“The unsuccessful [U.S.] cruise missile strike against bin Laden raised the profile of al Qaeda’s leader. Abdel Bari Atwan, the editor of Al Quds al Arabi newspaper, recalls this [in a June 2005 interview with Peter Bergen]: ‘It was [20] August 1998. …On my way from the airport to my office, Mohammed Atef [al Qaeda’s […]
Category: quotes
8/20/1998
Following President Bill Clinton’s attacks on al Qaeda compounds in Afghanistan on August 20, 1998, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar “called an Afghan news agency in Peshawar [Pakistan] to denounce the American intervention as ‘a demonstration of enmity’ for the Afghan people. He declared defiantly, ‘We can never hand over Osama to America.’ “ – […]
8/20/1998
On August 20, 1998, “U.S. submarines stationed in the Arabian Sea off Pakistan’s coastline launched 75 or so Tomahawk cruise missiles at two bin Laden-linked targets. The primary target was a complex of training camps in eastern Afghanistan, near Khost, where, according to CIA intelligence, bin Laden was meeting with his top aides. The second […]
8/20/1998
“On August 20, 1998, [Egyptian Islamic Jihad leader Ayman al-] Zawahiri, speaking with the Pakistani journalist Rahimullah Yusufzai by satellite phone, delivered this statement on bin Laden’s behalf [:] ‘Bin Laden calls on Muslims to continue jihad against Jews and Americans to liberate their holy places. In the meanwhile, he denies any involvement in the […]
8/20/1998
” ‘Our target was terror,’ President [Bill] Clinton said in disclosing a near-simultaneous cruise missile attack against targets near Khost [Afghanistan] and in Khartoum, Sudan [on August 20, 1998]. Bin Laden had launched a ‘terrorist war’ against the United States, Clinton said, and ‘our mission was clear: to strike at the network of radical groups […]
8/20/1998
Retaliation for the August 7, 1998, African embassy bombings took place on August 20, 1998. “When the smoke cleared following the hit by sixty-five U.S. Tomahawk cruise missiles, costing about $750,000 each… Bin Laden and top members of Al Qaeda were not among them [the casualties]. …In the end, the only winner was Osama bin […]
8/20/1998
In his Address to the Nation on August 20, 1998, President Clinton said: ” ‘Today I ordered our armed forces to strike at terrorist-related facilities in Afghanistan and Sudan because of the imminent threat they presented to our national security. …Our target was terror, our mission was clear–to strike at the network of radical groups […]
8/20/1998
“The destruction of the al Shifa [pharmaceutical] plant [in Sudan, on August 20, 1998] was not a near miss but a genuine blunder. The decision to target it was based on a single soil sample collected by a CIA operative across the road from the plant (which supposedly revealed traces of EMPTA, a precursor chemical […]
8/20/1998
Regarding U.S. retaliation on August 20, 1998, for the bombing of the East African embassies: ” ‘I think that raid really helped elevate bin Laden’s reputation in a big way, building him up in the Muslim world,’ said Harlan Ullman, a defense analyst. …’My sense is that because the attack was so limited and incompetent, […]
8/20/1998
Following the August 7, 1998, African embassy bombings, “…the simultaneous cruise missile reprisals against Afghanistan and Khartoum that [President Bill] Clinton ordered thirteen days later, on August 20 [1998], and their unintended consequences coincided with the lowpoint of his presidency. The missiles struck with sophisticated military efficiency, but proved to be embarrassments for the administration. […]