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Posted on 11/18/2001 7:40:37 PM PST by Heuristic Hiker

As the Taliban and their supporters fled Kabul, they left behind a mass of papers providing the strongest evidence yet to link al-Qaeda to the attacks of 11 September

War in Afghanistan: Observer special

Jason Burke in Jalalabad, Tim Judah and David Rohde in Kabul, Paul Harris in Quetta and Paul Beaver in London Sunday November 18, 2001 The Observer

It is the evidence that the world - and in particular the administration of President George Bush - has been seeking for two long months, the evidence that would silence the doubters and place the Taliban and Osama bin Laden at the centre of a global terrorist conspiracy. It has occupied the FBI and international police forces in their thousands since 11 September. Last week that evidence finally emerged as the Taliban's cities fell, scattered in drifts of yellowing paper across the floors of offices, training camps and the homes of senior figures in the al-Qaeda network of bin Laden and the Taliban.

The scraps of half-burnt paper, meticulously kept notebooks and pages torn from magazines and technical manuals reveal the vast and terrifying scale of the terrorists' ambitions to launch a jihad against the West. They reveal plans to assassinate world leaders in their cars; to bomb the power stations of America, Europe and Asia; and to make weapons of mass destruction from chemicals and smuggled nuclear material.

Critically, too, they reveal al-Qaeda's plans to send some members to the United States to learn how to pilot passenger jets, and the Taliban's support for such plans.

In two houses in Kabul last week, one belonging to the Taliban Ministry of Defence, the New York Times turned up the most compelling evidence yet of al-Qaeda's link to the 11 September attacks.

Among the finds was a flight-simulator computer program, a list of flying schools in the US and documents describing chemical, biological and nuclear warfare. Other documents reveal desperate efforts by the Pakistani government - even before the 11 September attacks - to warn the Taliban that its support for terrorism was dangerous.

Among the key documents retrieved is a notebook discovered by The Observer and written by an al-Qaeda student at an explosives laboratory in a training camp at Darunta, 15 miles from the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad. It is, in effect, a textbook of terror.

Much of the 100-page book, written in Turkish, focuses on urban guerrilla tactics, particularly assassinations against targets in cars. The favoured mode of attack is from a series of motorbikes, or from other cars, which would approach the target vehicle and force it off the road.

The book also includes detailed descriptions of the organisation of a terrorist cell. Such cells, split into four units covering intelligence, logistics, security and execution, bear a clear resemblance to those described by the al-Qaeda men convicted of the 1998 bombings in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam, and thus provide a key element of evidence linking bin Laden to the blasts.

The Saudi-born terrorist has never admitted responsibility for the attacks, which killed more than 200 people, though he has said he 'welcomed' them. The notebook was started on 23 February 1998, less than four months before the attacks in East Africa.

The notebook starts with important advice. 'Help each other' is the first injunction, followed by 'during lessons, listen carefully'. If one person makes a mistake then the whole group pays for it, it says. Terrorists are advised to take time planning their escape routes - a trademark of the al-Qaeda organisation.

Much of the last section of the course was clearly devoted to assassinations of people travelling in cars. There are dozens of diagrams showing how to attack vehicles, how to block them in and at what angle bullets best penetrate armoured or bulletproofed vehicles.

But the strongest evidence for al-Qaeda's involvement in the attacks of 11 September is in the documents found by New York Times reporter David Rohde in two houses in the Karte Parwan area of Kabul, the former diplomatic district, after the city's fall. Green and yellow forms in Arabic labeled 'al-Qaeda ammunition warehouse' were scattered throughout both houses. The apparent al-Qaeda presence, particularly in a Taliban Defence Ministry building, suggested that bin Laden's organisation and the radical Islamic government regime were closely linked.

Near the door of one, a seal showed two crossed Kalishnikov rifles below a Koran and the words, 'Jihad is our way'. A world map showed all Islamic countries, except for Turkey, an American ally, painted in dark green. A map of Saudi Arabia showed it surrounded by small American, French and British flags, representing foreign bases and ships. Above the painted map were the words, 'Occupation of the Holy Lands of Islam by the Crusaders'.

Documents and papers were strewn over the floors. Often piled in corners, they were written in Arabic, German, Urdu and English. Some were partly burnt, as if there had been a hurried attempt to destroy them. At the rear of one house, one room contained mountains of papers. Some were from training manuals showing diagrams of weapons. One had instructions on how to turn a digital watch into a bomb switch.

The most satisfying finds for President Bush's administration are likely to have been a page torn out of Flying magazine listing flight schools in Florida - including Walkwitz Aviation in Titusville and Phoenix East Aviation in Daytona Beach, two schools linked to the hijackers of 11 September - and a form that comes with a Microsoft Flight Simulator 98 computer program. The program, which simulates the experience of flying a commercial jet, is often used by pilots and is similar to one found in the luggage of Mohammed Atta, one of the hijackers.

The houses were adorned with maps, including one listing the location of power plants in Europe, Africa and Asia.

The papers include addresses of individuals living in Canada and Italy, letters listing the names of young recruits hoping to join al-Qaeda, and lists of people who lived in the houses. It is not known whether false names were used on the documents. One of the visiting cards was from U-Enterprises, a Vancouver-based company that was founded in April 1998. One of its directors is Essam Hafez Marzouk, who was arrested in Egypt two years ago and sentenced to 15 years of hard labour for links to a militant Islamic group.

Other papers appeared to be copies of a letter bin Laden sent to Mullah Omar, leader of the Taliban, asking not to be turned over to the Americans and a reply granting his request. Both men cited religious teachings to justify their position.

Neighbours described the men who occupied the houses as Arabs who kept to themselves and followed regular routines. The documents suggest there was a broad network, including Somalis, Algerians, Bosnians, Uzbeks, Sudanese and natives of the Dagastan region of Russia.

Intelligence sources in Pakistan warned that many more revealing documents had probably been taken by the former occupants as they fled south. 'You would not leave the most vital clues, even if you were in such a hurry,' said one intelligence official.

It was also not clear who might have visited the houses since the capture of the city by the Northern Alliance, or where all the documents had come from.

America's case that al-Qaeda is intimately linked to the Taliban is also supported by evidence gathered since last week's military campaign. In particular, papers also seen by The Observer reveal the efforts made by Pakistan to curb the Taliban's support for terrorism even before 11 September.

The US used Pakistan last year to tell Mullah Omar that unless he handed bin Laden over to face charges of supporting terrorism he risked being the target of a US missile strike. The papers reveal the mounting panic among Pakistani officials, who found themselves unable to influence or contain the Taliban, or to block known Arab terrorists crossing the border into Afghanistan to join bin Laden's organisation.

The papers, which include private correspondence between the leaderships in Kabul and Islamabad, were seen by The Observer in the chaotic hours following the flight of the Taliban from Kabul and after the sacking of the Pakistani Embassy, when files and papers were strewn over the street outside. They show that in the build-up to 11 September the Taliban brushed off messages from the US threatening to bomb them. They also reinforce the emerging evidence of how closely intertwined the Taliban was with al-Qaeda.

Earlier this year, Pakistan had protested to the Taliban because Arabs wanted on charges of terrorism had been given special visas to enter Afghanistan and even Afghan passports. In January, Arif Ayub, Pakistan's Ambassador to Kabul, complained in a report: 'The Taliban seem addicted to "International Jihad" as a means of mobilising support and as a distraction from their own shortcomings.' He also said there was a need for 'increased vigilance on our borders in order to hinder what seems to be a free crossing for terrorists'.

The documents reveal deep splits within the Pakistani administration, with the Foreign Ministry complaining that the Ministry of the Interior was undermining its policy of trying to curb the Taliban by giving a 'safe haven' to terrorists. Many Afghans blame Pakistan for being the chief sponsor and creator of the Taliban. Pakistani diplomats left Kabul in the wake of the 11 September attacks.

Some of the documents give details of meetings recording how the head of the ISI, Pakistan's intelligence agency, acted as a messenger between Mullah Omar and the US administration. On 26 May last year, the Pakistanis briefed the US Under Secretary of State, Thomas Pickering, on the results of their spy chief's mission to Mullah Omar at his base in Kandahar, to which several messages from the Americans were conveyed.

The most important was that 'nothing short of the extradition of Osama bin Laden to a place where he could be brought to justice would satisfy the US'. It continued: 'Washington wanted immediate results. This meant that Osama should either be handed over to the US or sent to a place where he could be picked up.'

Omar was told that unless he complied sanctions would be imposed on Afghanistan, which duly happened, but worse could also follow: 'This might entail missile attacks targeting the Taliban's military assets. Osama and even Omar himself could be targeted, and Russia and its allies given the go-ahead to embark on hot pursuit against terrorists.' This might also include Russian bombing 'of strategic targets' in Afghanistan.

In reply, Omar told the Pakistanis that 'he wanted to get rid of Osama but did not know how'. He also said he was 'ready to close terrorist training camps'.

The camps were not closed and on 16 January of this year, after Pakistan intensified its demands for action and the UN brought in new sanctions against Afghanistan, Mullah Omar personally threatened President Musharraf.

He wrote to him saying that the Pakistani leader found himself in a unique position to implement 'Islamic law - step by step', and that by doing so Pakistan's religious parties would 'be contented and avoid raising a hue and cry' that would give rise to 'instability'.

Mullah Omar rounded off this thinly veiled threat with the words: 'This is our advice and message based on Islamic ideology. Otherwise you had better know how to deal with it.'

A month earlier, Maulvi Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, the Taliban's Foreign Minister, had written a long letter to Abdul Sattar, the Pakistani Foreign Minister. It complained that the enemies of the Taliban had 'started to concoct plots, conspiracies and counter propaganda' against the Taliban, using several 'pretexts such as womens' rights and Osama bin Laden'.

In another undated and unsigned paper, the author discusses divisons of the Taliban into 'hardcore, the moderates and the neutral'. The author - probably a Pakistani diplomat or intelligence officer - argues that the 'hardcore', headed by Mullah Omar, were in full control, and that they received 'funds from drug smugglers and charity trusts'.

· David Rohde writes for the New York Times

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