The plot sickens

He compares Al Qaeda operatives to American revolutionaries in his tribunal testimony.
By Peter Spiegel

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the Kuwaiti national who is thought to be the highest-ranking Al Qaeda operative in U.S. custody, told a military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, last weekend that he was responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to a transcript of the hearing.

In a written statement read to a three-officer panel, Mohammed claimed he was Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden's "operational leader" for the "9/11 operation," responsible for the "organizing, planning, follow-up and execution" of the plot.

- Transcript: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed hearing (released by the Pentagon)

"I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z," Mohammed said, according to the transcript, which was released by the Pentagon on Wednesday night.

Mohammed was present at the hourlong, closed-door hearing Saturday, and he interjected frequently in slightly broken English. His admission was read to the tribunal by an Air Force lieutenant colonel who was serving as Mohammed's representative.

Mohammed also gave a lengthy, apparently spontaneous speech in which he likened Al Qaeda operatives to American revolutionaries, described a war against a dominating U.S. presence and even expressed a measure of remorse.

"I'm not happy that 3,000 been killed in America," he said, according to the transcript. "I feel sorry, even. I don't like to kill children and the kids. Never Islam are give me green light to kill people. Killing, as in the Christianity, Jews and Islam, are prohibited."

In his 31-point statement, Mohammed claimed responsibility for a wide range of terrorist plots, including the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center; the 2002 bombings of nightclubs in Bali, Indonesia; and the so-called shoe-bomber plot to down U.S. airliners traveling across the Atlantic. He said he took part in plans to kill former Presidents Carter and Clinton, as well as the late Pope John Paul II.

And it was the first time he was allowed to freely discuss U.S. allegations without interrogators present. He used the opportunity to present charges that he had been tortured by his U.S. captors, and he attempted to portray himself as a soldier fighting a war of independence.

"What I wrote here is not I'm making myself hero when I said I was responsible for this or that," Mohammed said, addressing the U.S. Navy captain who presided over the tribunal. "You are military man. You know very well there are language for any war."

Saturday's hearing, formally called a combatant status review tribunal, was intended to determine whether Mohammed will officially be classified as an "enemy combatant" and held at Guantanamo Bay.

Although Mohammed's tribunal is largely a formality, under military detention rules adopted after a series of Supreme Court rulings, all Guantanamo Bay detainees must be accorded such a hearing. A ruling is likely to take several weeks.

Mohammed appears to have exaggerated his role in some of the plots. The 1993 World Trade Center bombing, for instance, was masterminded by Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who was convicted of coordinating the attack by a U.S. court in 1996.

Mohammed spent most of his speech, which stretched over nearly four pages in the single-spaced transcript, attempting to explain his view that Al Qaeda attacks were a series of battles in a war for liberation. He said that U.S. labels such as "terrorists" and "enemy combatants" were deceptive, and that Al Qaeda operatives were merely soldiers. At one point, he compared Bin Laden to George Washington.

"If now we were living in the Revolutionary War and George Washington, he being arrested through Britain, for sure they would consider him enemy combatant," he said. "But American, they consider him as hero."

As he expressed regret for the children killed in the Sept. 11 attacks, he said they were the victims of a war and likened them to Iraqi civilians killed during the U.S. invasion.

"Because war, for sure, there will be victims," Mohammed said.

Mohammed appeared calm and composed, based on the transcript, and made an effort to understand the tribunal process and to cooperate with the panel. At one point, an officer asked him if he had any questions about the tribunal process.

"OK by me," Mohammed answered.

Just what state was he waging a "war of independence" for? Methinks it was a State of Mind. A murderous, malevolent, unjustifiable state of mind. If his "confession" is fair dinkum, and the operative words are "if" and "fair dinkum", the bastard should hang.