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The Age of Sacred Terror

Daniel Benjamin & Steven Simon

Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror (New York: Random House, 2002).

6: A Paradigm Lost

-after WTC 1993, some White House, CIA, and other officials start learning curve

-old paradigm on terrorism:

• fight terrorists to strengthen deterrence; let no one think U.S. will just take it

• work with other states to disrupt

• use force when sensible

• no concessions, pay-offs, appeasement (unlike Europeans and the one deviation, Reagan's
calamitous arms sales to Iran)

• no major int'l terrorist group had U.S. as its primary target

• most groups are state-sponsored or national-liberation fronts

• a second- or third-tier nuisance, not a strategic threat p. 220

-average annual fatalities were 26

-less likely than lightning strikes, bathtub drownings, or poisonous bites p. 220

-didn't threaten either U.S. power or large numbers of citizens

-Jan. 25/93: Mir Aimal Kansi, lone Pakistani gunman, shoots AK-47 into cars outside CIA HQ in
McLean, killing two

-Feb. 26/93: Ramzi Yousef attacks WTC in worst foreign terror attack on U.S. soil

-June 26/93: U.S. launches 23 Tomahawks at Baghdad's mukhabarat HQ after April 1993 plot to kill
former President Bush with car bomb on Kuwait visit

-first U.S. reprisal in 7 years, since Reagan's 1986 raid on Tripoli

-1994: 30+ killed in Israel by Hamas and PIJ in rage over Oslo

-July 1994: Hizballah bombs Buenos Aires Jewish center, killing almost 100

-CT aides see state sponsors as greatest threat

-after Pan Am 103, Bush tries U.N. sanctions and int'l pressure to get out of cycle
-Scowcroft: Pan Am 103 might've been Libya's answer to 1986 raid p. 223

-most menacing state sponsor is Iran, by a long shot (Beirut, Argentina, Rushdie)

-by 1993, Hizballah has stopped direct attacks on Americans

-after Desert Storm, Khameini seeks to cow Gulfies to become hegemon

-June 25/90 Khobar Towers attack, killing 19 U.S. troops in Dhahran

-biggest truck bomb FBI had ever seen

-early intell points to Saudi Hizballah, backed by Iran

-Saudis uncooperative

-Bandar badgers NSC aides about whether they'll attack Iran and how

they'll use any intell that Saudis hand over

-even FBI Director Freeh flies to Saudi to increase pressure

-Feb. 95: Omnibus Counterterrorism Act introduced; languishes

-March 20/95: Aum Shinrikyo attack on Tokyo subway

-April 19/95: Oklahoma City

-renamed Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996

• bans fundraising for groups backing FTOs, which had been legal (!)

• tags chemical markers to plastic and other explosives to trace them

• gun lobby and right-wing gets stuff removed

• civil liberterians join conservatives to block multipoint wiretaps

-in 1997, Lugar, Nunn, and Domenici start $50 million/year program to prepare big-city first responders
for WMD, amid snickers

-June 21/95: Clinton signs PDD-39, starts centralizing CT policy in White House

-first major policy document tackling asymmetric warfare

-cuts through confusion re CT, consequence management

-PDD-39 is handiwork of Richard Clarke, chair of CSG (originally Coordinating Subgroup, later
Counterterrorism and Security Group) founded in 1980s

-CIA and FBI hate each other

-FBI hates CIA unwillingness to let its evidence be used in court

-CIA hates FBI legal attachA©s (legatts) in embassies

-FBI assumed Ramzi Yousef was a one-off freelancer; doesn't probe network

-Muhammad Salameh returns for the deposit on Ryder truck in WTC 93

-FBI assumes anyone that dumb can't be part of a serious threat p. 238

-June 98: using CIA intell, U.S. Atty Mary Jo White files sealed indictment of UBL

-two weeks before embassy bombings; focuses on Somalia

-but indictment's kept locked down, so NSC can't use it

-in first term, CIA's a mess; Jim Woolsey's a failure til sacked over bungling Aldrich Ames case, then
rudderless (briefly John Deutch, then Tony Lake withdraws, then finally George Tenet)

-Lake on UBL psycho-profile: "Oh, yes, it's the fiftieth-child syndrome." p. 243

-1996: CIA's CTC sets up "virtual station" to focus on UBL

-Feb. 1996: embassy staff in Khartoum pulled out of Sudan, fearing attack

-as U.S. leaves, Sudanese try to be more tractable

-in DC meetings, senior Sudanese official offers to expel UBL to Saudi

-deliberate; know that UBL's family's too prominent to jail him in Saudi

-no senior U.S. official knows of any Sudanese offer to give UBL to U.S.

-CSG didn't want UBL w/o indictment, when he could vanish

-U.S. tells Sudan that Saudis refused to take UBL, and Sudan kicks him out p. 247

-U.S. wants UBL away from Sudanese bases, passport printers, cash, etc.

-from 1996 on, terrorism funding rises, using TWA 800 accident as a goad

-spend $5.7 billion in 1996; doubles to $11.3 billion in 2001 p. 248

-for 1996 Olympics, Clarke fears big bomb, WMD, hijacked plane

-CIA also steps up "renditions," extralegal transfers of criminal suspects

-April 1998: Clinton RT on bioweapons increases his personal concern

-July 1998: secret Blair House mtg of response agencies on WMD attack

7: The Unknown War

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-Feb. 1998: UBL fatwa "Jihad against Jews and Crusaders" in al-Quds al-Arabi

-summer 1998: CIA briefs NSC on intell that al-Qaeda may be preparing VX attack, with soil sample
from al-Shifa plant with precursor chemical to VX p. 259

-Aug. 7/98: East Africa bombings kill 224, wound 5,000 p. 258

-reprisal targets: six al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and al-Shifa in Khartoum

-launch strikes Aug. 20; intell shows UBL and others at Khost camp

-result is "a nightmare": allegations of "wag the dog," idiot WashTimes leak about UBL using satellite
phones drives him off them, flood of warnings

-after 1998, Clarke mafia sure it's obvious that U.S. itself could be hit p. 262

-start Sxweek NSC "threats mtg" evaluating credible info; flood of info to CSG

-after Beirut, posts abroad had slowly ignored Inrnan comm. standards

-crash survey of embassies; Congress gets $1.5 billion for upgrades

-at least one embassy closed; many had plate glass, not shatterproof

-Clinton and Berger interested in hearing of "takedowns" of cells w. foreign help

-U.S. has little leverage to get Taliban to surrender UBL

-Taliban want to beat Northern Alliance, get world recognition

-best U.S. can offer: won't block Taliban entry into world community if get UBL

-Sept. 1998: Turki al-Faisal, Saudi intell chief, to Kandahar to meet Mullah Omar

-Turki had been UBL's patron in 1980s during Afghan war

-Turki says he has screaming match over UBL w. Omar

-Saudis downgrade ties: withdraw Kabul amb., expel Talib rep in Riyadh

-ASS SAsia Rick Inderfurth meets Taliban reps at least 20 times, 1998-2001 p. 273

-often has SC/T Michael Sheehan along; meet at UN or in Islamabad

-Feb. 1999: Inderfurth warns Taliban US will hold Taliban responsible for terror from their turf if they
don't hand UBL over to a country where he'll face justice

-U.S. can respond "after the fact or preemptively" p. 273

-Taliban try transparent dodges: UBL's a guest, try him in sharia court, etc.

-pack of village clerics with no IR experience

r-ask UAE and Pakistanis (only other countries w. ties) to tell Kabul UBL must go

-parade of officials to urge on Pakistanis: Inderfurth, SC/Ts Philip Wilcox and Mike Sheehan, Ambs.
Thomas Simons and William Milam, DepSec Talbott, CentCom CINC Zinni, even several Clinton calls
to PM Nawaz Sharif

-incompetent, corrupt Sharif doesn't deliver

-U.S. has few carrots, w. sanctions from nukes

-Congress freezes 1980s deal of $658 million for 28 F-16s; keep P's $s & jets

-has no control over Pakistani military

-U.S.-Pak relations dominated after 1998 nuke tests by Kargil war fears

-Kargil may be Pak way to get int'l mediation—cry for help

-July 4/99: Sharif in DC for talks w. Clinton

-Clinton browbeats Sharif into cease-fire, return to LOG

-also lights into Sharif over failure to deliver UBL, ISI working w. Taliban

-Pakistanis focus on item #1 on U.S. agenda, nukes, and neglect #2, terror

-Oct. 99: Sharif tries to fire army COS Musharraf and is deposed in army coup

-Musharraf is an unknown, w. black mark as the architect of Kargil folly

-NSC gears up for hits on UBL three times 1999-2001, spins cruise missiles twice

-deploys Los Angeles-class subs off Pakistani coast

-UBL rarely spends more than one night in same place

-but intell is too vague; hunting party turns out to be rich UAE citizens,

possible fix on UBL in eastern Afgh. too vague to risk 100s of civilians

-Berger's "Small Group": top reps of State, DOD, CIA, NSC on al-Qaeda options

-by Nov. 1998, asking Pentagon for more options for future strikes

-Clarke wants to bomb broad range, incl. terror camps and Taliban targets

-but few good targets; State leery of more bombing after Kosovo, Desert Fox

-extensive covert ops in Afgh., incl. working w. militias to catch/kill UBL and CIA operatives in Afgh.
before 9/11

-OMB Dir Jack Lew: CIA had all the resources it needed p. 286
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-by 1999, intell ops are rolling up cells; $1.1 billion upgrade of embassy security underway;
Treasury/NSC pressing Saudis and UAE on terror financing

-Saudis wary on terror funding; see Hamas' Dawa as legit, no oversight of charities' funds, didn't know
size of UBL's inheritance, freak out when asked about wealthy Saudis who might be funding al-Qaeda p.
288

-July 4/99: Clinton exec order slaps sanctions on Taliban, freezes assets

-symbolic; real imports are only dried fruit and rugs

-keeps Taliban away from Afghanistan's $220 million gold reserves in Fed

-seized assets of Ariana, Afghan nat'l airline, for flying terrorists

-cuts air ties to Gulf, where Afghan drugs were shipped p. 289

-Oct. 99: UNSCR 1267 puts on same sanctions as U.S. already has, 15-0 vote

-Clinton, Sheehan, Pickering, and Tenet all get magnitude of the threat

-but others don't

State

-sluggish on NSC order to give threatened embassies WMD response gear

-Albright cuts embassy defense funds be. State's so strapped p. 293

-Lew blows up at an undersec and asst sec, gets funds restored p. 293

-Amb. Prudence Bushnell warned earlier that Nairobi embassy wasn't safe

-Adm. Crowe's review of the bombings is scathing to State security

-State CT bureau had less pull than big regional bureaus

-SC/T Sheehan can't get field posts to warn hosts about Islamist NGOs

Pentagon

-after 1998, NSC sees Tomahawks as too slow

-Clinton asks Pentagon for "boots on ground" options to get UBL in Afgh. p. 294

-JCS Chair Hugh Shelton briefs Small Group in Berger's office p. 294 -get memo

-offers only "usual two-division, $2 billion option," just like Bosnia

-Berger: "They didn't want to do it."

-JCS continue to be risk-averse, suspicious of admin, leaders

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-Shelton feels he's being asked to fix intell/diplomacy problem w. military

-"We knew this would be mistaken for resistance and that drove us up

the wall. We'd love to get that frigging guy." p. 295

-Pickering: Pentagon doesn't see CT as its mission; leave it to FBI, dips, civilians

-others in DOD suggest smaller package, since big deployment loses surprise and is tough to sell
politically

-Shelton is open, but adds a large force protection package

-but CentCom CINC Zinni bucks, warning that going into Afgh. could rock Pak.

-so no formal planning done for mission to grap al-Qaeda leadership p. 296

FBI

-PDD orders FBI to track and surveill terrorists in US, but lax on Islamists

-special agents in charge (SACs) want to keep old focus on jailing criminals

-FBI doesn't see itself as part of national security apparatus p. 298

-Nixon's Watergate abuses of FBI leave FBI fearing that close ties to national leadership can taint it, so
becomes unresponsive to White House concerns p. 299

-Freeh's a bad manager who can't rein in 56 independent field offices

-"From the inside, the FBI was a disorganized jumble of competing and unruly power centers; from the
outside, it was a surly colossus." p. 300

-worse, Freeh hates Clinton scandals and won't respond to AG Reno

-Freeh highly involved in Khobar Towers investigation

-stalls fast be. Saudis won't give FBI access to the suspects

-Freeh bitter when Clinton encourages Khatami's reformers, fearing that

undercuts FBI's quest for the Iranians who Freeh's sure were to blame

-Saudis fan Freeh's irritation, esp. Bandar, while barring access

-when Saudis let FBI watch via one-way mirror as Saudis ask the suspects

the FBI's questions, Freeh credits a call from Bush 41, not Clinton

-Freeh can't be fired by Clinton while prez is being investigated

-FBI screw-ups: Waco, Richard Jewell, Wen Ho Lee, Hanssen

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-FBI won't give intell on al-Qaeda to NSC, sometimes citing Rule 6E

-great exception: John O'Neill, FBI's CSG rep, who dies in 9/11

-replaced in DC by Dale Watson, competent manager (?)

-FBI also too PC on investigating Arab-Muslim communities

INS

-it's "nearly oblivious" p. 307; easy for terrorists to get student visas

-Deputy AG Gorelick orders INS to study and fix, but it's gutted

-early fall 1999: Tenet briefs White House on possible millenium attacks

-Customs catches Ahmed Ressam off ferry in Washington State

-for three weeks, daily SitRoom mtgs w. Berger, Tenet, Watson, Reno

-Jordanian plot disrupted, galvanizing Mideast govts to crack jihadist cells

-Clarke warns that immigration failures were letting people like Ressam's Montreal-based Algerian
network get into the country

-jeremiad: FBI has too few wiretaps and translators; DOJ not prosecuting

terror financing cases; JTTFs not bring prosecutions out of PC fears

-after millenium scare, Watson holds Tampa mtg for Clarke and FBI's SACs p313

-Berger: FBI HQ says al-Qaeda has no active US cells, and its sleepers are covered

-March 2000: Clinton introduces bill to expand US authority to ban US residents and firms from using
banks in countries that aren't stopping money laundering

-sails past House, derailed in Senate by Banking Cmtee Chair Phil Graham

-Euros doubt size of al-Qaeda threat, see al-Shifa bombing as blunder

-suspect weird US desire to create new threat to replace Soviets p. 315

-by early 2000, Taliban hunkering down from sanctions, still backed by Pakistan

-S/CT Mike Sheehan urges crackdown on Pakistan: either help us get UBL and close terrorist camps in
Afgh., or we get IMF to cut its aid

-but US can't drop nukes issue or deliberately bankrupt Pakistan

-April 2000: Clinton visit to India, but reluctant to reward Pakistan with stopover

-Secret Service digs heels in, fearing jihadist attack on him in Pakistan
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-finally goes to Islamabad in small CIA-run G-5 jet, using API as decoy

-raises terror w. Musharraf in small one-on-one mtg p. 317

-Clinton to Shelton: "You know, it would scare the shit out of al-Qaeda if suddenly a bunch of black
ninjas rappelled out of helicopters into the middle of then- camp." p. 318; Shelton blanches

-NSC asks for small new military package, but told by JCS it'd be Desert One

-Cohen & Shelton's deputy Richard Myers brief Berger & his deputy Don Kerrick

-don't want to use Special Forces on risky missions rather than support

-underlying problem: Shelton and JCS don't trust Clinton as CINC

-on Sunday in 2000, subs spin their cruise missiles for possible UBL strike, but Tenet calls Berger to
say, "We don't have it." p. 320

-spring/summer 2000: threat level rises; al-Qaeda more active in Mideast

-JCS wants to back off on subs, convinced they'll never get the intell

-Clarke, to DOD's surprise, agrees and asks for other options

-in particular, he likes DOD suggestion of using Predator flying drone to get UBL

-many at DOD dislike using new surveillance tool for intell mission

-Clinton eggs Clarke to "do better," so Predator idea gains ground p. 322

-Predator flew 12 times over Afgh.; spotted UBL three times, CIA thinks

-Taliban radar tracks Predator, sending MiGs to attack, who zip on by

-program suspended over cost wrangles, esp. after one drone crashes

-Air Force Sec. Whit Peters steps in to reinstate

-Oct. 12,2000: skiff hits U.S.S. Cole in Aden, killing 17 and almost sinking it

-audacious; sophisticated "shaped charge" bomb to blast in one direction

-1997 NSC memo had warned Pentagon of risks to US ships in port p. 323

-Navy disregarded this, as well as threat from terrorist-infested Yemen

-even CINC Zinni thinks it's OK to refuel in Yemen, despite intell on al-Qaeda

-strong intuition: it's jihadists & prob. al-Qaeda, but no real intell leading to Afgh.

-not enough to saddle new prez w.big strike on Afgh in last days of Clinton term

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8: The Shock of the New

-realist Rice in FA: focus on great power threats, tend to terrorism insofar as it's used by rogue states p.
327

Transition

-when TNT briefs Rice on UBL, Berger unexpectedly shows up: "I'm here because I want to underscore
how important this issue is." p. 328

-Berger tells Rice: "You're going to spend more time during your four years on terrorism generally and
al-Qaeda specifically than any issue." p. 328

-Clarke briefs VP Cheney and Deputy NSA Hadley

-Brian Sheridan, outgoing ASD-SOLIC, underscores al-Qaeda as "really big thing" in CSG briefing for
incoming SecState Powell

-tells Rice she needs Clarke; offers to brief; never taken up on it p. 329

-lots of energy for NMD and China, little for CT

-Bush's top priority: NMD (incl. scrapping ABM Treaty)

-next comes China (incl. multibillion arms sale to Taiwan, EP-3 spyplane crash)

-anti-Clinton syndrome; even softer Bushie tone on Iran, to Freeh's horror

-OEOB buzz: Rice chews out Freeh for meddling in FP after New Yorker piece

-June 22/01: DOJ announces indictment of 13 Saudis, 1 Lebanese for Khobar

-mentions unnamed Iranian officials who helped Saudi Hezbollah

-Ashcroft promises to go after Iranians

-despite Freeh's hatred of Clinton, Bush adopts similar Iran stance

-takes six months to confirm an ass't secstate for South Asia p. 332

-took forever to get a new ASD-SOLIC; Rumsfeld fires many career DASes

-but both Tenet and Clarke survive the transition, to much surprise

-Clarke pushes, but Rice is skeptical of his little bureaucratic empire

-NSC reorg, dumping Clarke from Principals Cmtee seat on terror issues

-Shelton: Bushies put terrorism "to the back burner," despite Clarke p. 335

-JCS still see al-Qaeda as intell problem but irked CIA can't sow dissent in Taliban
-JCS proposes disinformation op in Afgh., but Rumsfeld & Wolfowitz kill it p. 335

-don't see it as a real military mission; focused on NMD, restructuring

-Kerrick, Berger's deputy, stays on for four months in OEOB and sends memo to NSC: "We are going to
be struck again." Never hears back p. 336

-Feb. 9/01: intell briefers tell Cheney CIA's concluded al-Qaeda bombed the Cole

-Rice asks Clarke to lead interagency review of policy on al-Qaeda~GET THIS

-Clarke again pushes three options, all in his Oct. 2000 options paper

1. Predator

-Clarke champing, but new NSC wants full assessment

-CIA/DOD bickering over who pays for it

-Roger Cressey oversees crash program to arm it w. Hellfire missiles

-testing time costs chance to fly Predator over Afgh. in spring 2001

-in Nevada, Cressey watches Predator fry replica of UBL Kandahar home

-whose finger on trigger, CIA or USAF? what chain of command to fire?

2. field proxy force to fight UBL

-Uzbekistan volunteers, but CIA wary of getting in bed w. dictator

-Clarke hopes Bushies will go for it

3. arm Ahmad Shah Massoud's Northern Alliance

-hadn't happened under Clinton; Russia and Iran sent plenty of arms, cash

-Clintonites thought NA too small, Tajik, corrupt, despite heroic Massoud

-also wary of getting dragged into outright war in Asia

-until '98 bombings, even Clarke buys this, but then he shifts

-most Clinton aides still turn down Clarke requests for guns and $

-at Treasury, O'Neill doesn't fund tracking center for terror funding

-at DOJ, Ashcroft asks OMB to ask Congress to boost funding for 68 programs—but doesn't ask for
more terrorism funding

-suggests cutting $65 million from grants to help buy first-response gear
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-doesn't endorse FBI request for $58 million for 400 CT agents p. 340

-little threat reporting in first months of Bush admin.

-late spring 2001: surge in activity among known al-Qaeda operatives p. 340

-May: CTC head Gofer Black says Abu Zubaydah helping plan attacks p. 341

-CIA suspects overseas targets: Israel, Saudi, Rome, US bases in Turkey

-CSG warns of a pending "spectacular" qualitatively unlike any earlier attack

-Tenet briefs Rice and Hadley at White House in high alarm p. 341

-in Gulf, U.S. troops' threat condition raised to Delta, highest level: lock & load

-June: Fifth Fleet put to sea from its harbor in Bahrain

-all domestic law enforcement agencies warned re chance of attack

-July 4/01: FBI, Customs, FAA, Coast Guard, Secret Service emergency briefing

-FBI asked again to better surveill al-Qaeda linked people

-FBI tells 18,000 state/local law enf. agencies of credible, unspecific threat

-FAA alerts every airline and airport p. 342

-in July, reduce Gulf troops' threat level, after more than a month

-Mubarak: Egypt intell says al-Qaeda plans to attack Bush at July G-7 in Genoa

-plane laden w. explosives would crash; airspace closed, AA guns poised

-after Genoa, intell flows slows, although TNT and CIA still warn of threat

-Aug. 4/01: Bush leaves for month's vacation in Crawford

-Clarke's review is ready for Principals, but to give time and get Powell there, decide to take it up shortly
after Labor Day p. 343

-hope is to win a National Security Presidential Directive (NSPD, Bushies' FDD)

-Deputies Cmtee agrees: goal isn't "rolling back" al-Qaeda but "eliminating" 343

-CIA now warmer on Uzbeks, still opposed to NAlliance, cooling on Predator (still incomplete record,
but CIA worries: saps $ for human sources, Hellfires not deadly enough, rather have USAF fire it lest
CIA agents' lives be endangered)

-USAF: if we're bombing UBL, we'd use B-52s, not some lame drone...

-Sept 4/01: first Principals mtg on al-Qaeda (all there, ex. Wolfowitz for Rumsfeld and OMB Deputy
Dir. Sean O'Keefe for Mitch Daniels)

-OMB and CIA asked to figure out more help for Uzbeks, NAlliance

-Tenet urges activism on al-Qaeda but don't have DCI order Predator fire

-White House aides: decision to fire is president's, not DCI's

-JCS Chair Myers: we'd use cruise missiles; if it's a covert op, give to 1C

-meeting ends with no decision on armed Predator, no strategy to Bush

-German intell and law enf. hadn't taken US fears of al-Qaeda seriously p. 346

-didn't do any follow-up, let suspects wire money to 9/11 terrorists

-old INS system missed chances to flag files of WTC pilots Atta and al-Shehhi

-FBI assigns most new personnel hired to do CT tohandle cybersecurity p. 349

-July 2001: FBI Agent Kenneth Williams of Phoenix office asks HQ to investigate Islamists training at
U.S. flight schools, warns of Abu Zubaydah link p. 347

-Aug. 16/01: Moussaoui arrested outside St. Paul

-FBI HQ blocks field request for FISA warrant to check his laptop

-FBI never tells White House or CSG about the arrest

-Aug. 21/01: CIA tells INS that two hijackers should be on terrorist watch list

-both IDed on surveillance tape meeting al-Qaeda operative in Malaysia

-INS tells FBI and CIA both al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi are in U.S.

-FBI claims did its best to find them, but never tells NSC or CSG p. 347

-Nov. 2001: armed Predator kills military chief Muhammad Atef