack aircraft over London, and shows them a plan for doing so. The scheme is called the “MUSLIM ANTI-AIRCRAFT NET,” and Abu Hamza explains it to his audience with the aid of a diagram on a sheet that drops down behind him when he starts to speak. Abu Hamza sets aside his usual style of whipping his listeners up into a frenzy, instead choosing to speak “like a college professor.” He tells them that the purpose of the net “is to make the skies very high-risk for anybody who flies.” The equipment consists of a series of wire nets, held in the air by gas-filled balloons. When an aircraft is caught in the net, one of the mines attached to it explodes, destroying the aircraft. The diagram contains an image of a US fighter diving into one of the traps. Abu Hamza concludes: “This is not very clever, but it will work. Now invent your own idea and never give up.” The meeting is attended by an unnamed informer for the French intelligence service Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE), who is amazed by the plan. Abu Hamza has an agreement with the British authorities that he can pursue terrorist activities abroad, but that there should be no violence in Britain (see October 1, 1997). This would appear to be a breach of the agreement, and the informer thinks that if a fellow informer for the British police is present, action must be taken against Abu Hamza. However, nothing is done against Abu Hamza over the plan, which seems not to be implemented. The meeting is also attended by Omar Bakri Mohamed, who has a deal similar to Abu Hamza’s with the British authorities (see August 22, 1998) and is head of the Al-Muhajiroun organization. [O’Neill and McGrory, 2006, pp. 103-105]
February 1999-February 2000: Al-Marabh Possible Florida Advance Man for Hijackers
In February 1999, Nabil al-Marabh moves to Tampa, Florida. He gets a Florida driver’s license and begins driving taxis in Tampa, just as he did previously in Boston. According to an apartment complex manager, from February 1999 to February 2000 he lives in an apartment with another Arab man with a different last name. Investigators later will wonder if al-Marabh was an advance man for the Florida-based 9/11 hijackers. Tampa is about 50 miles north of Venice, where several 9/11 hijacker pilots will attend flight schools beginning in July 2000 (see July 1-3, 2000). While immigration records indicate Mohamed Atta will first arrive in the US in June 2000, there is some evidence of him being in the US before then (see Late April-Mid-May 2000; April 2000), and he may arrive in Florida by September 1999 (see September 1999). [New York Times, 9/18/2001; ABC News 7 (Chicago), 1/31/2002] Most of the information on al-Marabh’s taxi license application is fraudulent, including where he lived and worked from 1994 to 1999. [ABC News 7 (Chicago), 1/31/2002] In May 1999, a potential al-Qaeda sleeper agent named Ihab Ali Nawawi is arrested in Orlando, Florida, about 80 miles from Tampa. Nawawi had been working as a taxi driver and was in contact with top al-Qaeda leaders. While the similarity between him and al-Marabh is intriguing, there is no known reported connection in Florida between the two men (see May 18, 1999). In the early 1990s, both worked for the Pakistani branch of the Muslim World League, a charity with suspected terrorism ties (see 1989-1994). [St. Petersburg Times, 10/28/2001] Al-Marabh also apparently goes to Afghanistan some time in 1999 or early 2000. [Canadian Press, 10/11/2001]
Early February 1999: $8 Billion Weapons Deal Allegedly Influences US Decision Not to Strike at Bin Laden
In early February 1999, US intelligence gains good information that Osama bin Laden is bird hunting with members of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) royal family in an uninhabited region of Afghanistan (see February 11, 1999). A later book by Daniel Benjamin and Stephen Simon, both officials in the Clinton administration, will note, “At the moment the Tomahawks [US missiles] were being readied, the United States was in the final stages of negotiations to sell eighty Block 60 F-16s, America’s most sophisticated export fighter jets,” to the UAE government. “America’s relationship with the [UAE] was the best it had in the [Persian] Gulf, and the [Clinton] administration had devotedly cultivated Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the UAE’s president and the leader of the country’s royal clans.” [Benjamin and Simon, 2002, pp. 281] The F-16 fighter deal is worth about $8 billion. Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is particularly close to the UAE royal family, having negotiated arms deals and US military basing agreements with them for several years. He has a hand in negotiating the F-16 deal in 1998. In fact, just days before the US learned of bin Laden’s presence in the hunting camp, Clarke was in the UAE working on the fighter deal. [Coll, 2004, pp. 486; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 128] Journalist Steve Coll will later say: “If the United States bombed the camp and killed a few princes, it could potentially put [business deals like that] in jeopardy—even if bin Laden were killed at the same time. Hardly anyone in the Persian Gulf saw bin Laden as a threat serious enough to warrant the deaths of their own royalty.” Clarke is one who votes not to strike the camp, and others within the US government will speculate that his UAE ties had a role in his decision. [Coll, 2004, pp. 447-450] Michael Scheuer, head of the CIA’s bin Laden unit at the time, will later comment: “Why did President Clinton fail to attack? Because making money was more important than protecting Americans.” [Scheuer, 2008] The missile strike does not take place and the fighter deal is successfully completed. Some US officials, including Scheuer, will be very irate and vocally complain later this month (see Shortly After February 11, 1999).
February 2-4, 1999: KLA and Serbia Agree to Attend Peace Talks in Rambouillet
The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) says it will send representatives to the peace talks in Rambouillet, France on February 6 (see February 6-23, 1999). Representing the KLA, will be Supreme Commander Hashim Thaci, also known as “The Snake,” and four other Kosovars, all militants. [BBC, 2/3/1999] On Febuary 4, the Yugoslav government (essentially Serbia) agrees to join the peace talks. [US Information Agency, 4/13/1999]
