From the 9/11 Commission:
2-3 were advance men. They came to reconn the mission. The other 16-17 were in Afghanistan in AlQeada training camps. They were from Suadi, but in Afghanistan going thru AlQeada's training program.
The 2-3 advanced men traveled the US and Europe gaining a better understanding of our airport security methods. Getting funding for the mission.
The orginal idea came from Shiek Mohammed Khalid. For a time he was the 'manager' of it. He is removed from this role. We know this from his post arrest statements.
At some point the advance men report back to bin Laden that it is a viable mission. bin Laden sends some ranking AlQeada to meet with the Iranian Secret Service. This was to get Iranian OK to pass the 16-17 from Afghanistan thru Iran and get them into the US without getting their passports stamped or needing visa. Both of which would have caught the eye of custom agents.
All but one used false names and passports......good quality ones. Some get flying lessons. One nearly was compromised by a FBI agent in Pheonix. They add a 20th to the group. He was later cut from the group after he said to a instructor, all he want to learn was how to fly the plane.....not to take it off or land it. The school reported him. They saw him as somone that was going to compromise the mission.....he left the country prior to 9/11. They later arrested him.
This took 18 months to put togther. The men that did it were expat Saudi that were living outside of Suadi when it was first conceived. That is the answer to rmartin question.
Why so hard to understand?
After getting to Afghanistan and picking up intell from bin Laden training camps near Khandar the number going thru was 70K.
After 9/11, a 1 percent shift of the 1 billion Muslims in the world to militancy and to terrorism was 1 million.
Why is this hard to understand?
During the Afghan/Russian war bin Laden had less than 5000 foreign fighters come to Afghan. We were not going to find this 70,000 or others in Afghanistan.
Most of the 70,000 were already disbursed back to some 40 home countries, when Afghanistan fell. Who the others from the 1,000,000 were, we had no idea. But we knew from the Muslim street post 9/11, they were in this.
Again so hard to understand?
So how do you fight this?
You need a means to compromise them. Find out who they are. Preferably outside of your country before they conduct operations
in it. Hence Iraq. A side benefit, a Sadam is removed from power.
You may not like Iraq. You would like the US even less if terror operations here were a common event. You may not like Abu Grail. I don't like Abu Grail either. Abu Grail was a dishonor to our military, but was not ordered by GWB. Those that did it are now in Leavenworth, a military prison.
With a limited deployed force, Opal ...we have been able to compromise much of this 70,000 and the projected 1m in Iraq. Arrested alone is 35,000 of them from 18 different countries. 5 times that have been killed. This all has occurred in Iraq. Without Iraq, that 70,000 and that 1m would be free to conduct operations here, in Europe, and elsewhere. They would be free to disrupt Islamic countries in the region. Who do you think is slipping across those Iraqi borders, to join the fight in Iraq? Or fighting presently in Lebanon? Islamic boy scouts? No Opal, the 70K and the 1 m are slipping into Iraq or have joined
Hezbollah/Hamas.
If you have a better 'plan', please send it to either Obama or to the White House. Obama can use it if and when he becomes President.
The White House and Joint Chiefs would like to read how better to take on terrorism post 9/11. If you don't have a better 'plan', and wish to prove your thoughts that these arrested and killed in Iraq have been wronged.....maybe become a Iraqi attroney. Take it thru the legal process there. The country is looking for some good people to help it out.
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