 Chapter 7.3 of the 9-11 Commission Report. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Leanne Howlett. The 9-11 Commission Report, Chapter 7.3. During the summer and early autumn of 2000, Ben Laden and his senior al-Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan started selecting the muscle hijackers, the operatives who would storm the cockpits and control the passengers. Despite the phrase widely used to describe them, the so-called muscle hijackers were not at all physically imposing. Most were between 5 feet 5 inches and 5 feet 7 inches in height. And in selection for 9-11. Twelve of the 13 muscle hijackers, excluding Nawaf al-Hazmi and Medar, came from Saudi Arabia. Satam al-Sakami, Wael al-Sharih, Walid al-Sharih, Abdul Aziz al-Almari, Ahmed al-Gamadi, Hamza al-Gamadi, Mahan al-Sharih, Majed Mokad, Salam al-Hazmi, Saeed al-Gamadi, Ahmad al-Haznawi and Ahmad al-Nami. The remaining recruit, Fayez Bani Hamad, came from the UAE. He appears to have played a unique role among the muscle hijackers because of his work with one of the plot's financial facilitators, Mustafa al-Hasawi. Saudi authorities interviewed the relatives of these men and have briefed us on what they found. The muscle hijackers came from a variety of educational and societal backgrounds. All were between 20 and 28 years old. Most were unemployed with no more than a high school education and were unmarried. Four of them, Ahmed al-Gamadi, Saeed al-Gamadi, Hamza al-Gamadi and Ahmad al-Haznawi came from a cluster of three towns in the Al Baha region, an isolated and underdeveloped area of Saudi Arabia and shared the same tribal affiliation. None had a university degree. Their travel patterns and information from family members suggests that the four may have been in contact with each other as early as the fall of 1999. Five more, Walid al-Shari, Abdul Aziz al-Omari, Mahand al-Shari and Ahmed al-Nami, came from Asir province, a poor region in southwestern Saudi Arabia that borders Yemen. This weekly police area is sometimes called the wild frontier. Walid al-Shari and Walid al-Shari were brothers. All five in this group had begun university studies. Walid al-Shari had graduated with honors from high school, had attained a degree from the Imam Muhammad ibn Sa'l Islamic University, was married and had a daughter. The three remaining muscle hijackers from Saudi Arabia were Satam al-Sakami, Majed Mokad and Selim al-Hazmi. Sukami came from Riyadh. Mokad hailed from a small town called Anakil west of Medina. Sukami had very little education and Mokad had dropped out of university. Neither Sukami nor Mokad appears to have had ties to the other or to any of the other operatives before getting involved with extremists probably by 1999. Selim al-Hazmi, a younger brother of Nawaf, was born in Mecca. Selim's family recalled him as a quarrelsome teenager. His brother Nawaf probably recommended him for recruitment into al-Qaeda. One al-Qaeda member who knew them says that Nawaf pleaded with bin Laden to allow Selim to participate in the 9-11 operation. Detainees have offered varying reasons for the use of so many Saudi operatives. Bin al-Shib argues that al-Qaeda wanted to send a message to the government of Saudi Arabia about its relationship with the United States. Several other al-Qaeda figures, however, have stated that ethnicity generally was not a factor in the selection of operatives unless it was important for security or operational reasons. KSM, for instance, denies that Saudis were chosen from the 9-11 plot to drive a wedge between the United States and Saudi Arabia and stresses practical reasons for considering ethnic background with selecting operatives. He says that so many were Saudi because Saudis comprise the largest portion of the pool of recruits in the al-Qaeda training camps. KSM estimates that in any given camp, 70% of the Mujahideen were Saudi, 20% were Yemeni, and 10% were from elsewhere. Although Saudi and Yemeni trainees were most often willing to volunteer for suicide operations, prior to 9-11 it was easier for Saudi operatives to get into the United States. Most of the Saudi muscle hijackers developed their ties to extremists two or three years before the attacks. Their families often did not consider these young men religious sellots. Some were perceived as devout, others as lacking in faith. For instance, although Ahmad al-Gamadi, Hamza al-Gamadi, and Saeed al-Gamadi attended prayer services regularly and Omari often served as an Imam at his mosque in Saudi Arabia, Sikami and Salim al-Hansmi appeared unconcerned with religion and contrary to Islamic law were known to drink alcohol. Like many other al-Qaeda operatives, the Saudis who eventually became the muscle hijackers were targeted for recruitment outside Afghanistan, probably in Saudi Arabia itself. Al-Qaeda recruiters, certain clerics and, in a few cases, family members probably all played a role in spotting potential candidates. Several of the muscle hijackers seemed to have been recruited through contacts at local universities and mosques. According to the head of one of the training camps in Afghanistan, some were chosen by unnamed Saudi sheiks who had contacts with al-Qaeda. Omari, for example, is believed to have been a student of a radical Saudi cleric named Suleiman al-Awan. His mosque, which is located in Al-Qasim province, is known among more moderate clerics as a terrorist factory. The province is at the very heart of the strict Wahhabi movement in Saudi Arabia. Saeed al-Gamadi and Mahand al-Shari also spent time in Al-Qasim, both breaking with their families. According to his father, Mahand al-Shari's frequent visits to this area resulted in his failing exams at his university in Riyadh. Saeed al-Gamadi transferred to a university in Al-Qasim, but he soon stopped talking to his family and dropped out of school without informing them. The majority of these Saudi recruits began to break with their families in late 1999 and early 2000. According to relatives, some recruits began to make arrangements for extended absences. Members exhibited marked changes in behavior before disappearing. Salim al-Hazmi's father recounted that Salim, who had had problems with alcohol and petty theft, stopped drinking and started attending mosque regularly three months before he disappeared. Several family members remembered that their relatives had expressed the desire to participate in jihad, particularly in Chechnya. None had mentioned going to Afghanistan. These statements might be true or cover stories. The four recruits from the al-Gamadi tribe, for example, all told their families that they were going to Chechnya. Only two, Ahmed al-Gamadi and Saeed al-Gamadi, had documentation suggesting travel to a Russian republic. Some aspiring Saudi Mujahideen, attending to go to Chechnya, encountered difficulties along the way and diverted to Afghanistan. In 1999, Ibn al-Katab, the primary commander of Arab nationals in Chechnya, reportedly had started turning away most foreign Mujahideen because of their inexperience and inability to adjust to the local conditions. KSM states that several of the 9-11 muscle hijackers faced problems traveling to Chechnya and so went to Afghanistan where they were drawn into al-Qaeda. Khalad has offered a more detailed story of how such diversions occurred. According to him, a number of Saudi Mujahideen who tried to go to Chechnya in 1999 to fight the Russians were stopped at the Turkish-Georgian border. Upon arriving in Turkey, they received phone calls at guest houses in places such as Istanbul and Ankara, informing them that the route to Chechnya via Georgia had been closed. These Saudis then decided to travel to Afghanistan where they could train and wait to make another attempt to enter Chechnya during the summer of 2000. While training at al-Qaeda camps, a dozen of them heard bin Laden's speeches, volunteered to become suicide operatives, and eventually were selected as muscle hijackers for the plane's operation. Khalad says he met a number of them at the Kandahar Airport, where they were helping to provide extra security. He encouraged bin Laden to use them. Khalad claims to have been closest with Said al-Gamadi, whom he convinced to become a martyr and whom he asked to recruit a friend, Ahmed al-Gamadi, to the same cause. Although Khalad claims not to recall everyone from this group who was later chosen for the 9-11 operation, he says they also included Sukami, Walid and Waal al-Sheri, Almari, Nami, Hamza al-Gamadi, Salam al-Hazmi, and Mokad. According to KSM, operatives volunteered for suicide operations and for the most part were not pressured to martyr themselves. Upon arriving in Afghanistan, a recruit would fill out an application with standard questions such as, what brought you to Afghanistan? How did you travel here? How did you hear about us? What attracted you to the cause? What is your educational background? Where have you worked before? Applications were valuable for determining the potential of new arrivals, for filtering out potential spies from among them, and for identifying recruits with special skills. For instance, as pointed out earlier, Hanee Hanjur noted his pilot training. operatives also were asked whether they were prepared to serve as suicide operatives. Those who answered in the affirmative were interviewed by senior al-Qaeda Lieutenant Muhammad Atef. KSM claims that the most important quality for any al-Qaeda operative was willingness to martyr himself. Khalad agrees and claims that this criterion had preeminence in selecting the plane's operation participants. The second most important criterion was demonstrable patience, Khalad says, because the planning for such attacks could take years. Khalad claims it did not matter whether the hijackers had fought in jihad previously, since he believes that U.S. authorities were not looking for such operatives before 9-11. But KSM asserts that young Mujahideen with clean records were chosen to avoid raising alerts during travel. The al-Qaeda training camphead mentioned above adds that operatives with no prior involvement in activities likely to be known to international security agencies were purposefully selected for the 9-11 attacks. Most of the muscle hijackers first underwent basic training similar to that given other al-Qaeda recruits. This included training in firearms, heavy weapons, explosives, and topography. Recruits learned discipline and military life. They were subjected to artificial stresses to measure their psychological fitness and commitment to jihad. At least seven of the Saudi muscle hijackers took this basic training regime at the Al-Farouk camp near Kandahar. This particular camp appears to have been the preferred location for vetting and training the potential muscle hijackers because of its proximity to bin Laden and senior al-Qaeda leadership. Two others, Sukami and Mokad, trained at Calden, another large basic training facility located near Kabul where Medar had trained in the mid-1990s. By the time operatives for the plane's operation were picked in mid-2000, some of them had been training in Afghanistan for months. Others were just arriving for the first time and still others may have been returning after prior visits to the camps. According to KSM, Medladen would travel to the camps to deliver lectures and meet the trainees personally. If Medladen believed a trainee held promise for a special operation, that trainee would be invited to the Al-Qaeda leader's compound at Tarnak Farms for further meetings. KSM claims that Bin Laden could assess new trainees very quickly in about 10 minutes and that many of the 9-11 hijackers were selected in this manner. Bin Laden, assisted by ATEF, personally chose all the future muscle hijackers for the plane's operation primarily between the summer of 2000 and April 2001. Upon choosing a trainee, Bin Laden would ask him to swear loyalty for a suicide operation. After the selection and oath swearing, the operative would be sent to KSM for training and the filming of a martyrdom video, a function KSM supervises head of Al-Qaeda's media committee. KSM sent the muscle hijacker recruits on to Saudi Arabia to obtain U.S. visas. He gave them money, about $2,000 each, and instructed them to return to Afghanistan for more training after obtaining the visas. At this early stage, the operatives were not told details about the operation. The majority of the Saudi muscle hijackers obtained U.S. visas in Jeddah or Riyadh between September and November of 2000. KSM told potential hijackers to acquire new, clean passports in their home countries before applying for a U.S. visa. This was to avoid raising suspicion about previous travel to countries where Al-Qaeda operated. 14 of the 19 hijackers, including 9 Saudi muscle hijackers, obtained new passports. Some of these passports were then likely doctored by the Al-Qaeda passport division in Kandahar, which would add or erase entry and exit stamps to create false trails in the passports. In addition to the operatives who eventually participated in the 9-11 attacks as muscle hijackers, bin Laden apparently selected at least nine other Saudis who for various reasons did not end up taking part in the operation. Mohammad Mani Ahmad Al-Qatani Khalid Saeed Ahmad Al-Zarani Ali Abd Al-Raman Al-Fakasi Al-Gamadi Saeed Al-Baluki Qataiba Al-Naji Zuhair Al-Tubadi Saeed Abdullah Saeed Al-Gamadi Saad Al-Rashid and Musha Beb Al-Hamlan, a 10th individual, a Tunisian with Canadian citizenship named Abderuf Jaday, may have been a candidate to participate in 9-11, or he may have been a candidate for a later attack. These candidate hijackers either backed out, had trouble obtaining needed travel documents, or were removed from the operation by the Al-Qaeda leadership. Khalad believes KSM wanted between four and six operatives per plane. KSM states that Al-Qaeda had originally planned to use 25 or 26 hijackers but ended up with only the 19. Final training and deployment to the United States. Having acquired US visas in Saudi Arabia, the muscle hijackers returned to Afghanistan for special training in late 2000 to early 2001. The training reportedly was conducted at the Al-Matar complex by Abu Tarab Al-Jardani, one of only a handful of Al-Qaeda operatives who, according to KSM, was aware of the full details of the planned planes operation. Abu Tarab taught the operatives how to conduct hijackings, disarm air marshals, and handle explosives. He also trained them in bodybuilding and provided them with a few basic English words and phrases. According to KSM, Abu Tarab even had the trainees butcher a sheep and a camel with a knife to prepare to use knives during the hijackings. The recruits learned to focus on storming the cockpit at the earliest opportunity when the doors first opened and to worry about seizing control over the rest of the plane later. The operatives were taught about other kinds of attack as well, such as truck bombing, so that they would not be able to disclose the exact nature of their operation if they were caught. According to KSM, the muscle did not learn the full details, including the plan to hijack planes and fly them into buildings before reaching the United States. After training in Afghanistan, the operatives went to a safe house maintained by KSM and Karachi and stayed there temporarily before being deployed to the United States via the UAE. The safe house was run by Al-Qaeda operative Abd al-Rahim Ghulum Rabani, also known as Abu Ramah, a close associate of KSM who assisted him for three years by finding apartments and lending logistical support to operatives KSM would send. According to an Al-Qaeda facilitator, operatives were bought to the safe house by a trusted Pakistani Al-Qaeda courier named Abdullah Sindy, who also worked for KSM. The future hijackers usually arrived in groups of two or three, staying at the safe house for as long as two weeks. The facilitator has identified each operative whom he assisted at KSM's direction in the spring of 2001. Before the operatives left Pakistan, each of them received $10,000 from KSM for future expenses. From Pakistan, the operatives transited through the UAE en route to the United States. In the Emirates, they were assisted primarily by Al-Qaeda operatives Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa El-Hassawi. Ali apparently assisted nine future hijackers between April and June 2001 as they came through Dubai. He helped them with plane tickets, travelers checks and hotel reservations. He also taught them about everyday aspects of life in the West, such as purchasing clothes and ordering food. Dubai, a modern city with easy access to a major airport, travel agencies, hotels and western commercial establishments was an ideal transit point. Ali reportedly assumed the operatives he was helping were involved in a big operation in the United States. He did not know the details. When he asked KSM to send him an assistant, KSM dispatched Hassawi who had worked on Al-Qaeda's media committee in Kandahar. Hassawi helped send the last four operatives, other than Medar, to the United States from the UAE. Hassawi would consult with ATTA about the hijackers' travel schedules to the United States and later check with ATTA to confirm that each had arrived. Hassawi told the muscle hijackers that they would be met by ATTA at the airport. Hassawi also facilitated some of the operations financing. The muscle hijackers began arriving in the United States in late April 2001. In most cases they traveled in pairs on tourist visas and entered the United States in Orlando or Miami, Florida, Washington D.C. or New York. Those arriving in Florida were assisted by ATTA and Shahi while Hasmi and Hanjur took care of the rest. By the end of June, 14 of the 15 muscle hijackers had crossed the Atlantic. The muscle hijackers supplied an infusion of funds which they carried as a mixture of cash and traveler's checks purchased in the UAE in Saudi Arabia. Seven muscle hijackers are known to have purchased a total of nearly $50,000 in traveler's checks that were used in the United States. Moreover, substantial deposits into operatives U.S. bank accounts immediately followed the entry of other muscle hijackers, indicating that those newcomers brought money with them as well. In addition, muscle hijacker Bonnie Hamad came to the United States after opening bank accounts in the UAE and to which were deposited the equivalent of approximately $30,000 on June 25, 2001. After his June 27 arrival in the United States, Bonnie Hamad made visa and ATM withdrawals from his UAE accounts. The hijackers made extensive use of banks in the United States, choosing both branches of major international banks and smaller regional banks. All of the hijackers opened accounts in their own name and used passports and other identification documents that appeared valid on their face. Contrary to numerous published reports, there is no evidence the hijackers ever used false social security numbers to open any bank accounts. While the hijackers were not experts on the use of the U.S. financial system, nothing they did would have led the banks to suspect criminal behavior, let alone a terrorist plot to commit mass murder. The last muscle hijacker to arrive was Khalid Al-Madar. As mentioned earlier, he had abandoned Hasmi in San Diego in June 2000 and returned to his family in Yemen. Madar reportedly stayed in Yemen for about a month before Qalad persuaded him to return to Afghanistan. Madar complained about life in the United States. He met with KSM, who remained annoyed at his decision to go AWOL. But KSM's desire to drop him from the operation yielded to bin Laden's insistence to keep him. By late 2000, Madar was in Mecca staying with a cousin until February 2001, when he went home to visit his family before returning to Afghanistan. In June 2001, Madar returned once more to Mecca to stay with his cousin for another month. Madar said that bin Laden was planning five attacks on the United States. Before leaving, Madar asked his cousin to watch over his home and family because of a job he had to do. On July 4, 2001, Madar left Saudi Arabia to return to the United States, arriving at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. Madar gave his attendant address as the Marriott Hotel New York City, but instead spent one night at another New York hotel. He then joined the group of hijackers in Patterson, reuniting with Nawaf Al-Hazmi after more than a year. With two months remaining, all 19 hijackers were in the United States and ready to take the final steps toward carrying out the attacks. Assistance from Hezbollah and Iran to Al-Qaeda. As we mentioned in Chapter 2, while in Sudan, senior managers in Al-Qaeda maintained contacts with Iran and the Iranian-supported worldwide terrorist organization Hezbollah, which is based mainly in southern Lebanon and Beirut. Al-Qaeda members received advice and training from Hezbollah. Intelligence indicates the persistence of contacts between Iranian security officials and senior Al-Qaeda figures after bin Laden's return to Afghanistan. Khalad has said that Iran made a concerted effort to strengthen relations with Al-Qaeda after the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, but was rebuffed because bin Laden did not want to alienate his supporters in Saudi Arabia. Khalad and other detainees have described the willingness of Iranian officials to facilitate the travel of Al-Qaeda members through Iran on their way to and from Afghanistan. For example, Iranian border inspectors would be told not to place telltale stamps in the passports of these travelers. Such arrangements were particularly beneficial to Saudi members of Al-Qaeda. Our knowledge of the international travels of the Al-Qaeda operatives selected for the 9-11 operation remains fragmentary, but we now have evidence suggesting that 8 to 10 of the 14 Saudi muscle operatives traveled into or out of Iran between October 2000 and February 2001. In October 2000, a senior operative of Hezbollah visited Saudi Arabia to coordinate activities there. He also planned to assist individuals in Saudi Arabia in traveling to Iran during November. A top Hezbollah commander and Saudi Hezbollah contacts were involved. Also in October 2000, two future muscle hijackers, Mahand al-Sharih and Hamza al-Gamadi flew from Iran to Kuwait. In November, Ahmad al-Gamadi apparently flew to Beirut, traveling, perhaps by coincidence, on the same flight as a senior Hezbollah operative. Also in November, Salim al-Hazmi apparently flew from Saudi Arabia to Beirut. In mid-November, we believe, three of the future muscle hijackers, Wael al-Sharih, Walid al-Sharih and Ahmed al-Nami, all of whom had obtained their U.S. visas in late October, traveled in a group from Saudi Arabia to Beirut and then onward to Iran. An associate of a senior Hezbollah operative was on the same flight that took the future hijackers to Iran. Hezbollah officials in Beirut and Iran were expecting the arrival of a group during the same time period. The travel of this group was important enough to merit the attention of senior figures in Hezbollah. Later in November, two future muscle hijackers, Satom al-Sakami and Majed Mokad, flew into Iran from Bahrain. In February 2001, Khalid al-Madar may have taken a flight from Syria to Iran and then traveled further within Iran to a point near the Afghan border. KSM and Ben Al-Shib have confirmed that several of the 9-11 hijackers, at least eight according to Ben Al-Shib, transited Iran on their way to or from Afghanistan, taking advantage of the Iranian practice of not stamping Saudi passports. They deny any other reason for the hijackers' travel to Iran. They also deny any relationship between the hijackers and Hezbollah. In sum, there is strong evidence that Iran facilitated the transit of Al-Qaeda members into and out of Afghanistan before 9-11, and that some of these were future 9-11 hijackers. There also is circumstantial evidence that senior Hezbollah operatives were closely tracking the travel of some of these future muscle hijackers into Iran in November 2000. However, we cannot rule out the possibility of a remarkable coincidence. That is that Hezbollah was actually focusing on some other group of individuals traveling from Saudi Arabia during the same time frame rather than the future hijackers. We have found no evidence that Iran or Hezbollah was aware of the planning for what later became the 9-11 attack. At the time of their travel through Iran, the Al-Qaeda operatives themselves were probably not aware of the specific details of their future operation. After 9-11, Iran and Hezbollah wished to conceal any past evidence of cooperation with Sunni terrorists associated with Al-Qaeda. A senior Hezbollah official disclaimed any Hezbollah involvement in 9-11. We believe this topic requires further investigation by the U.S. government. End of Chapter 7.3. Recording by Leanne Howlett. Chapter 7.4 of the 9-11 commission report. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Leanne Howlett. The 9-11 commission report. Chapter 7.4. Final strategies and tactics. Final preparations in the United States. During the early summer of 2001, ATTA, assisted by Shahi, was busy coordinating the arrival of most of the muscle hijackers in southern Florida, picking them up at the airport, finding them places to stay, and helping them settle in the United States. The majority settled in Florida. Some opened bank accounts, acquired mailboxes, and rented cars. Several also joined local gyms, presumably to stay fit for the operation. Upon first arriving, most stayed in hotels and motels, but by mid-June, they settled in shared apartments relatively close to one another and ATTA. Though these muscle hijackers did not travel much after arriving in the United States, two of them, Walid al-Shari and Satam al-Sakami, took unusual trips. On May 19th, Shari and Sakami flew from Fort Lauderdale to Freeport, the Bahamas, where they had reservations at the Bahamas Princess Resort. The two were turned away by Bahamian officials on arrival, however, because they lacked visas. They returned to Florida that same day. They likely took this trip to renew Sakami's immigration status, as Sakami's legal stay in the United States ended May 21st. On July 30th, Shari traveled alone from Fort Lauderdale to Boston. He flew to San Francisco the next day, where he stayed one night before returning via Las Vegas. While this travel may have been a casing flight, Shari traveled in first class on the same type of aircraft he would help hijack on September 11th, a Boeing 767, and the trip included a layover in Las Vegas. Shari was neither a pilot nor a plot leader, as were the other hijackers who took surveillance flights. The three Hamburg pilots, ATTA, Shahi and Jarrah, took the first of their cross-country surveillance flights early in the summer. Shahi flew from New York to Las Vegas via San Francisco in late May. Jarrah flew from Baltimore to Las Vegas via Los Angeles in early June. ATTA flew from Boston to Las Vegas via San Francisco at the end of June. Each traveled in first class on United Airlines. For the east-west transcontinental leg, each operative flew on the same type of aircraft he would pilot on September 11th. ATTA and Shahi, a Boeing 767, Jarrah, a Boeing 757. Hangeur and Hasmi, as noted below, took similar cross-country surveillance flights in August. Jarrah and Hangeur also received additional training and practice flights in the early summer. A few days before departing on his cross-country test flight, Jarrah flew from Fort Lauderdale to Philadelphia, where he trained at Hortman Aviation and asked to fly the Hudson Corridor, a low-altitude hallway along the Hudson River that passes New York landmarks like the World Trade Center. Heavy traffic in the area can make the corridor a dangerous route for an inexperienced pilot. Because Hortman deemed Jarrah unfit to fly solo, he could fly this route only with an instructor. Hangeur, too, requested to fly the Hudson Corridor about this same time at Air Fleet Training Systems in Teterboro, New Jersey, where he started receiving ground instruction soon after settling in the area with Hasmi. Hangeur flew the Hudson Corridor, but his instructor declined a second request because of what he considered Hangeur's poor piloting skills. Shortly thereafter, Hangeur switched to Caldwell Flight Academy in Fairfield, New Jersey, where he rented small aircraft on several occasions during June and July. In one such instance on July 20th, Hangeur, likely accompanied by Hasmi, rented a plane from Caldwell and took a practice flight from Fairfield to Gaithersburg, Maryland, a route that would have allowed them to fly near Washington, D.C. Other evidence suggests that Hangeur may even have returned to Arizona for flight simulator training earlier in June. There is no indication that Atta or Shahee received any additional flight training in June. Both were likely too busy organizing the newly arrived muscle hijackers and taking their cross-country surveillance flights. Atta, moreover, needed to coordinate with his second-in-command, Nawaf Al-Hasmi. Although Atta and Hasmi appear to have been in Virginia at about the same time in early April, they probably did not meet then. Analysis of late April communications associated with KSM indicates that they had wanted to get together in April, but could not coordinate the meeting. Atta and Hasmi probably first met in the United States, only when Hasmi traveled roundtrip from Newark to Miami between June 19th and June 25th. After he returned to New Jersey, Hasmi's behavior began to closely parallel that of the other hijackers. He and Hangeur, for instance, soon established new bank accounts, acquired a mailbox, rented cars, and started visiting a gym. So did the four other hijackers who evidently were staying with them in New Jersey. Several also obtained new photo identification, first in New Jersey and then at the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles, where Hasmi and Hangeur had obtained such documents months earlier, likely with help from their Jordanian friend, Rababa. Atta probably met again with Hasmi in early July, returning from his initial cross-country surveillance flight. Atta flew into New York. Rather than return immediately to Florida, he checked into a New Jersey hotel. He picked up tickets to travel to Spain at a travel agency in Patterson on July 4th, before departing for Fort Lauderdale. Now that the muscle hijackers had arrived, he was ready to meet with Ramsey Ben El-Sheeb for the last time. The Meeting in Spain After meeting with Atta and Berlin in January 2001, Ben El-Sheeb had spent much of the spring of 2001 in Afghanistan and Pakistan, helping move the muscle hijackers as they passed through Karachi. During the Berlin Meeting, the two had agreed to meet later in the year in Kuala Lumpur to discuss the operation in person again. In late May, Ben El-Sheeb reported directly to Menladen at an Al-Qaeda facility known as Compound 6 near Kandahar. Menladen told Ben El-Sheeb to instruct Atta and the others to focus on their security and that of the operation, and to advise Atta to proceed as planned with the targets discussed before Atta left Afghanistan in early 2000. The World Trade Center, the Pentagon, the White House, and the Capitol. According to Ben El-Sheeb, Ben Laden said he preferred the White House over the Capitol, asking Ben El-Sheeb to confirm that Atta understood this preference. Ben El-Sheeb says Ben Laden had given the same message to Walid Al-Sheri for conveyance to Atta earlier that spring. Ben El-Sheeb also received permission to meet Atta in Malaysia. Atta provided money for the trip, which KSM would help Ben El-Sheeb arrange in Karachi. In early June, Ben El-Sheeb traveled by taxi from Kandahar to Kedah, Pakistan, where Al-Qaeda courier Abu Ramah took him to KSM. According to Ben El-Sheeb, KSM provided a plane ticket to Malaysia and a fraudulent Saudi passport to use for the trip. KSM told him to ask Atta to select a date for the attacks. Ben El-Sheeb was to return to Germany and then inform KSM of the date. KSM also gave Ben El-Sheeb the email address of Zarkarius Musawi for future contact. Ben El-Sheeb then left for Kuala Lumpur. Ben El-Sheeb contacted Atta upon arriving in Malaysia and found a change in plan. Atta could not travel because he was too busy helping the new arrivals settle in the United States. After remaining in Malaysia for approximately three weeks, Ben El-Sheeb went to Bangkok for a few days before returning to Germany. He and Atta agreed to meet later at a location to be determined. In early July, Atta called Ben El-Sheeb to suggest meeting in Madrid for reasons Ben El-Sheeb claims not to know. He says he preferred Berlin, but that he and Atta knew too many people in Germany and feared being spotted together. Unable to buy a ticket to Madrid at the height of the tourist season, Ben El-Sheeb booked a seat on a flight to Rias near Barcelona the next day. Atta was already en route to Madrid, so Ben El-Sheeb phoned Shahi in the United States to inform him of the change in itinerary. Atta arrived in Madrid on July 8. He spent the night in a hotel and made three calls from his room, most likely to coordinate with Ben El-Sheeb. The next day, Atta rented a car and drove to Rias to pick up Ben El-Sheeb. The two then drove to the nearby town of Campbells. Hotel records show Atta renting rooms in the same area until July 19 when he returned his rental car in Madrid and flew back to Fort Lauderdale. On July 16, Ben El-Sheeb returned to Hamburg using a ticket Atta had purchased for him earlier that day. According to Ben El-Sheeb, they did not meet with anyone else while in Spain. Ben El-Sheeb says he told Atta that Ben Laden wanted the attacks carried out as soon as possible. Ben Laden, Ben El-Sheeb conveyed, was worried about having so many operatives in the United States. Atta replied that he could not yet provide a date because he was too busy organizing the arriving hijackers and still needed to coordinate the timing of the flights so that the crashes would occur simultaneously. Atta said he required about five to six weeks before he could provide an attack date. Ben El-Sheeb advised Atta that Ben Laden had directed that the other operatives not be informed of the date until the last minute. Atta was to provide Ben El-Sheeb with advanced notice of at least a week or two so that Ben El-Sheeb could travel to Afghanistan and report the date personally to Ben Laden. As to targets, Atta understood Ben Laden's interest in striking the White House. Atta said he thought this target too difficult, but had tasked Hasmi and Hanjur to evaluate its feasibility and was awaiting their answer. Atta said that those two operatives had rented small aircraft and flown reconnaissance flights near the Pentagon. Atta explained that Hanjur was assigned to attack the Pentagon, Jirah the capital, and that both Atta and Shahi would hit the World Trade Center. If any pilot could not reach his intended target, he was to crash the plane. If Atta could not strike the World Trade Center, he planned to crash his aircraft directly into the streets of New York. Atta told Ben El-Sheeb that each pilot had volunteered for his assigned target and that the assignments were subject to change. During the Spain meeting, Atta also mentioned that he had considered targeting a nuclear facility he had seen during familiarization flights near New York, a target they referred to as electrical engineering. According to Ben El-Sheeb, the other pilots did not like the idea. They thought a nuclear target would be difficult because the airspace around it was restricted, making reconnaissance flights impossible and increasing the likelihood that any plane would be shot down before impact. Moreover, unlike the approved targets, this alternative had not been discussed with senior Al-Qaeda leaders and therefore did not have the requisite blessing, nor would a nuclear facility have particular symbolic value. Atta did not ask Ben El-Sheeb to pass this idea on to Menladen, Attef, or KSM, and Ben El-Sheeb says he did not mention it to them until after September 11th. Ben El-Sheeb claims that during their time in Spain, he and Atta also discussed how the hijackings would be executed. Atta said he, Shahi, and Jarrah had encountered no problems carrying box cutters on cross-country surveillance flights. The best time to storm the cockpit would be about 10 to 15 minutes after takeoff when the cockpit doors typically were open for the first time. Atta did not believe they would need any other weapons. He had no firm contingency plan in case the cockpit door was locked. While he mentioned general ideas such as using a hostage or claiming to have a bomb, he was confident the cockpit doors would be opened and did not consider breaking them down a viable idea. Atta told Ben El-Sheeb he wanted to select planes departing on long flights because they would be full of fuel and that he wanted a hijack Boeing aircraft because he believed them easier to fly than Airbus aircraft, which he understood had an autopilot feature that did not allow them to be crashed into the ground. Finally, Atta confirmed that the muscle hijackers had arrived in the United States without incident. They would be divided into teams according to their English-speaking ability. That way they could assist each other before the operation and each team would be able to command the passengers in English. According to Ben El-Sheeb, Atta complained that some of the hijackers wanted to contact their families to say goodbye, something he had forbidden. Atta, moreover, was nervous about his future communications with Ben El-Sheeb, whom he instructed to obtain new telephones upon returning to Germany. Before Ben El-Sheeb left Spain, he gave Atta eight necklaces and eight bracelets that Atta had asked him to buy when he was recently in Bangkok, believing that if the hijackers were clean-shaven and well-dressed, others would think them wealthy Saudis and give them less notice. As directed upon returning from Spain, Ben El-Sheeb obtained two new phones, one to communicate with Atta and another to communicate with KSM and others, such as Akharias Musawi. Ben El-Sheeb soon contacted KSM and, using code words, reported the results of his meeting with Atta. This important exchange occurred in mid-July. The conversation covered various topics. For example, Jarrah was to send Ben El-Sheeb certain personal materials from the hijackers, including copies of their passports, which Ben El-Sheeb in turn would pass along to KSM, probably for subsequent use in Al-Qaeda propaganda. The most significant part of the mid-July conversation concerned Jarrah's troubled relationship with Atta. KSM and Ben El-Sheeb both acknowledged that Jarrah chafed under Atta's authority over him. Ben El-Sheeb believes the disagreement arose in part from Jarrah's family visits. Moreover, Jarrah had been on his own for most of his time in the United States because Ben El-Sheeb's visa difficulty had prevented the two of them from training together. Jarrah thus felt excluded from the decision making. Ben El-Sheeb had to act as a broker between Jarrah and Atta. Concerned that Jarrah might withdraw from the operation at this late stage, KSM emphasized the importance of Atta and Jarrah's resolving their differences. Ben El-Sheeb claims that such concern was unwarranted and in their mid-July discussion reassured KSM that Atta and Jarrah would reconcile and be ready to move forward in about a month after Jarrah visited his family. Noting his concern and the potential for delay, KSM at one point instructed Ben El-Sheeb to send the skirts to Sally, a coded instruction to Ben El-Sheeb to send funds to Zakaria Musawi. While Ben El-Sheeb admits KSM did direct him to send Musawi money during the mid-July conversation, he denies knowing exactly why he received this instruction, though he thought the money was being provided within the framework of the 9-11 operation. KSM may have instructed Ben El-Sheeb to send money to Musawi in order to help prepare Musawi as a potential substitute pilot for Jarrah. On July 20, 2001, Izel Singwin, Jarrah's girlfriend, purchased a one-way ticket for Jarrah from Miami to Dusseldorf. On Jarrah's previous four trips from the United States to see Singwin and his family in Lebanon, he had always traveled with a round-trip ticket. When Jarrah departed Miami on July 25, Atta appears to have driven him to the airport, another unique circumstance. Ben El-Sheeb picked up Jarrah at the airport in Dusseldorf on July 25. Jarrah went to see Singwin as soon as possible, so he and Ben El-Sheeb arranged to meet a few days later. When they did, they had an emotional conversation during which Ben El-Sheeb encouraged Jarrah to see the plan through. While Jarrah was in Germany, Ben El-Sheeb and Musawi were in contact to arrange for the transfer of funds. Ben El-Sheeb received two wire transfers from Musawi in the UAE, totaling $15,000, and within days relayed almost all of this money to Musawi in two installments. Musawi had been taking flight lessons at the Airman Flight School in Norman, Oklahoma since February but stopped in late May. Although at that point he had only about 50 hours of flight time and no solo flights to his credit, Musawi began making inquiries about flight materials and simulator training for Boeing 747s. On July 10 he put down a $1,500 deposit for flight simulator training at Pan Am International Flight Academy in Egan, Minnesota, and by the end of the month he had received a simulator schedule to train from August 13 through August 20. Musawi also purchased two knives and inquired of two manufacturers of GPS equipment, whether their products could be converted for aeronautical use—activities that closely resembled those of the 9-11 hijackers during their final preparations for the attacks. On August 10, shortly after getting the money from Ben El-Sheeb, Musawi left Oklahoma with a friend and drove to Minnesota. Three days later Musawi paid the $6,800 balance owed for his flight simulator training at Pan Am and Cache and began his training. His conduct, however, raised the suspicions of his flight instructor. It was unusual for a student with so little training to be learning to fly large jets without any intention of obtaining a pilot's license or other goal. On August 16, once the instructor reported his suspicion to the authorities, Musawi was arrested by the INS on immigration charges. KSM denies ever considering Musawi for the plane's operation. Instead, he claims that Musawi was slated to participate in a second wave of attacks. KSM also states that Musawi had no contact with ATTA and we are unaware of evidence contradicting this assertion. Yet KSM has also stated that by the summer of 2001, he was too busy with the plane's operation to continue planning for any second wave attacks. Moreover, he admits that only three potential pilots were ever recruited for the alleged second wave. Musawi, plus two others, who by mid-summer of 2001 had backed out of the plot. We therefore believe that the effort to push Musawi forward in August 2001 lends credence to the suspicion that he was being primed as a possible pilot in the immediate plane's operation. Ben Elshib says he assumed Musawi was to take his place as another pilot in the 9-11 operation. Recounting a post-9-11 discussion with KSM and Kandahar, Ben Elshib claims KSM mentioned Musawi as being part of the 9-11 operation. Although KSM never referred to Musawi by name, Ben Elshib understood he was speaking of the operative to whom Ben Elshib had wired money. Ben Elshib says KSM did not approve of Musawi, but believes KSM did not remove him from the operation only because Musawi had been selected and assigned by Ben Laden himself. KSM did not hear about Musawi's arrest until after September 11. According to Ben Elshib, had been Laden and KSM were in prior to 9-11 that Musawi had been detained, they might have canceled the operation. When Ben Elshib discussed Musawi's arrest with KSM after September 11, KSM congratulated himself on not having Musawi contact the other operatives, which would have compromised the operation. Musawi had been in contact with Ben Elshib, of course, but this was not discovered until after 9-11. As it turned out, Musawi was not needed to replace Jirah. By the time Musawi was arrested in mid-August, Jirah had returned to the United States from his final trip to Germany. His disagreement with Atah apparently resolved. The operatives began their final preparations for the attacks. Readying the attacks A week after he returned from meeting Ben Elshib in Spain, Atah traveled to Newark, probably to coordinate with Hasmi and give him additional funds. Atah spent a few days in the area before returning to Florida on July 30. The month of August was busy, as revealed by a set of contemporaneous Atah-Ben Elshib communications that were recovered after September 11. On August 3, for example, Atah and Ben Elshib discussed several matters, such as the best way for the operatives to purchase playing tickets and the assignment of muscle hijackers to individual teams. Atah and Ben Elshib also revisited the question of whether to target the White House. They discussed targets in coded language, pretending to be students discussing various fields of study. Architecture referred to the World Trade Center, arts the Pentagon, law the Capitol, and politics the White House. Ben Elshib reminded Atah that Ben Laden wanted to target the White House. Atah again cautioned that this would be difficult. When Ben Elshib persisted, Atah agreed to include the White House, but suggested they keep the Capitol as an alternate target in case the White House proved too difficult. Atah also suggested that the attacks would not happen until after the first week in September when Congress reconvened. Atah and Ben Elshib also discussed the friend who was coming as a tourist, a cryptic reference to candidate hijacker Muhammad al-Katani mentioned above, whom Hassawi was sending the next day as the last one to complete the group. On August 4, Atah drove to the Orlando airport to meet Katani. Upon arrival, Katani was denied entry by immigration officials because he had a one-way ticket and little money, could not speak English, and could not adequately explain what he intended to do in the United States. He was sent back to Dubai. Hassawi contacted KSM, who told him to help Katani return to Pakistan. On August 7, Atah flew from Fort Lauderdale to Newark, probably to coordinate with Hasmi. Two days later, Ahmed Al-Gamadi and Abdul Aziz Al-Amari, who had been living in New Jersey with Hasmi and Hanjur, flew to Miami, probably signifying that the four hijacking teams had finally been assigned. While Atah was in New Jersey, he, Hasmi and Hanjur all purchased tickets for another set of surveillance flights. Like Shahi, Jara, Atah, and Walid Al-Shari before them, Hasmi and Hanjur each flew in first class on the same type of aircraft they would hijack on 9-11, a Boeing 757, and on transcontinental flights that connected to Las Vegas. This time, however, Atah himself also flew directly to Las Vegas, where all three stayed on August 13th to 14th. Beyond Las Vegas's reputation for welcoming tourists, we have seen no credible evidence explaining why, on this occasion and others, the operatives flew to or met in Las Vegas. Through August, the hijackers kept busy with their gym training, and the pilots took frequent practice flights on small rented aircraft. The operatives also began to make purchases suggesting that the planning was coming to an end. In mid-August, for example, they bought small knives that may actually have been used in the attacks. On August 22nd, moreover, Jara attempted to purchase four GPS units from a pilot shop in Miami. He was able to buy only one unit, which he picked up a few days later when he also purchased three aeronautical charts. Perhaps most significant, however, was the purchase of plane tickets for September 11th. On August 23rd, Atah again flew to Newark, probably to meet with Hasmi and select flights. All 19 tickets were booked and purchased between August 25th and September 5th. It therefore appears that the attack date was selected by the third week of August. This timing is confirmed by Ben Al-Shib, who claims Atah called him with the date in mid-August. According to Ben Al-Shib, Atah used a riddle to convey the date in code, a message of two branches, a slash, and a lollipop. To non-Americans, 11 slash 9 would be interpreted as September 11th. Ben Al-Shib says he called Atah back to confirm the date before passing it to KSM. KSM apparently received the date from Ben Al-Shib and a message sent through Ben Al-Shib's old Hamburg associate, Zachariah Esabar. Both Ben Al-Shib and KSM claimed that Esabar was not privy to the meaning of the message and had no foreknowledge of the attacks. According to Ben Al-Shib, shortly after the date was chosen, he advised Esabar and another Hamburg associate, Said Bahaji, that if they wanted to go to Afghanistan, now was the time because it would soon become more difficult. Esabar made reservations on August 22nd and departed Hamburg for Karachi on August 30th. Bahaji purchased his tickets on August 20th and departed Hamburg for Karachi on September 3rd. Ben Al-Shib also made arrangements to leave for Pakistan during early September before the attacks, as did Ali and Hasawi, the plot facilitators in the UAE. During these final days, Ben Al-Shib and Atah kept in contact by phone, email, and instant messaging. Although Atah had forbidden the hijackers to contact their families, he apparently placed one last call to his own father on September 9th. Atah also asked Ben Al-Shib to contact the family of one hijacker, pass along goodbyes from others, and give regards to KSM. Jarrah alone appears to have left a written farewell, a sentimental letter to Isal Sanghwan. Hasmi, however, may not have been so discreet. He may have telephoned his former San Diego companion, Maudar Abdullah, in late August. Several bits of evidence indicate that others in Abdullah's circle may have received word that something big would soon happen. As noted earlier, Abdullah's behavior reportedly changed noticeably. Prior to September 11th, both he and Yazid Al-Salmi suddenly became intent on proceeding with their planned marriages. One witness quotes Salmi as commenting after the 9-11 attacks. I knew they were going to do something that is why I got married. Moreover, as of August 2001, Iyad Crywish and other employees at the Texaco Station where Hasmi had worked suddenly were anticipating attention from law enforcement authorities in the near future. Finally, according to an uncorroborated witness account, early on the morning of September 10th, Abdullah Osama Awadallah, Omar Bakarbashat, and others behave suspiciously at the gas station. According to the witness, after the group met, Awadallah said, It is finally going to happen as the others celebrated by giving each other high fives. Descent within the Al-Qaeda leadership While tactical preparations for the attack were nearing completion, the entire operation was being questioned at the top as Al-Qaeda and the Taliban argued over strategy for 2001. Our focus has naturally been on the specifics of the plane's operation, but from the perspective of bin Laden and Attef, this operation was only one, admittedly key element of their unfolding plans for the year. Living in Afghanistan, interacting constantly with the Taliban, the Al-Qaeda leaders would never lose sight of the situation in that country. Bin Laden's consistent priority was to launch a major attack directly against the United States. He wanted the plane's operation to proceed as soon as possible. Medar reportedly told his cousin during the summer of 2001 that bin Laden was reputed to have remarked, I will make it happen even if I do it by myself. According to KSM, bin Laden had been urging him to advance the date of the attacks. In 2000, for instance, KSM remembers bin Laden pushing him to launch the attacks amid the controversy after then-Israeli opposition party leader Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. KSM claims bin Laden told him it would be enough for the hijackers simply to down planes rather than crash them into specific targets. KSM says he resisted the pressure. KSM claims to have faced similar pressure twice more in 2001. According to him, bin Laden wanted the operation carried out on May 12, 2001, seven months to the day after the coal bombing. KSM adds that the 9-11 attacks had originally been envisioned for May 2001. The second time he was urged to launch the attacks early was in June or July 2001, supposedly after bin Laden learned from the media that Sharon would be visiting the White House. On both occasions, KSM resisted, asserting that the hijacking teams were not ready. Bin Laden pressed particularly strongly for the latter date in two letters, stressing the need to attack early. The second letter reportedly was delivered by bin Laden's son-in-law, Afs al-Madani. Other evidence corroborates KSM's account. For instance, Medar told his cousin that the attacks were to happen in May but were postponed twice, first to July than to September. Moreover, one candidate at hijacker remembers a general warning being issued in the Al-Qaeda camps in July or early August, just like the warnings issued two weeks before the coal bombing and 10 days before the eventual 9-11 attacks. During the mid-summer alert, Al-Qaeda members dispersed with their families, security was increased, and bin Laden disappeared for about 30 days until the alert was cancelled. While the details of the operation were strictly compartmented by the time of the alert, word had begun to spread that an attack against the United States was coming. KSM notes that it was generally well known by the summer of 2001 that he was planning some kind of operation against the United States. Many were even aware that he had been preparing operatives to go to the United States, leading some to conclude that Al-Qaeda was planning a near-term attack on U.S. soil. Moreover, bin Laden had made several remarks that summer, hinting at an upcoming attack and generating rumors throughout the worldwide jihadist community. Bin Laden routinely told important visitors to expect significant attacks against U.S. interests soon, and, during a speech at the Al-Farouk camp, exhorted trainees to pray for the success of an attack involving 20 martyrs. Others have confirmed hearing indications of an impending attack and have verified that such news, albeit without specific details, had spread across Al-Qaeda. Although bin Laden's top priority apparently was to attack the United States, others had a different view. The Taliban leaders put their main emphasis on the year's military offensive against the Northern Alliance, an offensive that ordinarily would begin in the late spring or summer. They certainly hoped that this year's offensive would finally finish off their old enemies, driving them from Afghanistan. From the Taliban's perspective, an attack against the United States might be counterproductive. It might draw the Americans into the war against them, just when final victory seemed within their grasp. There is evidence that Mullah Omar initially opposed a major Al-Qaeda operation directly against the United States in 2001. Furthermore, by July, with word spreading of a coming attack, a schism emerged among the senior leadership of Al-Qaeda. Several senior members reportedly agreed with Mullah Omar. Those who reportedly sided with bin Laden included Attef, Suleiman Abu Gath, and KSM. But those said to have opposed him were weighty figures in the organization, including Abu Hafs the Mauritanian, Sheikh Said al-Mazri, and Saif al-Adal. One senior Al-Qaeda operative claims to recall bin Laden arguing that attacks against the United States needed to be carried out immediately to support insurgency in the Israeli occupied territories and protest the presence of U.S. forces in Saudi Arabia. Beyond these rhetorical appeals, bin Laden also reportedly thought an attack against the United States would benefit Al-Qaeda by attracting more suicide operatives, eliciting greater donations, and increasing the number of sympathizers willing to provide logistical assistance. Mullah Omar is reported to have opposed this course of action for ideological reasons rather than out of fear of U.S. retaliation. He is said to have preferred for Al-Qaeda to attack Jews, not necessarily the United States. KSM contends that Omar faced pressure from the Pakistani government to keep Al-Qaeda from engaging in operations outside Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda's chief financial manager, Sheikh Said, argued that Al-Qaeda should defer to the Taliban's wishes. Another source says that Sheikh Said opposed the operation, both out of deference to Omar and because he feared the U.S. response to an attack. Abu Hafs the Mauritanian reportedly even wrote bin Laden a message basing opposition to the attacks on the Koran. According to KSM in late August when the operation was fully planned, bin Laden formally notified the Al-Qaeda Shura Council that a major attack against the United States would take place in the coming weeks. When some council members objected, bin Laden countered that Mullah Omar lacked authority to prevent Al-Qaeda from conducting Jihad outside Afghanistan. Though most of the Shura council reportedly disagreed, bin Laden persisted. The attacks went forward. The story of dissension within Al-Qaeda regarding the 9-11 attacks is probably incomplete. The information on which the account is based comes from sources who were not privy to the full scope of Al-Qaeda and Taliban planning. Bin Laden and Atef, however, probably would have known at least that the general Taliban offensive against the Northern Alliance would rely on Al-Qaeda military support. Another significant Al-Qaeda operation was making progress during the summer. A plot to assassinate the Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Masoud. The operatives disguised as journalists were in Masoud's camp and prepared to kill him sometime in August. Their appointment to see him was delayed. But on September 9th the Masoud assassination took place. The delayed Taliban offensive against the Northern Alliance was apparently coordinated to begin as soon as he was killed and it got underway on September 10th. As they deliberated earlier in the year, bin Laden and Atef would likely have remembered that Mullah Omar was dependent on them for the Masoud assassination and for vital support in the Taliban military operations. KSM remembers Atef telling him that Al-Qaeda had an agreement with the Taliban to eliminate Masoud after which the Taliban would begin an offensive to take over Afghanistan. Atef hoped Masoud's death would also appease the Taliban when the 9-11 attacks happened. There are also some scant indications that Omar may have been reconciled to the 9-11 attacks by the time they occurred. Moving to departure positions. In the days just before 9-11 the hijackers returned leftover funds to Al-Qaeda and assembled in their departure cities. They sent the excess funds by wire transfer to Hasawi and the UAE about $26,000 altogether. The hijackers targeting American Airlines Flight 77 to depart from Dulles migrated from New Jersey to Laurel, Maryland about 20 miles from Washington DC. They stayed in a motel during the first week in September and spent time working out at a gym. On the final night before the attacks they lodged at a hotel in Herndon, Virginia close to the airport. Further north the hijackers targeting United Airlines Flight 93 to depart from Newark gathered in that city from their base in Florida on September 7th. Just after midnight on September 8th through 9th, Jarrah received a speeding ticket in Maryland as he headed north on I-95. He joined the rest of his team at their hotel. Atta was still busy coordinating the teams. On September 7th he flew from Fort Lauderdale to Baltimore, presumably to meet with the Flight 77 team in Laurel. On September 9th he flew from Baltimore to Boston. By then Shahi had arrived there and Atta was seen with him at his hotel. The next day Atta picked up Omari at another hotel and the two drove to Portland, Maine for reasons that remain unknown. In the early morning hours of September 11th they boarded a commuter flight to Boston to connect to American Airlines Flight 11. The two spent their last night pursuing ordinary activities making ATM withdrawals, eating pizza and shopping at a convenience store. Their three fellow hijackers for Flight 11 stayed together in a hotel in Newton, Massachusetts just outside of Boston. Shahi and his team targeting United Airlines Flight 175 from Logan Airport spent their last hours at two Boston hotels. The plan that started with a proposal by KSM in 1996 had evolved to overcome numerous obstacles. Now nineteen men waited in nondescript hotel rooms to board four flights the next morning. End of Chapter 7.4. Recording by Lee Ann Howlett. Chapter 8.1 of the 9-11 Commission Report. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how you can volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Lee Ann Howlett. The 9-11 Commission Report. Chapter 8.1. The system was blinking red. 8.1. The Summer of Threat. As 2001 began counterterrorism officials were receiving frequent but fragmentary reports about threats. Indeed there appeared to be possible threats almost everywhere the United States had interests including at home. To understand how the escalation and threat reporting was handled in the summer of 2001 it is useful to understand how threat information in general is collected and conveyed. Information is collected through several methods including signals intelligence and interviews of human sources and gathered into intelligence reports. Depending on the source and nature of the reporting these reports may be highly classified and therefore tightly held or less sensitive and widely disseminated to state and local law enforcement agencies. Threat reporting must be disseminated either through individual reports or through threat advisories. Such advisories intended to alert their recipients may address a specific threat or be a general warning. Because the amount of reporting is so voluminous only a select fraction can be chosen for briefing the president and senior officials. During 2001 director of central intelligence George Tennant was briefed regularly regarding threats and other operational information relating to Osama bin Laden. He in turn met daily with President Bush who was briefed by the CIA through what is known as the president's daily brief PDB. Each PDB consists of a series of six to eight relatively short articles or briefs covering a broad array of topics. CIA staff decides which subjects are the most important on any given day. There were more than 40 intelligence articles in the PDBs from January 20th to September 10th 2001 that related to bin Laden. The PDB is considered highly sensitive and is distributed to only a handful of high-level officials. The senior executive intelligence brief SEIB distributed to a broader group of officials has a similar format and generally covers the same subjects as the PDB. It usually contains less information so as to protect sources and methods. Like their predecessors the attorney general the FBI director and Richard Clark the National Security Council NSC counterterrorism coordinator all received the SEIB not the PDB. Clark and his staff had extensive access to terrorism reporting but they did not have access to internal non-disseminated information at the national security agency NSA CIA or FBI. The drumbeat begins in the spring of 2001 the level of reporting on terrorist threats and planned attacks increased dramatically to its highest level since the millennium alert. At the end of March the intelligence community disseminated a terrorist threat advisory indicating a heightened threat of SUNY extremist terrorist attacks against US facilities personnel and other interests. On March 23rd in connection with discussions about possibly reopening Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House Clark warned National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice that domestic or foreign terrorists might use a truck bomb that are weapon of choice on Pennsylvania Avenue. That would result he said in the destruction of the West Wing and parts of the residents. He also told her that he thought there were terrorist cells within the United States including Al Qaeda. The next week Rice was briefed on the activities of Abu Zabeda and on CIA efforts to locate him. As pointed out in Chapter 6 Abu Zabeda had been a major figure in the millennium plots. Over the next few weeks the CIA repeatedly issued warnings including calls from DCI tenant to Clark that Abu Zabeda was planning an operation in the near future. One report cited a source indicating that Abu Zabeda was planning an attack in a country that CIA analysts thought might be Israel or perhaps Saudi Arabia or India. Clark relayed these reports to Rice. In response to these threats the FBI sent a message to all its field offices on April 13th summarizing reporting to date. It asked the offices to task all resources including human sources and electronic databases for any information pertaining to current operational activities relating to Sunni extremism. It did not suggest that there was a domestic threat. The interagency counter-terrorism security group CSG that Clark chaired discussed the Abu Zabeda reports on April 19th. The next day a briefing to top officials reported mid-modern planning multiple operations. When the deputies discussed Al Qaeda policy on April 30th they began with a briefing on the threat. In May 2001 the drumbeat of reporting grew louder with reports to top officials that bin Laden public profile may presage attack and bin Laden network's plans advancing. In early May a walk-in to the FBI claimed there was a plan to launch attacks on London, Boston and New York. Attorney general John Ashcroft was briefed by the CIA on May 15th regarding Al Qaeda generally and the current threat reporting specifically. The next day brought a report that a phone call to a U.S. Embassy had warned that bin Laden supporters were planning an attack in the United States using high explosives. On May 17th based on the previous day's report the first item on the CSG's agenda was UBL operation planned in U.S. The anonymous caller's tip could not be corroborated. Late May brought reports of a possible hostage plot against Americans abroad to force the release of prisoners including Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman the blind shake who was serving a life sentence for his role in the 1993 plot to blow up sites in New York City. The reporting noted that operatives might opt to hijack an aircraft or storm a U.S. Embassy. This report led to a federal aviation administration FAA information circular to airlines noting the potential for an airline hijacking to free terrorists incarcerated in the United States. Other reporting mentioned that Abu Zabeda was planning an attack possibly against Israel and expected to carry out several more if things went well. On May 24th alone counter terrorism officials grappled with reports alleging plots in Yemen and Italy as well as a report about a cell in Canada that an anonymous caller had claimed might be planning an attack against the United States. Reports similar to many of these were made available to President Bush in morning intelligence briefings with DCI tenant usually attended by Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Advisor Rice. While these briefings discussed general threats to attack America and American interests the specific threats mentioned in these briefings were all overseas. On May 29th Clark suggested that Rice asked DCI tenant what more the United States could do to stop Abu Zabeda from launching a series of major terrorist attacks probably on Israeli targets but possibly on U.S. facilities. Clark wrote to Rice and her deputy Stephen Hadley. When these attacks occur as they likely will we will wonder what more we could have done to stop them. In May CIA counterterrorist center CTC chief co-for-black told Rice that the current threat level was a seven on a scale of one to ten as compared to an eight during the millennium. High probability of near-term spectacular attacks. Threat reports surged in June and July reaching an even higher peak of urgency. The summer threats seemed to be focused on Saudi Arabia, Israel, Bahrain, Kuwait, Yemen and possibly Rome but the danger could be anywhere including a possible attack on the G8 summit in Genoa. A June 12th CIA report passing along biographical background information on several terrorists mentioned in commenting on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed that he was recruiting people to travel to the United States to meet with colleagues already there so that they might conduct terrorist attacks on bin Laden's behalf. On June 22nd the CIA notified all its station chiefs about intelligence suggesting a possible al-Qaeda suicide attack on a U.S. target over the next few days. DCI tenant asked that all U.S. ambassadors be briefed. That same day the State Department notified all embassies of the terrorist threat and updated its worldwide public warning. In June the State Department initiated the Visa Express program in Saudi Arabia as a security measure in order to keep long lines of foreigners away from vulnerable embassy spaces. The program permitted visa applications to be made through travel agencies instead of directly at the embassy or consulate. A terrorist threat advisory distributed in late June indicated a high probability of near-term spectacular terrorist attacks resulting in numerous casualties. Other report titles warned bin Laden attacks may be imminent and bin Laden and associates making near-term threats. The latter reported multiple attacks planned over the coming days including a severe blow against U.S. and Israeli interests during the next two weeks. On June 21st near the height of the threat reporting U.S. Central Command raised the force protection condition level for U.S. troops in six countries to the highest possible level, Delta. The U.S. Fifth Fleet moved out of its port in Bahrain and a U.S. Marine Corps exercise in Jordan was halted. U.S. embassies in the Persian Gulf conducted an emergency security review and the embassy in Yemen was closed. The CSG had foreign emergency response teams known as FES ready to move on four hours notice and kept up the terrorism alert posture on a rolling 24-hour basis. On June 25th Clark warned Rice and Hadley that six separate intelligence reports showed Al Qaeda personnel warning of a pending attack. An Arabic television station reported bin Laden's pleasure with Al Qaeda leaders who were saying that the next weeks will witness important surprises and that U.S. and Israeli interests will be targeted. Al Qaeda also released a new recruitment and fundraising tape. Clark wrote that this was all too sophisticated to be merely a psychological operation to keep the United States on edge and the CIA agreed. The intelligence reporting consistently described the upcoming attacks as occurring on a calamitous level indicating that they would cause the world to be in turmoil and that they would consist of possible multiple but not necessarily simultaneous attacks. On June 28th Clark wrote Rice that the pattern of Al Qaeda activity indicating attack planning over the past six weeks had reached a crescendo. A series of new reports continue to convince me and analysts at state CIA, DIA, Defense Intelligence Agency and NSA that a major terrorist attack or series of attacks is likely in July he noted. One Al Qaeda intelligence report warned that something very very very very big was about to happen and most of bin Laden's network was reportedly anticipating the attack. In late June the CIA ordered all its station chiefs to share information on Al Qaeda with their host governments and to push for immediate disruptions of cells. The headline of a June 30th briefing to top officials was stark. Bin Laden planning high-profile attacks. The report stated that bin Laden operatives expected near-term attacks to have dramatic consequences of catastrophic proportions. That same day Saudi Arabia declared its highest level of terror alert. Despite evidence of delays possibly caused by heightened U.S. security the planning for attacks was continuing. On July 2nd the FBI counterterrorism division sent a message to federal agencies and state and local law enforcement agencies summarizing information regarding threats from bin Laden. It warned that there was an increased volume of threat reporting indicating a potential for attacks against U.S. targets abroad from groups aligned with or sympathetic to Osama bin Laden. Despite the general warnings the message further stated the FBI has no information indicating a credible threat of terrorist attack in the United States. However it went on to emphasize that the possibility of attack in the United States could not be discounted. It also noted that the July 4th holiday might heighten the threats. The report asked recipients to exercise extreme vigilance and report suspicious activities to the FBI. It did not suggest specific actions that they should take to prevent attacks. Disruption operations against Al Qaeda affiliated cells were launched involving 20 countries. Several terrorist operatives were detained by foreign governments possibly disrupting operations in the Gulf and Italy and perhaps averting attacks against two or three U.S. embassies. Clark and others told us of a particular concern about possible attacks on the 4th of July. After it passed uneventfully the CSG decided to maintain the alert. To enlist more international help Vice President Cheney contacted Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah on July 5th. Hadley apparently called European counterparts while Clark worked with senior officials in the Gulf. In late July because of threats Italy closed the airspace over Genoa and mounted anti-aircraft batteries at the Genoa airport during the G8 summit which President Bush attended. At home the CSG arranged for the CIA to brief intelligence and security officials from several domestic agencies. On July 5th representatives from the Immigration and Naturalization Service INS, the FAA, the Coast Guard, the Secret Service, Customs, the CIA and the FBI met with Clark to discuss the current threat. Attendees report that they were told not to disseminate the threat information they received at the meeting. They interpreted this direction to mean that although they could brief their superiors they could not send out advisories to the field. An NSC official recalls a somewhat different emphasis saying that attendees were asked to take the information back to their home agencies and do what you can with it subject to classification and distribution restrictions. A representative from the INS asked for a summary of the information that she could share with field officers. She never received one. That same day the CIA briefed Attorney General Ashcroft on the Al Qaeda threat warning that a significant terrorist attack was imminent. Ashcroft was told that preparations for multiple attacks were in late stages are already complete and that little additional warning could be expected. The briefing addressed only threats outside the United States. The next day the CIA representative told the CSG that Al Qaeda members believed the upcoming attack would be spectacular, qualitatively different from anything they had done to date. Apparently as a result of the July 5th meeting with Clark the Interagency Committee on Federal Building Security was tasked to examine security measures. This committee met on July 9th when 37 officials from 27 agencies and organizations were briefed on the current threat level in the United States. They were told that not only the threat reports from abroad but also the recent convictions in the East Africa bombings trial, the conviction of Ahmed Rasam and the just-returned Cobar Tower's indictments reinforced the need to exercise extreme vigilance. Attendees were expected to determine whether their respective agencies needed enhanced security measures. On July 18th, 2001, the State Department provided a warning to the public regarding possible terrorist attacks in the Arabian Peninsula. Acting FBI Director Thomas Picard told us he had one of his periodic conference calls with all special agents in charge on July 19th. He said one of the items he mentioned was the need, in light of increased threat reporting, to have evidence response teams ready to move at a moment's notice in case of an attack. He did not task field offices to try to determine whether any plots were being considered within the United States or to take any action to disrupt any such plots. In mid-July, reporting started to indicate that bin Laden's plans had been delayed maybe for as long as two months but not abandoned. On July 23rd, the lead item for CSG discussion was still the al-Qaeda threat and it included mention of suspected terrorist travel to the United States. On July 31st, an FAA circular appeared alerting the aviation community to reports of possible near-term terrorist operations, particularly on the Arabian Peninsula and or Israel. It stated that the FAA had no credible evidence of specific plans to attack U.S. civil aviation, though it noted that some of the currently active terrorist groups were known to plan and train for hijackings and were able to build and conceal sophisticated explosive devices in luggage and consumer products. Tenet told us that in his world the system was blinking red. By late July, Tenet said it could not get any worse. Not everyone was convinced. Some asked whether all these threats might just be deception. On June 30th, the SEIB contained an article titled, Been Laden Threats Are Real, yet Hadley told Tenet in July that Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz questioned the reporting. Perhaps Bin Laden was trying to study U.S. reactions. Tenet replied that he had already addressed the Defense Department's questions on this point. The reporting was convincing. To give a sense of his anxiety at the time, one senior official in the Counterterrorist Center told us that he and a colleague were considering resigning in order to go public with their concerns. The calm before the storm. On July 27th, Clark informed Rice and Hadley that the spike in intelligence about a near-term al-Qaeda attack had stopped. He urged keeping readiness high during the August vacation period, warning that another report suggested an attack had just been postponed for a few months but would still happen. On August 1st, the FBI issued an advisory that in light of the increased volume of threat reporting and the upcoming anniversary of the East Africa Embassy bombings, increased attention should be paid to security planning. It noted that although most of the reporting indicated a potential for attacks on U.S. interests abroad, the possibility of an attack in the United States could not be discounted. On August 3rd, the intelligence community issued an advisory concluding that the threat of impending al-Qaeda attacks would likely continue indefinitely. Citing threats in the Arabian Peninsula, Jordan, Israel, and Europe, the advisory suggested that al-Qaeda was lying in wait and searching for gaps in security before moving forward with the planned attacks. During the spring and summer of 2001, President Bush had on several occasions asked his briefers whether any of the threats pointed to the United States. Reflecting on these questions, the CIA decided to write a briefing article summarizing its understanding of this danger. Two CIA analysts involved in preparing this briefing article believed it represented an opportunity to communicate their view that the threat of a bin Laden attack in the United States remained both current and serious. The result was an article on the August 6th Presidential Daily Brief titled, Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S. It was the 36th PDB item brief so far that year that related to Bin Laden or al-Qaeda and the first devoted to the possibility of an attack in the United States. The following is the text of an item from the Presidential Daily Brief received by President George W. Bush on August 6th, 2001. Redacted material is indicated by brackets. Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S. clandestine foreign government and media reports indicate Bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the U.S. Bin Laden implied in U.S. television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramsey Youssef and bring the fighting to America. After U.S. missile strikes on his base in Afghanistan in 1998, Bin Laden told followers he wanted to retaliate in Washington according to a redacted material service. An Egyptian Islamic jihad E.I.J. operative told an redacted material service at the same time that Bin Laden was planning to exploit the operatives access to the U.S. to mount a terrorist strike. The millennium plotting in Canada in 1999 may have been part of Bin Laden's first serious attempt to implement a terrorist strike in the U.S. Convicted plotter Ahmed Rassam has told the FBI that he conceived the idea to attack Los Angeles International Airport himself but the Bin Laden Lieutenant Abu Zabeda encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation. Rassam also said that in 1998 Abu Zabeda was planning his own U.S. attack. Rassam says Bin Laden was aware of the Los Angeles operation. Although Bin Laden has not succeeded, his attacks against the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 demonstrate that he prepares operations years in advance and is not deterred by setbacks. Bin Laden associates surveilled our embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam as early as 1993 and some members of the Nairobi cell planning the bombings were arrested and deported in 1997. Al-Qaeda members including some who are U.S. citizens have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks. Two Al-Qaeda members found guilty in the conspiracy to bomb our embassies in East Africa were U.S. citizens and a senior EIJ member lived in California in the mid-1990s. A clandestine source said in 1998 that a Bin Laden cell in New York was recruiting Muslim American youth for attacks. We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting such as that from a redacted material service in 1998 saying that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of blind Sheikh Omar al-Rahman and other U.S. held extremists. Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York. The FBI is conducting approximately 70 full field investigations throughout the U.S. that it considers Bin Laden related. CIA and the FBI are investigating a call to our embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group of Bin Laden supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives. The president told us the August 6 report was historical in nature. President Bush said the article told him that Al-Qaeda was dangerous, which he said he had known since he had become president. The president said Bin Laden had long been talking about his desire to attack America. He recalled some operational data on the FBI and remembered thinking it was heartening that 70 investigations were underway. As best he could recollect, Rice had mentioned that the Yemeni surveillance of a federal building in New York had been looked into in May and June but there was no actionable intelligence. He did not recall discussing the August 6 report with the Attorney General or whether Rice had done so. He said that if his advisers had told them there was a cell in the United States they would have moved to take care of it. That never happened. Although the following days SEIB repeated the title of this PDB, it did not contain the reference to hijackings, the alert in New York, the alleged casing of buildings in New York, the threat phoned into the embassy, or the fact that the FBI had approximately 70 ongoing Bin Laden related investigations. No CSG or other NSC meeting was held to discuss the possible threat of a strike in the United States as a result of this report. Late in the month, a Foreign Service reported that Abu Zabeda was considering mounting terrorist attacks in the United States after postponing possible operations in Europe. No targets, timing, or method of attack were provided. We have found no indication of any further discussion before September 11 among the President and his top advisers of the possibility of a threat of an al-Qaeda attack in the United States. DCI Tenant visited President Bush in Crawford, Texas on August 17 and participated in PDB briefings of the President between August 31 after the President had returned to Washington in September 10. But Tenant does not recall any discussions with the President of the domestic threat during this period. Most of the intelligence community recognized in the summer of 2001 that the number and severity of threat reports were unprecedented. Many officials told us that they knew something terrible was planned and they were desperate to stop it. Despite their large number, the threats received contained few specifics regarding time, place, method, or target. Most suggested that attacks were planned against targets overseas. Others indicated threats against unspecified U.S. interests. We cannot say for certain whether these reports, as dramatic as they were, related to the 9-11 attacks. Government response to the threats. National Security Advisor Rice told us that the CSG was the nerve center for running the crisis, although other senior officials were involved over the course of the summer. In addition to his daily meetings with President Bush and weekly meetings to go over other issues with Rice, Tenant was speaking regularly with Secretary of State Colin Powell and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The foreign policy principles routinely talked on the telephone every day on a variety of topics. Hadley told us that before 9-11, he and Rice did not feel they had the job of coordinating domestic agencies. They felt that Clark and the CSG, part of the NSC, were the NSC's bridge between foreign and domestic threats. There was a clear disparity in the levels of response to foreign versus domestic threats. Numerous actions were taken overseas to disrupt possible attacks and listing foreign partners to upset terrorist plans, closing embassies, moving military assets out of the way of possible harm. Far less was done domestically, in part surely because to the extent that specifics did exist, they pertained to threats overseas. As noted earlier, a threat against the embassy in Yemen quickly resulted in its closing. Possible domestic threats were more vague. When reports did not specify where the attacks were to take place, officials presumed that they would again be overseas, though they did not rule out a target in the United States. Each of the FBI threat advisories made this point. Clark mentioned to National Security Advisor Rice, at least twice, that al-Qaeda sleeper cells were likely in the United States. In January 2001, Clark forwarded a strategy paper to Rice, warning that al-Qaeda had a presence in the United States. He noted that two key al-Qaeda members in the Jordanian cell involved in the millennium plot were naturalized U.S. citizens and that one jihadist suspected in the East Africa bombings had informed the FBI that an extensive network of al-Qaeda sleeper agents currently exists in the U.S. He added that Rice's abortive December 1999 attack revealed al-Qaeda supporters in the United States. His analysis, however, was based not on new threat reporting but on past experience. The September 11th attacks fell into the void between the foreign and domestic threats. The foreign intelligence agencies were watching overseas, alert to foreign threats to U.S. interests there. The domestic agencies were waiting for evidence of a domestic threat from sleeper cells within the United States. No one was looking for a foreign threat to domestic targets. The threat that was coming was not from sleeper cells. It was foreign, but from foreigners who had infiltrated into the United States. A second cause of the disparity in response is that domestic agencies did not know what to do and no one gave them direction. Cressy told us that the CSG did not tell the agencies how to respond to the threats. He noted that the agencies that were operating overseas did not need direction on how to respond. They had experience with such threats and had a playbook. In contrast, the domestic agencies did not have a game plan, neither the NSC, including the CSG, nor anyone else instructed them to create one. This lack of direction was evident in the July 5th meeting with representatives from the domestic agencies. The briefing focused on overseas threats. The domestic agencies were not questioned about how they planned to address the threat and were not told what was expected of them. Indeed, as noted earlier, they were specifically told they could not issue advisories based on the briefing. The domestic agency's limited response indicates that they did not perceive a call to action. Clark reflected a different perspective in an email to Rice on September 15th, 2001. He summarized the steps taken by the CSG to alert domestic agencies to the possibility of an attack in the United States. Clark concluded that domestic agencies, including the FAA, knew that the CSG believed a major al-Qaeda attack was coming and could be in the United States. Although the FAA had authority to issue security directives mandating new security procedures, none of the few that were released during the summer of 2001 increased security at checkpoints or onboard aircraft. The information circular has mostly urged air carriers to exercise prudence and be alert. Prior to 9-11, the FAA did present a CD-ROM to air carriers and airport authorities describing the increased threat to civil aviation. The presentation mentioned the possibility of suicide hijackings, but said that fortunately we have no indication that any group is currently thinking in that direction. The FAA conducted 27 special security briefings for specific air carriers between May 1st, 2001 and September 11th, 2001. Two of these briefings discussed the hijacking threat overseas. None discussed the possibility of suicide hijackings or the use of aircraft as weapons. No new security measures were instituted. Rice told us she understood that the FBI had tasked its 56 U.S. field offices to increase surveillance of suspected terrorists and to reach out to informants who might have information about terrorist plots. An NSC staff document at the time described such a tasking as having occurred in late June, but does not indicate whether it was generated by the NSC or the FBI. Other than the previously described April 13th communications sent to all FBI field offices, however, the FBI could not find any record of having received such a directive. The April 13th document asking field offices to gather information on Sunni extremism did not mention any possible threat within the United States and did not order surveillance of suspected operatives. The NSC did not specify what the FBI's directive should contain and did not review what had been issued earlier. Acting FBI Director Picard told us that in addition to his July 19th conference call, he mentioned the heightened terrorist threat in individual calls with the special agents in charge of field offices during their annual performance review discussions. In speaking with agents around the country, we found little evidence that any such concerns had reached FBI personnel beyond the New York field office. The head of counterterrorism at the FBI, Dale Watson, said he had many discussions about possible attacks with Kofor Black at the CIA. They had expected an attack on July 4th. Watson said he felt deeply that something was going to happen, but he told us the threat information was nebulous. He wished he had known more. He wished he had had 500 analysts looking at Osama bin Laden threat information instead of two. Attorney General Ashcroft was briefed by the CIA in May and by Picard in early July about the danger. Picard said he met with Ashcroft once a week in late June through July and twice in August. There was a dispute regarding Ashcroft's interest in Picard's briefings about the terrorist threat situation. Picard told us that after two such briefings, Ashcroft told him that he did not want to hear about the threats anymore. Ashcroft denies Picard's charge. Picard says he continued to present terrorism information during further briefings that summer, but nothing further on the chatter the US government was receiving. The Attorney General told us he asked Picard whether there was intelligence about attacks in the United States and that Picard said no. Picard said he replied that he could not assure Ashcroft that there would be no attacks in the United States although the reports of threats were related to overseas targets. Ashcroft said he therefore assumed the FBI was doing what it needed to do. He acknowledged that in retrospect this was a dangerous assumption. He did not ask the FBI what it was doing in response to the threats and did not task it to take any specific action. He also did not direct the INS, then still part of the Department of Justice, to take any specific action. In sum, the domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction and did not have a plan to institute. The borders were not hardened. Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat. State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI's efforts. The public was not warned. The terrorists exploited deep institutional failings within our government. The question is whether extra vigilance might have turned up an opportunity to disrupt the plot. As seen in Chapter 7, Al-Qaeda's operatives made mistakes. At least two such mistakes created opportunities during 2001, especially in late August. End of Chapter 8.1 Recording by Leanne Howlett