“In April [30, 2001], the National Security Council deputies’ committee, made up of the No. 2’s in each major department and agency, recommended that President Bush adopt a policy that would include a serious effort to arm the Northern Alliance, the loose confederation of various warlords and tribes in Afghanistan that opposed the Taliban regime […]
Category: quotes
4/30/2001
At a Counterterrorism Security Group meeting on April 30, 2001, Undersecretary of State Richard Armitage said “the top U.S. priority in Southeast Asia would be the complete destruction of al Qaeda. …The goal of eliminating al Qaeda, he said, was more important than stopping the spread of nuclear weapons in Asia, preventing another Indian-Pakistani war, […]
4/30/2001
“Iraq’s last conspiracy against the United States was the failed attempt to assassinate former President George H.W. Bush in Kuwait in [April] 1993, a fact that was noted in the State Department’s annual report ‘Patterns of Global Terrorism‘ in 2000 [which was released on April 30, 2001].” – Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Next […]
4/26/2001
On April 26, 2001, future 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta “was stopped on a traffic violation by a Broward County [Florida] sheriff’s deputy and ticketed for driving without a valid license. Atta would skip a scheduled May court appearance, but he and [fellow hijacker Ziad] Jarrah acquired licenses within a week of the stop to avoid […]
4/25/2001
The muscle hijackers–the ones who weren’t training to be pilots, “twelve of whom (out of a total of thirteen) were Saudi nationals–began arriving in the United States in late April 2001, and were in place with the arrival of [pilot Khalid al] Mihdhar on July 4. They had secured their U.S. tourist visas before leaving […]
4/22/2001
While in Quebec at the Summit of the Americas, President George W. Bush respond to a question about a new hemispheric-wide energy plan with: “Part of our issue is to make sure our electricity grids are open enough to handle additional power, say, in the western part of our state and obviously the western part of […]
4/20/2001
A SEIB (Senior Executive Intelligence Brief) headline on April 20, 2001 read: “Bin Laden Planning Multiple Operations.” – Philip Shenon, The Commission, Page 152 […]
4/18/2001
“On April 18 [2001], U.S. airlines got a memo from the FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] that they should demonstrate a ‘high degree of alertness’ because Middle Eastern terrorists might try to hijack or blow up an American jet.’ …the threats were so frequent and, often, so vague, they had little impact on security.” – Craig […]
4/18/2001
“On April 18 [2001], the FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] warned that Middle Eastern terrorists might try to hijack or blow up a U.S. plane. Air carriers were told to ‘demonstrate a high degree of alertness.’ ” – Peter Lance, 1000 Years For Revenge, Page 403 […]
4/16/2001
“As pressure mounted on the Taliban, the moderate wing within its leadership–who despised the Arabs, was opposed to international terrorism, and was secretly willing to negotiate with the United Nations and others–suffered a major setback when their leader, Mullah Mohammed Rabbani, died of cancer in a Karachi [Pakistan] hospital on 16 April [2001]. Rabbani was […]