Testimony of J. T. Caruso, Acting Assistant Director, CounterTerrorism
Division, FBI
Before the Subcommittee
on International Operations and Terrorism, Committee on
Foreign Relations, United States Senate
December 18, 2001
"Al-Qaeda International"
Good morning, Madam Chairwoman
and Members of the Subcommittee. My name is J.T. Caruso and
I am the Acting Assistant Director of the FBI's Counterterrorism
Division. I am pleased to appear before the Subcommittee to
discuss Al Qaeda International.
AL-QAEDA INTERNATIONAL
"Al-Qaeda" ("The
Base") was developed by Usama Bin Laden and others in
the early 1980's to support the war effort in Afghanistan
against the Soviets. The resulting "victory" in
Afghanistan gave rise to the overall "Jihad" (Holy
War) movement. Trained Mujahedin fighters from Afghanistan
began returning to such countries as Egypt, Algeria, and Saudi
Arabia, with extensive "jihad" experience and the
desire to continue the "jihad". This antagonism
began to be refocused against the U.S. and its allies.
Sometime in 1989, Al-Qaeda dedicated
itself to further opposing non-Islamic governments in this
region with force and violence. The group grew out of the
"mekhtab al khidemat" (the Services Office) organization
which maintained offices in various parts of the world, including
Afghanistan, Pakistan and the United States. Al-Qaeda began
to provide training camps and guesthouses in various areas
for the use of Al-Qaeda and its affiliated groups. They attempted
to recruit U.S. citizens to travel throughout the Western
world to deliver messages and engage in financial transactions
for the benefit of Al-Qaeda and its affiliated groups and
to help carry out operations. By 1990 Al-Qaeda was providing
military and intelligence training in various areas including
Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Sudan, for the use of Al-Qaeda
and its affiliated groups, including the Al-Jihad (Islamic
Jihad) organization.
One of the principal goals of
Al-Qaeda was to drive the United States armed forces out of
Saudi Arabia (and elsewhere on the Saudi Arabian peninsula)
and Somalia by violence. Members of Al-Qaeda issued fatwahs
(rulings on Islamic law) indicating that such attacks were
both proper and necessary.
Al-Qaeda opposed the United
States for several reasons. First, the United States was regarded
as an "infidel" because it was not governed in a
manner consistent with the group's extremist interpretation
of Islam. Second, the United States was viewed as providing
essential support for other "infidel" governments
and institutions, particularly the governments of Saudi Arabia
and Egypt, the nation of Israel and the United Nations organization,
which were regarded as enemies of the group. Third, Al-Qaeda
opposed the involvement of the United States armed forces
in the Gulf War in 1991 and in Operation Restore Hope in Somalia
in 1992 and 1993, which were viewed by Al-Qaeda as pretextual
preparations for an American occupation of Islamic countries.
In particular, Al-Qaeda opposed the continued presence of
American military forces in Saudi Arabia (and elsewhere on
the Saudi Arabian peninsula) following the Gulf War. Fourth,
Al-Qaeda opposed the United States Government because of the
arrest, conviction and imprisonment of persons belonging to
Al-Qaeda or its affiliated terrorist groups or with whom it
worked, including Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who was convicted
in the first World Trade Center bombing.
From its inception until approximately
1991, the group was headquartered in Afghanistan and Peshawar,
Pakistan. Then in 1991, the group relocated to the Sudan where
it was headquartered until approximately 1996, when Bin Laden,
Mohammed Atef and other members of Al-Qaeda returned to Afghanistan.
During the years Al-Qaeda was headquartered in Sudan the network
continued to maintain offices in various parts of the world
and established businesses which were operated to provide
income and cover to Al-Qaeda operatives.
AL-QAEDA TIES TO OTHER TERRORIST
ORGANIZATIONS
Although Al-Qaeda functions
independently of other terrorist organizations, it also functions
through some of the terrorist organizations that operate under
its umbrella or with its support, including: the Al-Jihad,
the Al-Gamma Al-Islamiyya (Islamic Group - led by Sheik Omar
Abdel Rahman and later by Ahmed Refai Taha, a/k/a "Abu
Yasser al Masri,"), Egyptian Islamic Jihad, and a number
of jihad groups in other countries, including the Sudan, Egypt,
Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Afghanistan,
Pakistan, Bosnia, Croatia, Albania, Algeria, Tunisia, Lebanon,
the Philippines, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, the Kashmiri region
of India, and the Chechen region of Russia. Al-Qaeda also
maintained cells and personnel in a number of countries to
facilitate its activities, including in Kenya, Tanzania, the
United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. By banding together,
Al-Qaeda proposed to work together against the perceived common
enemies in the West - particularly the United States which
Al-Qaeda regards as an "infidel" state which provides
essential support for other "infidel" governments.
Al-Qaeda responded to the presence of United States armed
forces in the Gulf and the arrest, conviction and imprisonment
in the United States of persons belonging to Al-Qaeda by issuing
fatwahs indicating that attacks against U.S. interests, domestic
and foreign, civilian and military, were both proper and necessary.
Those fatwahs resulted in attacks against U.S. nationals in
locations around the world including Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania,
Yemen, and now in the United States. Since 1993, thousands
of people have died in those attacks.
THE FATWAH'S OF AL-QAEDA
The Fatwah Against American
Troops in Somalia
At various times from about
1992 until about 1993, Usama Bin Laden, working together with
members of the fatwah committee of Al-Qaeda, disseminated
fatwahs to other members and associates of Al-Qaeda which
directed that the United States forces stationed in the Horn
of Africa, including Somalia, should be attacked. Indeed,
Bin Laden has claimed responsibility for the deaths of 18
U.S. servicemen killed in "Operation Restore Hope"
in Somalia in 1994.
February, 1998 Fatwah
On February 22, 1998, Bin Laden
issued a fatwah stating that it is the duty of all Muslims
to kill Americans. This fatwah read, in part, that "in
compliance with God's order, we issue the following fatwah
to all Muslims: the ruling to kill the Americans and their
allies, including civilians and military, is an individual
duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which
it is possible to do it." This fatwah appears to have
provided the religious justification for, and marked the start
of logistical planning for, the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya
and Tanzania.
In February 1998, Usama Bin
Ladin and one of his top lieutenants and leader of the Al-Jihad
organization in Egypt, Ayman Al Zawahiri, endorsed a fatwah
under the banner of the "International Islamic Front
for Jihad on the Jews and Crusaders." This fatwah, published
in the publication Al-Quds al-Arabi on February 23, 1998,
stated that Muslims should kill Americans -- including civilians
-- anywhere in the world where they can be found. In or about
April 1998, one of the defendants in the East Africa trial,
Mohamed Sadeek Odeh, discussed the fatwahs issued by Bin Ladin
and Al-Qaeda against America with another defendant, Mustafa
Mohamed Fadhil. This discussion took place in Kenya.
THE TRIAL IN NEW YORK CITY
As was revealed at the trial
that took place in New York earlier this year, a former member
of Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network began working with the United
States government in 1996. That witness revealed that Bin
Laden had a terrorist group, Al-Qaeda, which had privately
declared war on America and was operating both on its own
and as an umbrella for other terrorist groups. The witness
revealed that Al-Qaeda had a close working relationship with
the aforementioned Egyptian terrorist group known as Egyptian
Islamic Jihad. The witness recounted that Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda
were seeking to obtain nuclear and chemical weapons and that
the organization engaged in sophisticated training. He also
revealed that Al-Qaeda obtained specialized terrorist training
from and worked with Iranian government officials and the
terrorist group Hezballah. Thereafter, in August 1996, two
years prior to the bombings of the embassies in East Africa,
Usama Bin Laden issued a public Declaration of Jihad against
the United States military. This was followed by a series
of other statements including a February 1998 joint declaration,
signed by Usama Bin Laden and the leader of Egyptian Islamic
Jihad (EIJ), among others, which declared war on the American
population, military and civilian. The public statements corroborated
the witness information that Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and EIJ were
working to kill Americans. In May 1998, Bin Laden gave a press
interview in which he threatened American interests and complained
that the United States was using its embassies overseas to
track down terrorists.
On August 7, 1998, the bombings
of the embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
occurred roughly simultaneously. The persons who carried out
the attacks in Kenya and Tanzania have since been identified
publicly: the principal participants were members of Al-
Qaeda and/or the affiliated
terrorist group EIJ. Indeed, Mohamed Rashed Daoud al-Owhali,
a Saudi who admitted he was in the bomb truck used in Nairobi,
confessed that he had been trained in Al-Qaeda camps, fought
with the Taliban in Afghanistan (with the permission of Usama
Bin Laden), had asked Bin Laden for a mission and was thereafter
dispatched by others to East Africa after undergoing extensive
specialized training at camps in Afghanistan. Another defendant,
Mohamed Sadeek Odeh, in whose residence was found a sketch
of the area where the bomb was to be placed, admitted he was
a member of Al-Qaeda and identified the other principal participants
in the bombing as Al-Qaeda members. Odeh admitted that he
was told the night prior to the bombings that Bin Laden and
the others he was working with in Afghanistan had relocated
from their camps because they expected the American military
to retaliate.
There was independent proof
of the involvement of Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and EIJ in the bombings.
First, the would-be suicide bomber, al-Owhali, ran away from
the bomb truck at the last minute and survived. However, he
had no money or passport or plan by which to escape Kenya.
Days later, he called a telephone number in Yemen and thus
arranged to have money transferred to him in Kenya. That same
telephone number in Yemen was contacted by Usama Bin Laden's
satellite phone on the same days that al-Owhali was arranging
to get money. Moreover, al-Owhali and Odeh both implicated
men named "Harun," "Saleh" and "Abdel
Rahman," now all fugitives, as organizing the Nairobi
bombing. All three have been conclusively shown to be Al-Qaeda
and/or EIJ members. Indeed, documents recovered in a 1997
search of a house in Kenya showed Harun to be an Al-Qaeda
member in Kenya. The house where the Nairobi bomb was assembled
was located and proved to have been rented by that same Al-Qaeda
member Harun. Moreover, the records for the telephone located
at the bomb factory showed calls to the same number in Yemen
which al-Owhali contacted for money after the bombing and
which Usama Bin Laden's satellite telephone also contacted
before and after the bombings.
The person arrested for the
Tanzania bombing, Khalfan Khamis Mohamed, also implicated
"Saleh" and "Abdel Rahman" in the Tanzania
bombing as did Odeh. Telephone records confirmed that the
Kenya and Tanzania cells were in contact shortly before the
bombings.
Additional proof of the involvement
of Al-Qaeda and EIJ in the East Africa bombings came from
a search conducted in London of several residences and business
addresses belonging to Al-Qaeda and EIJ members. In those
searches, a number of documents were found, including claims
of responsibility in the name of a fictitious group. Al-Owhali,
the would-be suicide bomber, admitted that he was told to
make a videotape of himself using the name of a fictitious
group, the same name found on the claims of responsibility.
The claims of responsibility were received in London on the
morning the bombings occurred, likely before the bombings
even occurred. The claim documents could be traced back to
a telephone number that was in contact with Bin Laden's satellite
telephone. The claims, which were then disseminated to the
press, were clearly authored by someone genuinely familiar
with the bombing conspirators as they stated that the bombings
were carried out by two Saudis in Kenya and one Egyptian in
Tanzania. The nationality of the bombers did not become known
to investigators until weeks later. Moreover, the plan had
been for two Saudis to be killed in the Nairobi bombing but
only one was actually killed as al-Owhali ran away at the
last minute. Thus the claims were written by someone who knew
what the plan was but before they knew the actual results.
In short, the trial record left
little doubt that the East Africa embassy bombings were carried
out as a joint operation of Al-Qaeda and EIJ. The testimony
in the trial confirmed that:
- Al-Qaeda has access to the
money, training, and equipment it needs to carry out successful
terrorist attacks.
- They plan their operations
well in advance and have the patience to wait to conduct
the attack at the right time,
- Prior to carrying out the
operation, Al-Qaeda conducts surveillance of the target,
sometimes on multiple occasions, often using nationals of
the target they are surveilling to enter the location without
suspicion. The results of the surveillance are forwarded
to Al-Qaeda HQ as elaborate "ops plans" or "targeting
packages" prepared using photographs, CADCAM (computer
assisted design/computer assisted mapping) software, and
the operative's notes.
HOW U.S. MILITARY ACTIONS
MIGHT AFFECT AL-QAEDA
It is too early to tell, from
a law enforcement perspective, how the current military campaign
in Afghanistan will affect Al-Qaeda and its ability to operate
in the future. Determination and vigilance will remain the
keys to any success. It is one thing to disrupt an organization
such as Al-Qaeda, it is another to totally dismantle and destroy
it. This must truly remain an international effort, with international
cooperation on all levels, in order to be successful. All
agencies within the U.S. government must remain vigilant,
and must continue to cooperate and work together, in order
to truly eradicate this scourge to all mankind everywhere
known as Al-Qaeda.
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