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Osama bin Ladin entered on his current path of holy warrior in 1979, the year Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan. He transfered his business to Afghanistan--including several hundred loyal workmen and heavy construction tools--and set out to liberate the land from the infidel invader. Recognizing at once that the Afghans were lacking both infrastructure and manpower to fight a protracted conflict, he set about solving both problems at once. The first step was to set up an organized program of conscription. Together with Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood leader Abdallah Azzam, he organized a recruiting office--Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK - Services Office).

MAK advertised all over the Arab world for young Muslims to come fight in Afghanistan and set up branch recruiting offices all over the world, including in the U.S. and Europe. Bin Ladin paid for the transportation of the new recurits to Afghanistan, and set up facilities to train them. The Afghan government donated land and resources, while bin Ladin brought in experts from all over the world on guerilla warfare, sabotage, and covert operations. Within a little over a year he had thousands of volunteers in training in his private bootcamps. It is estimated that as many as 10,000 fighters received training and combat experience in Afghanistan, with only a fraction coming from the native Afghan population. Nearly half of the fighting force came from bin Ladin's native Saudi Arabia. Others came from Algeria (roughly 3,000), from Egypt (2,000), with thousands more coming from other Muslim countries such as Yemen, Pakistan and the Sudan.

Superpower vs. superpower
The war in Afghanistan was the stage for one of the last major stand-offs between the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union. The Americans at that time had the same goals as bin Ladin’s mujahedin--the ousting of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. In what was hailed at the time as one of its most successful covert operations, America’s Central Intelligence Agency launched a $500 million-per-year campaign to arm and train the impoverished and outgunned mujahedin guerrillas to fight the Soviet Union. The most promising guerilla leaders were sought out and “sponsored” by the CIA. U.S. official sources are understandably vague on the question of whether Osama bin Ladin was one of the CIA’s “chosen” at that time. Bin Ladin’s group was one of seven main mujahedin factions. It is estimated that a significant quantity of high tech American weapons, including “stinger” anti-aircraft missiles, made their way into his arsenal. The majority of them are reported to be still there.

The Mujahedin were wildly successful. In ten years of savage fighting they vanquished the Soviet Union. What had begun as a fragmented army of tribal warriors ended up a well-organized and equipped modern army--one capable of beating a super power. The departing Soviet troops left behind an Afghanistan with a huge arsenal of sophisticated weapons and thousands of seasoned Islamic warriors from a variety of countries.

The Afghan Veterans
Some of these veterans returned to their own countries and got on with their lives. Others returned to their own countries steeped in Islamic fundamentalism and a will to topple “western-influenced, infidel governments” in favor of Islamic regimes. They used the knowledge gleaned in the Afghan war to set up guerilla and terror cells. In Egypt and Algeria, the “Afghan Veterans,” as they came to be called, aided Islamic extremists in their fight against the secular governments. In most Arab countries, the veterans were not at all welcome, and the governments kept a close eye on their doings. However, in some countries the Afghan veterans were accorded a warm welcome. Such was the case in Sudan, where the government gave them jobs, helped them to set up training camps, and appointed some of them to government posts.

In addition to these facilities established in “friendly” Arab countries, the majority of the mujahedin training camps in Afghanistan continued to operate, supplying Islamic mercenaries to conflicts in a number of countries. Afghanistan was still seen as the hearth-stone of the mujahedin, from whence trained fighters could be sent out to fight wherever they were needed. Mujahedin veterans began showing up in Islamic struggles in such places as Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Chechnya.

A state unto himself
Toward the end of the war in Afghanistan, bin Ladin split with MAK co-founder Azzam in the late 1980s, and in 1988 formed al-Qaida to continue the work of the Jihad. While Azzam continued to focus on support to Muslims in Afghanistan, bin Ladin turned his attention to carrying the war to other countries. In late 1989 Abdallah Azzam died in the explosion of a car bomb, generally blamed on a rival Afghani faction. Several rumours circulating at the time blamed bin Ladin himself for the attack.

After the victory in Afghanistan, Osama bin Ladin returned to his native Saudi Arabia to take up the fight against the infidel government there. The Saudis were not disposed to tolerate his calls to insurrection, and quickly acted against him. In April 1994, his Saudi citizenship was revoked for “irresponsible behavior,” and he was expelled from the country. Together with his family and a large band of followers, Bin Ladin moved to Khartoum in Sudan. There he set up factories and farms, some of which were established solely for the purpose of supplying jobs to out-of-work mujahedin. He built roads and infrastructure for the Sudanese government and training camps for the Afghan Veterans. Among bin Ladin’s numerous Sudanese commercial interests are: a factory to process goat skins, a construction company, a bank, a sunflower plantation, and an import-export operation.

His construction company “el-Hijrah for Construction and Development Ltd.”--in partnership with the National Islamic Front and the Sudanese military--built the new airport at Port Sudan, as well as a 1200 km-long highway linking Khartoum to Port Sudan.

Another company reputed to be owned by bin Ladin is the “Wadi al-Aqiq” Company, an export-import firm.  He also runs the Taba Investment Company Ltd. and the “el-Shamal Islamic Bank” in Khartoum, a joint effort with the  NIF, in which bin Ladin is said to have  invested $50 million.

For many years, bin Ladin lived in Khartoum, in a residence guarded by the local security forces, while he was arranging for many of the “Afghan veterans” to move to Sudan.  Bin Ladin is said to be close to Sudanese  leader Omar Albashir, and to Hassan Turabi, the head of the National Islamic Front (NIF) in Sudan.

However, Sudan--long on the U.S. State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism--in recent years began to thaw toward the West. As a gesture toward the United States, the Sudanese government requested that bin Ladin depart. In May 1996, he moved to Afghanistan, leaving behind him in Sudan a network of Afghan Veterans and several successful factories and corporations. Several major companies in Sudan are linked to him, and are believed to be doing double-duty as logistics support for bin Ladin’s network.

The Islamic Front for the struggle against the Jews and the Crusaders
In February 1998, bin Ladin announced the formation of an umbrella organization called “The Islamic World Front for the struggle against the Jews and the Crusaders” (Al-Jabhah al-Islamiyyah al-`Alamiyyah li-Qital al-Yahud wal-Salibiyyin) Among the members of this organization are the Egyptian al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya and the Egyptian al-Jihad. Both of these groups were have been active in terrorism over the past decade. (see Attacks of al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya and al-Jihad). The founder members of the Front include, besides bin Ladin; Dr. Ayman al- Zawahiri, leader of the Egyptian Jihad; Rifa'i Ahmad Taha, a leader of the Islamic Group. The Islamic Group is linked with the al-Dir al-Bahri massacre in Luxor in November 1997,which claimed the lives of 58 tourists; and some leaders of extremist fundamentalist movements in Pakistan.

On May 28, 1998 the Islamabad daily, The News reported that Osama bin Ladin had announced the formation of an International Islamic Front for Jihad against America and Israel. Talking to a group of journalists who had traveled from Pakistan to meet him at his base in Khost in southern Afghanistan, he said leaders of Islamic movements in several countries, including Pakistan had evinced interest in joining the front. He stated that Dr Aiman Al-Zawahiri, leader of the Jamaat-ul-Jihad in Egypt who was present at the time, had played a crucial role in launching the front.

Bin Ladin justified the formation of the anti-American and anti-Israeli front by arguing that Muslims everywhere in the world were suffering at the hands of the U.S. and Israel. He said the Muslims must wage holy war against their real enemies not only to rid themselves of unpopular regimes backed by the Americans and Israelis but also protect their faith. When a reporter maintained that bin Ladin and his colleagues could not possibly take on the world's onlsuperpower, bin Ladin contended that the US was vulnerable and could be defeated in war. This would happen in the same way as the USSR suffered humiliation at the hands of the Afghan and Arab “mujahideen” in Afghanistan and was eventually dismembered

On 14 May 1998, The London Al-Quds al-'Arabi published an article to the effect that clerics in Afghanistan had issued a fatwa stipulating the necessity to move U.S. forces out of the Gulf region. Addressing Muslims the world-over, the Afghan ulema said: “The enemies of Islam are not limited to a certain group or party; all atheists are enemies of Islam, and they take one another as friends.” The Afghan ulema declared “jihad -- based on the rules of the Shari'ah -- against the United States and its followers.” They urged Islamic governments to perform the duty of “armed jihad against the enemies of Islam,” pointing out that “if Muslims are lax in their responsibility, the enemies of Islam will occupy the two holy mosques as well, just as they occupied the al- Aqsa Mosque.” They stressed, in a statement attached to the fatwa, that: “This fatwa--with the evidence and the rulings issued by early and current ulema, on which it is based--is not merely a fatwa issued by the ulema of a Muslim country, but rather a religious fatwa that every Muslim should adopt and work under.”

There are probably a few hundred Arab volunteers still living in Afghanistan. They are the leftovers of the several thousand Arabs who came to Afghanistan via Pakistan in the 1980s to take part in the “jihad” against the USSR's Red Army and the Afghan communists. Those left behind have nowhere else to go because they risk being caught should they venture to return home. No other country would be willing to accept them. In any case, present-day Afghanistan continues to be their safest hideaway. The ones who have returned to their countries have mostly joined the political and military struggle aimed at bringing an Islamic change there. Known as Arab-Afghans, these battle-hardened Islamists have come to be known as the most radical and dangerous of the fighters who have taken up arms against the Algerian and Egyptian governments.

The Paris al-Watan al-'Arabi estimated on 26 June 1998, that “the fact that bin-Ladin has shown up again in the press clearly indicates his emergence as a leader of the revolutionary council that was eventually established.” According to the newspaper, a Dutch official who closely follows developments in the new Islamic Front, in cooperation with European organs, believes that relations were actually reorganized among the organizations--which used to cooperate and coordinate with each other on the organizational and logistical levels--on a new basis that gives an organizational working configuration to past relations. This is a new and important development. According to the Dutch official, this confirms the seriousness of this event, which requires larger and more accurate coordination between the European and U.S. authorities. It also calls for cooperation by some of the Middle Eastern authorities.

The organizations whose membership in the Islamic Front was announced are the Egyptian Jihad, the Egyptian Armed Group, the Pakistan Scholars Society, the Partisans Movement in Kashmir, the Jihad Movement in Bangladesh, and the Afghan military wing of the “Advice and Reform” commission led by Osama bin Ladin. All these organizations once cooperated and coordinated with one another, but without any specific configuration or mechanism for such cooperation. Moreover, each of these organizations had freedom of action, and they determined their own objectives independently. Cooperation among these organizations was only at the level of “those who carry arms,” which is one of the organizational levels of each organization. There were no means of cooperation and coordination among “the people of the call,” another of the organizational levels. This is due to the fact that Afghanistan enhanced relations among the “carriers of arms” and created a kind of interpersonal cohesion.

According to this evaluation, the threat posed by this new front is due to the fact that it combines all the organizational levels, by establishing a shura [consultative] council. According to most assessments, this council is led by Osama Bin Ladin. This increases the front's effectiveness. It can be said that the Islamic Front has now moved from the constituent and organizational phase to the operational phase.
 

Al-Qaida is a network of many different fundamentalist organizations in diverse countries.  The common factor in all these groups is the use of terrorism for the attainment of their political goals, and an agenda whose main priority is the overthrow of the “heretic governments” in their respective countries and the establishment of Islamic governments based on the rule of “Shariah.”

Much of the driving philosophy behind al-Qaida was no doubt formed during the Afghan war of 79-89. Al-Qaida's leader, Osama bin Ladin came to see that conflict in the light of "Muslim believers vs. heretics." In his view, the term, "heretics" embraces the "pragmatic" Arab regimes (including his homeland, Saudi Arabia), and the United States, which he sees as taking over the Muslim holy sites of Mecca and Medina, and assisting the Jews in their conquest of Palestine. Throughout bin Ladin’s public statements and declarations runs one fundamental and predominant strategic goal: the expulsion of the American presence, military and civilian, from Saudi Arabia and the whole Gulf region.

According to the “Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places,”

“the latest and the greatest of [the] aggressions, incurred by the Muslims since the death of the Prophet . . .is the occupation of the land of the two Holy Places - the foundation of the house of Islam, the place of therevelation, the source of the message and the place of the noble Ka'ba, the Qiblah of all Muslims - by the armies of the American Crusaders and their allies.”

The declaration is presented as the first step in  “correcting what had happened to the Islamic world in general, and the Land of the two Holy Places in particular. . . Today . . . the sons of the two Holy Places, have begun their Jihad in the cause of Allah, to expel the occupying enemy out of the country of the two Holy places.”

In an interview with Nida’ul Islam several months later bin Ladin details the work that has been done in this direction:

However, these terrorist attacks had a larger strategic importance, as bin Ladin reveals in the same interview:

Bin Ladin sees the new Islamic Front as the vehicle that will eventually vanguish the American enemy:

Bin Ladin's name has come up in connection with a number of terror attacks around the world, among them the attacks in Riyadh (November 95) and Dhahran (June 96), that left about 30 people dead. It is doubtful whether he had any direct connection with these two attacks. He is also implicated in the attacks on a Yeminite hotel (December 92) that injured several tourists; the assassination attempt on Egyptian president Mubarak in Ethiopia (June 95); the World Trade Center bombing (February 93) that killed 3 and injured hundreds; and the Somali attack on American forces that left hundreds wounded.

The following list of American grievances against bin Ladin and his network was taken from a U.S. State Department Fact Sheet:

• Bin Ladin's followers conspired to kill US servicemen in Yemen who were on their way to participate in the humanitarian mission "Operation Restore Hope" in Somalia in 1992, and plotted the deaths of American and other peacekeepers in Somalia who were there to deliver food to starving Muslim people.
   
• Bin Ladin's network assisted Egyptian terrorists who tried to assassinate Egyptian President Mubarak in 1995 and who have killed dozens of tourists in Egypt in recent years.
   
• The Egyptian Islamic Jihad, one of the key groups in the network, conducted a car bombing against the Egyptian embassy in Pakistan in 1995 that killed over 20 Egyptians and Pakistanis.
   
• Members of bin Ladin's network plotted to blow up US airliners in the Pacific and separately conspired to kill the Pope.
   
• His followers bombed a joint US and Saudi military training mission in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1995.
   
• Bin Ladin's network has publicly and repeatedly articulated a clear and violent anti-US agenda:
   
• In August 1996, bin Ladin issued a "declaration of war" against the United States.
   
• In February 1998, bin Ladin stated "If someone can kill an American soldier, it is better than wasting time on other matters."
   
• In February 1998, the bin Ladin network's World Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders declared its intention to attack Americans and our allies, including civilians, anywhere in the world.
   
• In May 1998, bin Ladin stated at a press conference in Afghanistan that we would see the results of his threats "in a few
  weeks."

Although Osama bin Ladin is suspected of involvement in a whole string of terrorist attacks on American targets, it’s interesting to note that no one was able to produce incontrovertible proof that his hand was the one on the trigger. At least this was the case until the August 7th bombing of the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam. The breakthrough in proving bin Ladin's role in that attack came on August 15^th, 1998 when Mohammed Sadiq Odeh was arrested at Karachi International Airport in Pakistan. Odeh’s description of bin Ladin’s international network--and his role in the bombing of the American embassies--finally brought conclusive evidence of the extent of bin Ladin's activities.  This provided the opportunity for the U.S. to put into play a whole stable of electronic eavesdropping measures from U.S. spy satellites and ground-based facilities. The U.S. had been trying for some time to “get connected” to bin Ladin’s network. The East Africa bombings provided them with the opportunity. Reportedly, the U.S. had intercepted communications linking bin Ladin to the bombings within a few days after they occurred, something that was impossible to attain in connection with previous attacks.

On August 20, 1998, the U.S. military struck a number of facilities associated with bin Ladin's network. The targets included six training camps belonging to al-Qaida and a pharmaceuticals factory in Sudan which the intelligence sources suspected of producing components of chemical weapons. The American administration has since admitted that the attack on the factory was a mistake.
 

Al-Qaeda Afghanistan, Islamists   Updated May 2003 What is al-Qaeda? Al-Qaeda is an international terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden. It seeks to rid Muslim countries of what it sees as the profane influence of the West and replace their governments with fundamentalist Islamic regimes. After al-Qaeda’s September 11, 2001, attacks on America, the United States launched a war in Afghanistan to destroy al-Qaeda’s bases there and overthrow the Taliban, the country’s Muslim fundamentalist rulers who harbored bin Laden and his followers. “Al-Qaeda” is Arabic for “the base.” U.S. Embassy, Nairobi, Kenya, Aug. 7, 1998. (AP Photo/Sayyid Azim) What are al-Qaeda’s origins? Al-Qaeda grew out of the Services Office, a clearinghouse for the international Muslim brigade opposed to the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In the 1980s, the Services Office—run by bin Laden and the Palestinian religious scholar Abdullah Azzam—recruited, trained, and financed thousands of foreign mujahedeen, or holy warriors, from more than 50 countries. Bin Laden wanted these fighters to continue the “holy war” beyond Afghanistan. He formed al-Qaeda around 1988. Who are al-Qaeda’s leaders? According to a 1998 federal indictment, al-Qaeda is administered by a council that “discussed and approved major undertakings, including terrorist operations.” At the top is bin Laden. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the head of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, is thought to be bin Laden’s top lieutenant and al-Qaeda’s ideological adviser. At least one senior al-Qaeda commander, Muhammad Atef, died in the U.S. air strikes in Afghanistan, and another top lieutenant, Abu Zubaydah, was captured in Pakistan in March 2002. In March 2003, the alleged mastermind of the September 11 attacks, Khalid Shaikh Muhammad, and al-Qaeda’s treasurer, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, were also captured in Pakistan. Where does al-Qaeda operate? We don’t know if it has a headquarters anymore. From 1991 to 1996, al-Qaeda worked out of Sudan. From 1996 until the collapse of the Taliban in 2001, al-Qaeda operated out of Afghanistan and maintained its training camps there. U.S. intelligence officials now think al-Qaeda’s senior leadership is trying to regroup in lawless tribal regions just inside Pakistan, near the Afghan border, or inside Pakistani cities. Al-Qaeda has autonomous underground cells in some 100 countries, including the United States, officials say. Law enforcement has broken up al-Qaeda cells in the United Kingdom, the United States, Italy, France, Spain, Germany, Albania, Uganda, and elsewhere. How big is al-Qaeda? It’s impossible to say precisely, because al-Qaeda is decentralized. Estimates range from several hundred to several thousand members. Is al-Qaeda connected to other terrorist organizations? Yes. Among them: Egyptian Islamic Jihad Jamaat Islamiyya (Egypt) The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group Islamic Army of Aden (Yemen) Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad (Kashmir) Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan Salafist Group for Call and Combat and the Armed Islamic Group (Algeria) Abu Sayyaf Group (Malaysia, Philippines) These groups share al-Qaeda’s Sunni Muslim fundamentalist views. Some terror experts theorize that Al-Qaeda, after the loss of it Afghanistan base, may be increasingly reliant on sympathetic affiliates to carry out it agenda. Intelligence officials and terrorism experts also say that al-Qaeda has stepped up its cooperation on logistics and training with Hezbollah, a radical, Iran-backed Lebanese militia drawn from the minority Shiite strain of Islam. What major attacks has al-Qaeda been responsible for? The group has targeted American and other Western interests as well as Jewish targets and Muslim governments it saw as corrupt or impious — above all, the Saudi monarchy. Al-Qaeda linked attacks include: The May 2003 car bomb attacks on three residential compounds in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia The November 2002 car bomb attack and a failed attempt to shoot down an Israeli jetliner with shoulder-fired missiles, both in Mombasa, Kenya The October 2002 attack on a French tanker off the coast of Yemen Several spring 2002 bombings in Pakistan The April 2002 explosion of a fuel tanker outside a synagogue in Tunisia The September 11, 2001, hijacking attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon The October 2000 U.S.S. Cole bombing The August 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Al-Qaeda is suspected of carrying out or directing sympathetic groups to carry out the May 2003 suicide attacks on Western interests in Casablanca, Morocco; the October 2002 nightclub bombing in Bali, Indonesia; and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Plots linked to al-Qaeda that were disrupted or prevented include: a 2001 attempt by Richard Reid to explode a shoe bomb on a transatlantic flight; a 1999 plot to set off a bomb at Los Angeles International Airport; a 1995 plan to blow up 12 transpacific flights of U.S. commercial airliners; a 1995 plan to kill President Bill Clinton on a visit to the Philippines; and a 1994 plot to kill Pope John Paul II during a visit to Manila. How is al-Qaeda connected to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing? There are strong links. Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, the militant cleric convicted in the 1993 plot, once led an Egyptian group now affiliated with al-Qaeda; two of his sons are senior al-Qaeda officials. And Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who was convicted of masterminding the 1993 attack, planned al-Qaeda’s foiled attack on American airliners over the Pacific Ocean. He is also the nephew of the former senior al-Qaeda terrorist Khalid Shaikh Muhammad, who is now in U.S. custody.

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