September 11 Attacks

III

The Terrorists

Almost immediately after the September 11 attacks, suspicion centred on Osama bin Laden as the person responsible for initiating them. As the leader of a terrorist organization known as Al-Qaeda, Arabic for “the base”, Bin Laden was a known advocate of violence against the United States and was believed to be responsible for a series of attacks on United States interests around the world. Additionally, the level of coordination required for the hijackings suggested they were the work of a highly organized terrorist group with extensive resources such as Al-Qaeda.

The hijackers had worked closely together in the United States in the months preceding the flights and had maintained their Al-Qaeda connections. Mohammed Atta, the alleged ringleader, had lived previously in Hamburg, Germany, and officials there found evidence that Atta had links to Al-Qaeda agents. United States investigators also uncovered financial ties between Atta and Al-Qaeda. United States officials also reported that several of the hijackers had received training in Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, where the network was based. Bin Laden’s top military adviser, Muhammad Atef, was believed to have planned the September 11 attacks.

A

Al-Qaeda

The origins of the Al-Qaeda organization date from the 1980s. Osama bin Laden supported the Afghan mujahedin forces that were resisting the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. After the Soviets were forced to abandon Afghanistan in the late 1980s, Bin Laden turned his attention to other places where Muslims were being “corrupted” by foreign influences. Following the Gulf War of 1991, this included the stationing of US military forces in Saudi Arabia. He later attacked the United States for supporting Israeli policies toward the Palestinians (see Arab-Israeli Conflict).

Such views resonated in the Islamic world, especially among young men, many of whom were alienated from their own governments and resentful of the power and prosperity associated with the United States and other Western countries. Bin Laden was seen as a hero by some Muslims for his willingness to stand up against the United States, and he found several followers for his cause. He transformed Al-Qaeda into a terror network. In 1996 he settled in Afghanistan, where the ruling Taliban regime shared his radical Islamist views. With Taliban support, Bin Laden organized Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, where volunteers learned how to carry out terror strikes.

B

The “Martyrdom Operation”

Evidence gathered by investigators has suggested that those who carried out the September 11 attacks knew that it would be a “martyrdom operation”. Suicide bombers have played significant roles in many national struggles, in the Middle East and beyond. Most of them, however, have died in pursuit of a specific political cause, viewing their death as a sacrifice to be made towards the realization of a goal. The September 11 hijackers seem to have seen death itself as a goal, with the martyrdom as a form of worship to Allah. Nowhere in the evidence discovered about the attackers is there any indication of what specific goal they thought might be served by their deaths.

Observers have noted how this idea of martyrdom departs from traditional Islamic beliefs, which generally underscore the sanctity of life and accommodate martyrdom only in extreme circumstances, when the survival of a community is at stake. Most Islamic theologians and Muslim leaders have argued that the September 11 attacks—with their deliberate aim of causing mass civilian casualties—have no basis in the Islamic tradition. The attacks, instead, seem to have been motivated simply by hatred of the United States and a desire for retribution in the face of what some Muslims see as the globally dominating, corrupting, and destructive role of the United States in the world today.

IV

US Response

The attacks in New York and Washington saw a massive display of solidarity, both in the United States and throughout the world. There was global condemnation of the attacks: NATO governments for the first time declared an Article V emergency—an attack on a member state requiring a united and mandatory response. Federal, local, and state government agencies in the United States were forced to redefine national security to emphasize the defence of the continental United States against a similar attack.

A

War on Terrorism

In a speech before a joint session of Congress nine days after the attacks, President Bush suggested that the top priority of his administration would be a campaign to end terrorism, which would begin with a drive to eliminate Al-Qaeda. Bush also said the United States would not only target the terrorist organizations themselves, but also those governments that supported them. Consequently, on October 7, 2001, a US-led international coalition launched military operations in Afghanistan intended to dislodge the Taliban regime from power and eliminate Al-Qaeda activities there.

A combination of anti-Taliban rebel forces, acting under the advice of US military advisers, coalition special forces, and precision bombing by US air forces proved decisive. Taliban and Al-Qaeda forces were routed across the country, and by December 2001 the Taliban regime had been driven from power. Hundreds of Al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters were taken prisoner and in some cases incarcerated as “enemy combatants” at the US military base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Many others were killed, among them Mohammed Atef.

However, Osama bin Laden and other top Al-Qaeda leaders evaded capture, as did the leader of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammed Omar. Hundreds of Al-Qaeda fighters scattered into the mountains of eastern Afghanistan or crossed into Pakistan, where they continue to pose a security threat. Remaining pockets of Al-Qaeda strength prompted renewed fighting in Afghanistan in March 2002, and the United Nations-supported government of Harmid Karzai remained weak.

Some of the war on terrorism would consist of military action, but as the hunt for Al-Qaeda spread to other countries, it would also consist of an intelligence and law enforcement operation. Success depended on tracking and blocking the finances and communication network of Al-Qaeda, and these efforts required close cooperation with other governments. The perpetrators and accomplices of subsequent terrorist atrocities around the world, such as in Bali in October 2002 and Casablanca and Riyadh in May and June 2003, have been the focus of intensive police investigations involving international cooperation. Furthermore, United States special forces have also been deployed in support of anti-terrorism operations in the Philippines. United States officials reported that Al-Qaeda cells are active in more than 50 countries, and Bush has cautioned that the war on terrorism will be long.