Lt. Gen. John R. Vines, commander of US troops in Afghanistan at this time, will later complain that an opportunity to kill bin Laden is lost due to a lack of the right equipment. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) like the Predator are in short supply due to the war in Iraq. Vines receives intelligence that bin Laden is on the move and can take one of three routes. However, there is only one UAV to send. Vines will later recall, “A UAV was positioned on the route that was most likely, but he didn’t go that way. We believed that we were within a half-hour of possibly getting him, but nothing materialized.” [Washington Post, 9/10/2006]
July 2003: Fired ISI Director Resurfaces as Businessman
Lt. Gen. Mahmood Ahmed, who lost his position as ISI Director one month after 9/11 (see October 7, 2001), resurfaces in Pakistan as the head of a subsidiary of a prominent business consortium. The New Yorker notes that it is “a position that require[s] government backing.” Ahmed was considered close to the Taliban, and according to some media accounts, ordered money to hijacker Mohamed Atta. He still apparently has not given any media interviews or been interviewed by US intelligence since his firing. [New Yorker, 7/28/2003]
July 2003: Neoconservative Author Says CIA, State Department Hiding Connections between Iraq and 9/11
Neoconservative author Laurie Mylroie, who believes that Saddam Hussein was behind every terrorist attack on the US from 1993 through 2001 (see 1990 and October 2000), publishes her latest book, Bush vs. the Beltway: How the CIA and the State Department Tried to Stop the War on Terror. Mylroie accuses those agencies of suppressing information about Iraq’s role in 9/11, names 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (KSM) as an Iraqi agent (whose identity as such is being hidden by shadowy forces within the Bush administration), and calls President Bush “an actual hero… who could not be rolled, spun, or otherwise diverted from his most solemn obligation” to overthrow Saddam Hussein. However, like Mylroie’s other theories, her belief that KSM was an Iraqi agent is not popularly accepted. Author and war correspondent Peter Bergen is contemptuous of her theorizing, noting that Mylroie claims “a senior administration official told me in specific that the question of the identities of the terrorist masterminds could not be pursued because of bureaucratic obstructionism.” Bergen will write: “So we are expected to believe that the senior Bush administration officials whom Mylroie knows so well could not find anyone in intelligence or law enforcement to investigate the supposed Iraqi intelligence background of the mastermind of 9/11, at the same time that 150,000 American soldiers had been sent to fight a war in Iraq under the rubric of the war on terrorism. Please.” Bergen also notes that repeated interrogations of KSM—sometimes verging on torture (see Shortly After February 29 or March 1, 2003)—have failed to produce a shred of evidence connecting him with Iraq. [Washington Monthly, 12/2003]
July 2003: Saudi Embassy in US Found to Be Passing Money to Suspect Charities through US Bank that Has CIA Ties
In late 2002, US federal banking investigators began looking into transactions at Riggs Bank because of news reports that some money may have passed from the Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington through Riggs Bank to the associates of two 9/11 hijackers in San Diego (see December 4, 1999). But in July 2003, the probe expands as investigators discover irregularities involving tens of millions of dollars also connected to the Saudi embassy. The Wall Street Journal will later report, “Riggs repeatedly failed in 2001 and 2002 to file suspicious-activity reports related to cash transactions in the low tens of millions of dollars in Saudi accounts, said people familiar with the matter.” Riggs Bank “handles the bulk of [Washington’s] diplomatic accounts, a niche market that revolves around relationships and discretion.” [Wall Street Journal, 1/14/2004] Newsweek will later report that “investigators say the embassy accounts show a large commingling of funds with Islamic charities that have been the prime target of US probes.” In one instance, on July 10, 2001 the Saudi embassy sent $70,000 to two Saudis in Massachusetts. One of the Saudis wrote a $20,000 check that same day to a third Saudi who had listed the same address as Aafia Siddiqui, a microbiologist who is believed to have been a US-based operative for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (see Late September 2001-March 2003). [Newsweek, 4/12/2004] The Wall Street Journal will later discover that Riggs Bank “has had a longstanding relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency, according to people familiar with Riggs operations and US government officials” (see December 31, 2004). The relationship included top Riggs executives receiving US government security clearances. Riggs also overlooked tens of millions of dollars in suspicious transactions by right wing dictators from Africa and South America such as former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. [Wall Street Journal, 12/31/2004] A connection between the CIA and Riggs Bank goes back to at least the early 1960s. And in 1977, journalist Bob Woodward tied Riggs Bank to payments in a CIA operation in Iran. [Slate, 1/10/2005] The CIA tie leads to suspicions that the bank’s failure to disclose financial activity by Saudi diplomats and other foreign officials may have been implicitly authorized by parts of the US government. Some of the suspicious Saudi accounts belong to Saudi diplomats, including Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to the US. Shortly after these irregularities are discovered, Prince Bandar meets with Treasury Secretary John Snow and details his work for the CIA. For instance, during the 1980s, Prince Bandar helped fund the anticommunist Nicaraguan Contra rebels at the request of the White House and CIA as part of what became known as the Iran-Contra affair, and he also helped the CIA support Afghan rebels fighting the Soviet Union. It is not known what was discussed but US intelligence officials suggest Prince Bandar disclosed his CIA connections “as an explanation for the prince’s large unexplained cash transactions at Riggs.” [Wall Street Journal, 12/31/2004] It will later come to light that for many years $30 million a month were being secretly deposited into a Riggs Bank account controlled by Prince Bandar. It has been alleged that major British arms contractor BAE Systems funneled up to $2 billion in bribes through this account over the years as part of an $80 billion weapons deal between Britain and Saudi Arabia. Riggs Bank never knew the source of the funds. After the probe uncovers these suspicious transactions, the bank cuts off all business with the Saudis. [Newsweek, 6/11/2007] The US Treasury will later impose unusually strict controls on Riggs Bank and fine the bank $25 million. [Wall Street Journal, 1/14/2004] The bank will also plead guilty to one felony count of failing to file suspicious activity reports and pay an additional fine of $16 million. [Washington Post, 1/28/2005]
July 2003: Former German Government Minister Releases Book Alleging US Government Complicity in 9/11
Andreas von Bulow, a former German government minister, releases a book called “Die CIA und der 11. September” (The CIA and September 11), in which he alleges US government complicity in 9/11. Von Bulow was Federal Minister of Research and Technology under Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, and before that was high up in Germany’s Ministry of Defense. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 9/8/2003] He argues that 9/11 was a covert operation in which the CIA and the Israeli Mossad played a role. He suggests remote control could have been used to direct the hijacked planes into their targets; that the WTC towers collapsed due to explosives; that no planes crashed into the Pentagon or in Pennsylvania; and that the CIA had faked mobile phone calls from Flight 93 passengers. [Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Frankfurt), 9/9/2003; International Herald Tribune, 10/1/2003; Daily Telegraph, 11/20/2003] Von Bulow tells the Daily Telegraph, “If what I say is right, the whole US government should end up behind bars.” The book is a bestseller in Germany, selling over 100,000 copies. [Daily Telegraph, 11/20/2003] He previewed some of his theories in a January 2002 interview (see January 13, 2002). [Daily Telegraph, 11/20/2003]
July 2003: Madrid Bomber Released from Prison, Falls Under Surveillance
Jamal Ahmidan, alias “El Chino,” has a long history of drug dealing in Spain. In 2000, he returned to his home country of Morocco and was arrested on murder charges there. In July 2003, he is released and returns to Spain. He continues to deal drugs, but he allegedly became a radical Islamist while in prison as well. He soon meets Serhane Abdelmajid Fakhet, the leader of a group of Islamist militants in Madrid, and joins their group. But the group is being heavily monitored and soon Ahmidan is being monitored as well. For instance, Spanish police notice that Fakhet sometimes uses a car owned by Ahmidan’s relatives (see Spring 2003 and After). The wife of one of the militants also informs for the police and reports on Ahmidan (see January 4, 2003). Ahmidan will prove to be the key link between the militants and a group of drug dealers (who are mostly also government informants) that supply the explosives enabling the militants to conduct the Madrid train bombings (see 7:37-7:42 a.m., March 11, 2004). [El Pais (Spain), 3/8/2007]
July 2003: CIA Claims There Was ‘Steady and Heavy’ Pressure to Find Al-Qaeda-Iraq Link before 2003 Iraq War
In a classified report, the CIA states: “Requests for reporting and analysis of [Iraq’s link to al-Qaeda] were steady and heavy in the period leading up to the war, creating significant pressure on the Intelligence Community to find evidence that supported a connection.” This comment will not be publicly mentioned until September 2006, in a media leak of still classified material. [Newsweek, 9/13/2006]
July-September 2003: ISI Allegedly Warns British Intelligence 7/7 London Bomber Has Attended Al-Qaeda Training Camp
In the summer of 2003, a group of young Pakistani-Briton men rent a room in a hostel in Lahore, Pakistan. The group is very noisy at night, talking and playing music, which draws complaints from neighbors. One neighbor will later tell the Times of London that it was obvious they were violent militants: “We knew what they were doing and we were afraid at those boys being here, but we couldn’t do anything about it.” The neighbors finally call the police after hearing a series of late night explosions coming from their room. The group tells police that a propane gas cylinder had exploded. But the police do not believe it and begin a surveillance operation.
Investigation – Investigators learn the group recently traveled to Malakand, a very mountainous region of Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan. It is known that al-Qaeda maintains training camps there. Members of the group are also seen making regular visits to an office complex in Lahore where Al-Muhajiroun and other militant groups rent space. Most of the group members are linked to Al-Muhajiroun back in Britain. One member of the group is Omar Khyam, who is a key figure in a fertilizer bomb plot in Britain that will be foiled by British intelligence in March 2004 (see Early 2003-April 6, 2004). Another member is Mohammad Sidique Khan, the head suicide bomber in the 7/7 London bombings (see July 7, 2005). Yet another member is Mohammed Junaid Babar, an al-Qaeda operative living in Britain who is important enough to attend a key al-Qaeda summit in 2004 (see March 2004).
Return Home – Khan returns to Britain in August 2003 and Khyam returns one month later (Khyam is already under surveillance in Britain). It is unknown when Babar returns exactly, but in early April 2004 he flies from Britain to the US, is arrested, and begins telling all he knows about his associates in return for a reduced sentence (see April 10, 2004). He only knows Khyam by his alias “Ausman” and Khan by his alias “Ibrahim,” and it is unknown just how much he reveals about their training together in Pakistan.
Warnings – But the Pakistani ISI will later claim that they twice gave warnings to British intelligence about the monitored group in Lahore. Apparently the ISI decided the group was not a threat in Pakistan but was planning a bombing in Britain. A high-ranking ISI official will later claim: “There is no question that 7/7 could have and should have been stopped. British agencies did not follow some of the information we gave to them.” [London Times, 5/1/2007]
Surveillance – If the ISI does not in fact warn British intelligence, then it is likely the British have at least some awareness of this group in Lahore attending training camps through another source. British intelligence has been closely monitoring Mohammed Quayyum Khan, who is believed to be a key al-Qaeda operative living in Britain and sending funds and militant recruits to Pakistan (see March 2003 and After). Quayyum remains in phone contact with Khayam in Pakistan. He also is monitored as he talks on the phone with Salahuddin Amin, a member of the fertilizer bomb plot who lives in Pakistan. [BBC, 5/25/2007]
July 2003-Mid-2004: Al-Qaeda Leader Al-Libbi Lives in Abbottabad, Pakistan; Works with Key Courier Ahmed
In July 2003, al-Qaeda leader Abu Faraj al-Libbi allegedly receives a letter from Osama bin Laden’s “designated courier” stating that this person will be the “official messenger” between bin Laden and others in Pakistan. Around the same time, al-Libbi moves to Abbottabad, Pakistan. Al-Libbi had become al-Qaeda’s head of operations following the capture of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in March 2003 (see February 29 or March 1, 2003). This is according to one of al-Libbi’s Guantanamo prison files, from September 2008. In the file, the courier is named as Maulawi Abd al-Khaliq Jan. [US Department of Defense, 9/10/2008]
Al-Libbi Leads to Bin Laden’s Courier – Other sources make clear that this information comes from al-Libbi’s 2005 interrogation (see Shortly After May 2, 2005). By late 2005, US intelligence analysts will decide that al-Libbi was lying, and he had made up the name of Jan to protect the real courier, whose real name will eventually be discovered to be Ibrahim Saeed Ahmed (see Late 2005). In fact, Ahmed moves to Abbottabad in 2004 (see January 22, 2004-2005) and bin Laden joins him there in late 2005 (see Late 2005-Early 2006).
Al-Libbi Moves Away – Al-Libbi moves away from Abbottabad in mid-2004. Perhaps this is in response to two Pakistani government raids that narrowly miss catching him (see April 2004 and After April 2004). [US Department of Defense, 9/10/2008]
Musharraf’s 2006 Book – In a 2006 book, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf will detail the two raids that narrowly miss him, and adds that al-Libbi revealed in a 2005 interrogation “that he was in contact with Osama through a courier and the last letter he had received from Osama was sometime in December 2004. We have been looking for the couriers intensely.” [Musharraf, 2006, pp. 172] Presumably, al-Libbi’s confession about living in Abbottabad and meeting the courier would help point US investigators looking for the courier to Abbottabad, and if not that, Musharraf’s 2006 book would do so. But it is unknown when US intelligence begins closely investigating al-Qaeda activity in Abbottabad.
Early July 2003: Background Checks Not Finished for Almost Half of US Airport Screeners
At a Congressional hearing, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officials admit that almost half of the background checks for US airport screeners have still not been completed. Of the 30,000 screeners who have been checked, 1,200 were fired. Even scores of federal air marshals have been put on leave for discrepancies in background checks. [Time, 7/8/2003]
