“By April 1999, bin Laden had chosen four men to serve in the [9/11] operation; late that year, he dispatched two Saudis and two Yemenis to the United States for pilot training. …Khalid al Mihdhar and Nawaf al Hazmi, Mecca-born Saudis who had fought in Bosnia in 1995, secured their visas readily, but Yemenis Tawfiq […]
4/15/1999
“On an al-Qaeda computer, recovered after the fall of the Taliban, [al-Qaeda second-in-command] Ayman al-Zawahiri wrote to [al-Qaeda military commander] Mohammed Atef on April 15, 1999, saying, ‘Despite their extreme danger, we only became aware of [chemical and biological weapons] when the enemy drew our attention to them by repeatedly expressing concerns that they can […]
4/15/1999
“One of the documents stored on the al Qaeda computer recovered by the Wall Street Journal after the fall of the Taliban was a letter from [al Qaeda second-in-command] Ayman al Zawahiri to [al Qaeda military commander Mohammed Atef, aka] Abu Hafs, dated April 15, 1999, an excerpt of which follows. ‘The enemy [the West] […]
4/15/1999
” ‘If he [bin Laden] had the wherewithal to kill Americans,’…[former U.S. State Department official Larry C. Johnson] told Frontline in April 1999, ‘and attack U.S. targets he would do so, but he doesn’t. He is not in the position; he’s not an army. He doesn’t have an arsenal of nuclear weapons; he doesn’t have […]
4/15/1999
FBI Director Louis Freeh wrote: “In April 1999, we placed bin Laden on the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted List. …Simultaneously, we created a bin Laden Unit at FBI headquarters. Arrest warrants were flying around the globe for him. …Our own investigations jumpstarted similar ones all across Europe and countries around the world, and every […]
4/7/1999
“Although [9/11 hijacker Khalid] al Mihdhar, a Saudi citizen, was known to have connections to al Qaeda and the Yemeni mujahideen, he was not yet on any terrorist watch lists on April 7, 1999, when the U.S. consulate in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, had given him a one-year visa granting him multiple-entry privilege to the United […]
3/27/1999
In a report dated March 27, 1999, a UN panel “concluded that ‘the bulk of Iraq’s proscribed weapons programmes has been eliminated’ and suggested that the presence of inspectors was the most effective way to provide assurance that Iraq did not retain, acquire or rebuild any prohibited weapons. The panel warned against believing that any […]
3/19/1999
“In a report to Congress sent March 19, 1999, [leader of a commission on ballistic missile threats Donald] Rumsfeld…said the problems within the intelligence community were due to ‘budget cuts, isolation, excessive turnover, a decline in scientific and engineering competence, a highly-charged political atmosphere, foreign penetration of the intelligence community, and stovepiping of functions and […]
3/18/1999
” ‘Throughout Central Asia, leaders are on edge about instability in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. They fear an expansion of Iranian influence and the rise of violent extremism in their countries,’ said Stephen Sestanovich, Special Adviser to the US State Department on the States of the former Soviet Union (FSU) in March [18] 1999.” – Ahmed […]
3/16/1999
According to a highly redacted CIA intelligence report from March 16, 1999: “Iraqi delegation [redacted] meet with Usama (Bin Ladin) in Afghanistan. [Redacted] Arranged for a meeting with Bin Ladin [redacted] through an Egyptian friend, Dr. Ahmad [redacted] Zawahri). [Redacted] The main objective of this meeting was to coordinate activities with the anti-United States (U.S.) […]