Against All Enemies (24 page)

Diplomacy and peacekeeping were not the only tools we employed. In 1995 Abu Talal al-Qasimy, the leader of the Egyptian muj in Bosnia, disappeared. He had earlier run an office of the International Islamic Relief Organization in Peshawar on the Pakistan-Afghan border. He had worked with Ayman Zawahiri, leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad (later bin Laden's deputy), in exile in Denmark. His disappearance was responded to with a car bomb directed at Croatian police. The bomber was a Canadian working for the Vienna-based Third World Relief.

As it became clear that diplomacy had not entirely worked, in 1998 French troops raided one of the remaining muj facilities still operating in Bosnia in violation of the Dayton Accord. They arrested eleven, including two Iranian diplomats and nine muj. The facility was filled with explosives, arms, and plans for terrorist attacks on U.S. and other Western troops. Also in 1998 a shipment of C-4 plastic explosives was intercepted en route to an Egyptian Islamic Jihad terrorist cell in Germany. Indications were that the explosives were intended for a round of attacks on U.S. military installations in Germany. The same year, an Egyptian Islamic Jihad cell in nearby Albania disappeared. The group, led by Abu Hajir (Mahmoud Salim), was plotting to blow up the U.S. embassy in Tirana.

The United States threatened Bosnian President Izetbegovic with a termination of military aid, then a cessation of all assistance, if he did not fully and faithfully implement Dayton by evicting the muj. The Bosnians claimed that they had evicted them, except for sixty men who had married Bosnian women and become Bosnian citizens. Not until 2000 in his last week in office, did Izetbegovic expel the remaining muj leader, Abu al-Ma'ali. (The Netherlands welcomed him.) And Izetbegovic never did expel everyone. Al Qaeda cells in Bosnia were identified by the United States and raided by Bosnian police as late as 2002.

Despite Izetbegovic's lapses, Bosnia was largely a failure for al Qaeda. They invested men and money, but were unable to establish a major, permanent base, unsuccessful at turning another country into part of the Caliphate. They did, however, gain further experience and burrow deeper into Western Europe. For the United States, Bosnia was largely a success. Although late to address the issue, the U.S. was the major reason that the Islamic government in Bosnia survived. The U.S. also blocked Iranian and al Qaeda influence in the country. Moreover, CIA was able to cripple parts of the al Qaeda network and uncover others. Much of what was uncovered was in Europe, where al Qaeda had taken advantage of refugee policies and other forms of international openness to lay down roots. Although West European governments knew what was present in their countries, many continued to turn a blind eye to al Qaeda's presence. The Finsbury Park Mosque in London, the Islamic Cultural Center in Milan, and similar gathering places for terrorists continued to operate without interference.

T
HROUGHOUT BIN
L
ADEN'S YEARS
in Sudan, that country served as a base for arms and fighters going not just to Bosnia, but also to terrorists in Egypt, Ethiopia, Uganda, and even Qadhafi's Libya. Sudan's intelligence service and military supported the terrorists. Then in June 1995, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak flew to Ethiopia for a meeting in Addis Ababa of the Organization of African Unity. Aware that Sudanese-based Egyptian terrorists were plotting to kill Mubarak as they had assassinated his predecessor, Anwar Sadat, Mubarak's intelligence advisor insisted on an armored limousine and rooftop snipers along the routes from the airport. Without them, Mubarak would have been dead. Islamic Jihad terrorists attempted to block the road, fire on the limousine, and bomb the motorcade. They narrowly failed. Evidence tied the attack to terrorists in Sudan, and all of that evidence indicated support from the Sudanese government.

Following that event, Egypt and we (joined by other countries in the region) sought and obtained the United Nations Security Council's sanction on Sudan. Only Libya had previously been subject to U.N. sanctions because of terrorist sponsorship. In the Counterterrorism Security Group we considered the sanctions a rare diplomatic success. The CSG also considered direct action, examining options for attacks on bin Laden's and/or Turabi's facilities in and around Khartoum. The White House requested the Pentagon to develop plans for a U.S. Special Forces operation against al Qaeda–related facilities in Sudan. Weeks later a Pentagon team briefed National Security Advisor Tony Lake and other Principals in Lake's West Wing office. There were options to raid a terrorist facility that the Pentagon briefing labeled “Veterans' Housing for Afghan War Fighters,” a plan to blow up a bank in downtown Khartoum that was thought to house bin Laden's money, and a few other options. While the Joint Staff dutifully briefed on the plan, they recommended strongly against it. “I can see why,” Lake replied after seeing the details. “This isn't stealth. There is nothing quiet or covert about this. It's going to war with Sudan.”

The military briefing leader nodded: “That's what we do, sir. If you want covert, there's the CIA.” The CIA, however, had no capability to stage significant operations against al Qaeda in Sudan, covert or otherwise.

The Saudis or perhaps the Egyptians may have been thinking along similar lines about the need for some covert operation against bin Laden in Sudan. Reports reached us from Sudan of two incidents in which someone had attempted to kill bin Laden in Khartoum. We also knew that Mubarak was sending the word to Khartoum to rein in the terrorists, or else. Egypt had moved troops and aircraft to the Sudan border once before and had even used its air force to bomb an anti-Egyptian radio station in Khartoum in the early 1980s. Now, Mubarak was threatening another military buildup. The weak Sudanese military could beat up Christian tribes in the south, but it was no match for the Egyptian military. It was getting a little too hot there for the al Qaeda leader.

Afghanistan was looking better to bin Laden in 1996. The puppet government the Soviets had left behind in Kabul had fallen and, after ten years of factional fighting, Pakistan had intervened to stabilize the situation. Hoping to see the return of millions of Afghan refugees in Pakistan, the Pakistan military intelligence service (ISID) had armed and trained the Taliban religious movement to gain control of much of Afghanistan. The leader of the Taliban was much like Sudan's Turabi, a religious zealot seeking to create theocracy at the point of gun. Like Turabi, Mullah Omar was known to bin Laden and was eager to have his men and money back.

Turabi and bin Laden departed as friends, and pledged to continue the struggle and to use Khartoum as a safe haven.

In recent years Sudanese intelligence officials and Americans friendly to the Sudan regime have invented a fable about bin Laden's final days in Khartoum. In the fable the Sudanese government offers to arrest bin Laden and hand him over in chains to FBI agents, but Washington rejects the offer because the Clinton administration does not see bin Laden as important or does and cannot find anywhere to put him on trial.

The only slivers of truth in this fable are that a) the Sudanese government was denying its support for terrorism in the wake of the U.N. sanctions, and b) the CSG had initiated informal inquiries with several nations about incarcerating bin Laden, or putting him on trial. There were no takers. Nonetheless, had we been able to put our hands on him then we would have gladly done so. U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White in Manhattan could, as the saying goes, “indict a ham sandwich.” She certainly could have obtained an indictment for bin Laden in 1996 had we needed it. In the spring of 1998, she did so. The facts about the supposed Sudanese offer to give us bin Laden are that Turabi was not about to turn over his partner in terror to us and no real attempt to do so ever occurred.

Had they wanted to, the National Islamic Front government could have arrested bin Laden just as they had arrested the legendary terrorist Ilyich Sánchez (“Carlos the Jackal”) when he was uncovered in Khartoum by CIA and then by French intelligence in 1994. Carlos, however, was a lone wolf doing nothing for the NIF. Usama bin Laden was an ideological blood brother, family friend, and benefactor of the NIF leaders. He also had many well-armed followers.

Turabi and bin Laden decided to relocate al Qaeda's leadership to Afghanistan to reduce international pressure on the NIF and to help the Taliban finish putting another nation into the Caliphate. Sudan, they thought, was already well on the path. (Turabi was later jailed by the Sudanese military in 2002 and the NIF largely thrown out of government positions.)

The CSG did not, however, stop considering U.S. military or CIA raids into Khartoum. Following bin Laden's departure in 1996, a series of intelligence reports established that a bin Laden associate named Abu Hafs al-Muratani was in Khartoum engaged in supporting terrorist cells elsewhere. The reports became so specific that we knew his hotel and the room in the hotel he was using. I referred the reports to National Security Advisor Sandy Berger with a recommendation that we snatch the terrorist. My CSG colleagues from every agency concurred.

Snatches, or more properly “extraordinary renditions,” were operations to apprehend terrorists abroad, usually without the knowledge of and almost always without public acknowledgment of the host government. One terrorist snatch had been conducted in the Reagan administration. Fawaz Yunis, who had participated in a hijacking of a Jordanian aircraft in 1985 in which three Americans were killed, was lured to a boat off the Lebanese shore and then grabbed by FBI agents and Navy SEALs. By the mid-1990s these snatches were becoming routine CSG activity. Sometimes FBI arrest teams, sometimes CIA personnel, had been regularly dragging terrorists back to stand trial in the United States or flying them to incarceration in other countries. All but one of the World Trade Center attackers from 1993 had been found and brought to New York. Nonetheless, the proposed snatch in Khartoum went nowhere. Several meetings were held in the White House West Wing with Berger demanding the snatch. The Joint Staff had an answer that they used whenever asked to do something that they did not want to do:

• it would take a very large force;
  
• the operation was risky and might fail, with U.S. forces caught and killed, embarrassing the President;
  
• their “professional military opinion” was not to do it;
  
• but, of course, they would do it if they received orders to do so in writing from the President of the United States;
  
• and, by the way, military lawyers said it would be a violation of international law.
  

Fletcher School professor Richard Shultz came to similar conclusions about how the U.S. military would refuse to fight terrorism prior to September 11. His study is summarized in the article “Show Stoppers” in the January 21, 2004
Weekly Standard.

The first time I had proposed a snatch, in 1993, the White House Counsel, Lloyd Cutler, demanded a meeting with the President to explain how it violated international law. Clinton had seemed to be siding with Cutler until Al Gore belatedly joined the meeting, having just flown overnight from South Africa. Clinton recapped the arguments on both sides for Gore: Lloyd says this. Dick says that. Gore laughed and said, “That's a no-brainer. Of course it's a violation of international law, that's why it's a covert action. The guy is a terrorist. Go grab his ass.” We tried, but failed. We learned that often things change by the time you can get a snatch team in place. Sometimes intelligence is wrong. Some governments cooperate with the terrorists. It was worth trying, however, because often enough we succeeded.

But in the 1996 discussion of Sudan, Berger turned to George Tenet, asking if CIA could snatch the man in the Khartoum hotel room. Tenet responded that they had no capability to do that in that hostile environment, nor could they find a friendly intelligence service that could (or would) do it.

Mike Sheehan, the Army Special Forces colonel who had worked with me on terrorism, Somalia, and Haiti, offered to go to Khartoum and do the snatch himself. He was only half joking. “This guy doesn't even have bodyguards. Hit him over the head and throw him in a Chevy Suburban.” To the complete frustration of Berger, Albright, and me, the CIA finally admitted it could do nothing to effect a snatch in Khartoum. DOD was only able to generate options, once again, that looked like going to war with Sudan. Two years later Sheehan was visiting the headquarters of the Joint Special Operations Command (which includes Delta Force) at Fort Bragg. He struck up a conversation with two fellow Green Berets. They told each other stories about operations they had done and about “the ones that got away,” missions planned but not carried out. The two told Sheehan about the plan they had to snatch an al Qaeda leader in a Khartoum hotel. “Woulda been so sweet. Six guys. Two cars. In and out. Easy egress across the border and fly out, low-risk.”