Legacy of Osama Bin Laden
A
journey from rugged mountains of Tora Bora to
comforts of Waziristan Haveli
Daanish Bin Nabi
Smoke
was billowing out of both towers of the World Trade Center. People were jumping
out the windows. There was sheer panic, utter chaos. It was not a light private
aircraft that had been involved but two fuel-laden commercial Boeings full of
passengers. The planes had been hijacked and purposely crashed into the twin
towers. This could hardly be a mishap. It had to be deliberate. Two other
aircrafts had also been hijacked. One to hit the Pentagon and another had gone
down in a field in Pennsylvania.
It
was a day that changed the world - September 11, 2001.
US
blamed Osama Bin Laden for the gruesome acts on the American people. The poor
and innocent people of Afghanistan had to pay the price of this horrible work.
Abid Ullah Jan refutes all these allegations made by the US in his book ‘The Genesis of The Final Crusade’ in
which he say that the war on Afghanistan after 9/11 was pre-planned. The author
compiled a huge amount of undeniable evidence to prove this point.
On
the other hand, Pakistan was enforced to be the part of this pre-planned “War
on Terror”. This war on terror was, “War of Shadow”, for Pakistan as stated in
General Pervaiz Musharaff book ‘In The Line of Fire’. Furthermore, General
Musharaff writes the conversion between him and Collin Powel as: “I was
chairing an important meeting at the Governor’s House when my military
secretary told me that the US Secretary of State, General Collin Powell, was on
phone. I said I would call back later, but he insisted that I come out of the
meeting and take the call. Powell was quite candid: ‘You are either with us or
against us.’ I took this as a blatant ultimatum. When I was back in Islamabad
the next day, our Director General of Intel Services Intelligence (ISI) who was
in Washington told me over phone about his meeting with the US Deputy Secretary
of State, Richard Armitage. In what has to be the most undiplomatic statement
ever made, Armitage added to what Colin Powell had said to me and told the DG
ISI that not only did we have to decide whether we were with America or with
the terrorists, but if we chose the terrorist, then we should be prepared to be
‘Bombed back to the Stone Age’. This was a shockingly barefaced threat.”
Pakistan
was set to become next Laos and Cambodia because of the imposed war.
Corruption, suicide bombings, sectarian clashes, coercion of the minorities,
political murders and despot rulers were soon to become part of the Pakistani
society.
Osama is Born
Friend
to few and foe to millions, Osama Bin laden was born in 1957 to a Syrian mother.
He was the seventh son among fifty brothers and sisters. His father Mohammad
Awad Bin Laden came to Saudi Kingdom from Hardamout (South Yemen) sometime
around 1930. His father started his life as very poor labourer to end up an owner
of the biggest construction company in the Kingdom.
Osama’s Afghan Jihad
On
December 25, 1979, Soviet troops crossed the border into Afghanistan and began
an occupation of the country that would initiate 20 years of internal conflict
and profoundly affect the growing militancy of Islamic groups throughout the
world.
The
Soviet invasion and occupation would set the stage for the rise of Taliban in
Afghanistan and the simultaneous rise of Al-Qaeda net of Osama Bin Laden. The United
States provided a variety of overt and tacit assistance to the anti-Soviet Mujahideen
during the occupation.
Ronald
Wilson Reagan the 40th President of the United States even said that Afghan Mujahideen
are equivalent to the founding fathers of our nation. The Regan administration printed
millions of textbooks to support the Afghan Jihad at the University of Nebraska
at Omaha.
Once
Soviets withdrew, the US strategic interests in Afghanistan ended and the
vacuum crafted by the detachment of both superpowers pave conditions which
produced Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
From
the ashes of the Mujahideen that were formed to “liberate” Afghanistan from the
Soviets, Osama Bin Mohammad Bin Awad Bin Laden, formed the core elements of
what became Al-Qaeda. He joined Mujahideen forces in Peshawar against Soviets in
Afghanistan.
Abdullah
Yusuf Azzam, a Palestinian Islamic scholar, who raised funds and recruited the
international Islamic volunteer efforts of Afghan Arab through the 1980s, was
also teacher and mentor of Osama Bin Laden and persuaded Osama to come to
Afghanistan and help him in Jihad against Soviets. Most of the Bin Laden’s
first half of 1980s was spent as a fund raiser for Afghan Jihad and recruiting Mujahideen
all over the Muslim countries.
When
Azzam was assassinated on November 24, 1989 by some unknown assassins who detonated
a bomb and killed him instantly, the blame was immediately put on Osama. However,
the widow of Azzam (Umm Mohamed) in an interview to Al-Jazeera says, “It’s
inconceivable that anyone would kill his mentor, when the assassination
happened in Peshawar some people came to film the scene of the attack to prove
to those who had sent them what they had done. We caught them and took their
cameras. One was French, the other Pakistani. The Pakistani told us it was an
international organization that was involved in the assassination and not Bin
Laden but the investigation was never carried out.”
Year
1987 is considered a transitional phase for Sheikh Osama. He was influenced by
the idea of the Egyptians who were primarily behind the ideology of Al-Qaeda in
1987. The founders of Al-Qaeda were Abu Obadiah, Abu Hafs Al-Masri and Saif
Al-Adel.
Fallout between Saudis and Bin Laden
When
the Soviet withdrew from Afghanistan in February 1989, Osama returned to Saudi
Arabia. As the experienced leader of the valiant Mujahideen, he was treated
with respect and helped Saudi intelligence create the first Jihad group in
South Yemen, which was seeking to oust the Communist regime. Just after Iraq
had invaded Iran, Saddam had his eyes on the tiny state of Kuwait. On August 2,
1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait and occupied the oil fields.
As the Saudi royal family
discussed inviting US troops to repel the Iraqis and establish a presence in
their country, Osama approached them with an alternative plan. He offered his
services to build an anti-Saddam Hussein Arab coalition and to defeat Iraqis by
enlisting 5000 Mujahideen veterans.
His
proposal got rejected. US troops were invited into the Holy Kingdom, and Osama
was humiliated. Osama disliked the very idea of armed non-Muslims even entering
the land of the two Holy mosques, and expressed his displeasure with the Saudis.
The
Saudi royal family assured Osama that US troops would remain only until the
threat receded. However, their failure to honour the pledge to withdraw foreign
troops after Kuwait was liberated only reinforced Osama’s betrayal.
When he expressed his displeasure publicly at
the continuing presence of US troops, which he regarded as infidels on Saudi
soil, he was sidelined.
Clearly, Osama had now joined the ranks of
the Saudi dissidents. Osama left Saudi Arabia for Pakistan in April 1991 where
he launched a campaign against the land of his birth.
Pakistan Politics and Osama Bin Laden
In
the mean time, political scenario of Pakistan was in doldrums with Zia-ul-Haq’s
rule ending in a plane crash. With the Jihad against Soviets over, the tussle
between Benazir Bhutto’s government and the military establishment was increasing
day by day. Accusation is ripe to this day that Bin Laden supported Pakistani
politician Nawaz Sharif in a bid to topple the Bhutto government.
Khalid
Khawaja, a former Pakistani intelligence official, in an interview with Al-Jazeera
narrated that “Nawaz Sharif refuses he ever met Osama or he ever got any
support from Osama. This is totally a cover up of his secret contact with Osama.
He was a person who would always ask me where my benefactor is. I would like to
salute him. Sometimes it was Osama’s money, sometimes money would come from
outside and mostly money would come from governments like Saudi Arabia and
U.A.E to support Nawaz Sharif’s efforts either to remain in power or in getting
back country’s most powerful job.”
Sustaining
these claims, Ali Moher, Nawaz Sharif’s former translator writes: “I know this
happened because Khalid Khawaja was a common friend of Bin Laden and Nawaz
Sharif. Khawaja worked for Pakistani intelligence and he was one of the
supporters of the Afghan Jihad against the Soviets. He was in contact with Bin
Laden. When the Arab fighters in Peshawar
were harassed by Pakistani intelligence during Benazir’s first term, he
suggested to Bin Laden to support Nawaz Sharif and to topple Benazir Bhutto’s
government.”
Senior
Pakistani journalist, Hamid Mir in an interview said: “When General Zia was
dead, the Pakistani security agencies started arresting them (Arab Afghan
fighters). This was the problem and Sheik Osama wanted to settle this quandary.
He wanted someone to help him. Someone from Nawaz Sharif’s close circles contacted
him and said actually its Benazir’s government which is creating problems and
if you want solution of your problems, a new government can solve them. So you
must support us in toppling her government.”
Osama’s
former bodyguard Naseer Al-Bahri writes: “Sheikh Osama sent a letter
congratulating the Pakistani government and Nawaz Sharif after the nuclear
tests. He reminded them that this bomb was the Islamic deterrent and they
shouldn’t use it in their dispute with India. Instead it should be used to
protect Islam.”
Sudan and Bin Laden
In
Sudan, Laden built up a business empire by investing in banks and agricultural
projects and building a major highway and a number of link roads.
While
praising Osama, a resident of Al- Damazin, Sudan Shoaa Khalafallah in an
interview to Al-Arabia says: “We used to call him Sheikh Bin Laden. Many people
know him very well. Everybody wanted to meet him. He treated people with utmost
generosity. Everyone was astonished. Poor people used to go to him and he’d
give them money. This is what I know about Sheikh Bin Laden.”
In
1995, an assassination attempt was made on Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in Ethiopian
capital Addis Ababa. Bin Laden and his Egyptian allies were suspected to be
behind the attack.
Sudanese
government came under heavy pressure to expel Bin Laden from their country and
was at the brink of international sanction if Sudanese government refused to
expel him. So, in 1996 he returned to Afghanistan.
When
the bombing of 1998 in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania happened, the
blame was all over again planted on Bin Laden. The senior editor-in-chief of
the News International, Rahimullah Yusufzai in an interview says: “On 20th
August, 1998 after the attacks happened on the two embassies, I received a
phone call from Aiman Al Zawahiri. He spoke in fluent English and told me that
Osama is sitting next to him. As Osama could not communicate in English, so he
was sending his regards. Zawahiri told me that Bin Laden is denying his
involvement and Al-Qaeda’s involvement in bombing of US embassies.”
It
was after the bombing of US embassies in eastern Africa that anxiety about
Osama in US government and public started to grow. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) set up a separate
Bin Laden unit and offered a reward of millions of dollars wanting Osama dead
or alive.
Manhunt of Century
As
Colin Powell lamented in his 1995 memoir, ‘A Soldier’s Way’, reflecting on the
manhunt for Panamanian drug lord Manuel Noriega, “A President has to rally the country
behind his policies. And when that policy is war, it is tough to arouse public
opinion against political abstractions. A flesh-and-blood villain serves
better.” Beyond the American tendency to personalize conflicts, there are quite
a few reasons that manhunts are likely to lure more and more future US
policymakers.
There
have been a number of rebels from all over the world whom USA has hunted down.
Amongst all those personalities, three are worth mentioning: Geronimo
1885-1886; Che Guevara 1967 and Osama Bin Laden 1996-2011.
US
spent billions of dollars on mercenaries, air surveillances, vicious drones, covert
operation, modernized weapons and technology and hundreds of thousands of
troopers from all over the world to chase one man down.
It
took US over 10 years of intense search and surveillance to reach to Osama.
Various mysteries surround the death of Osama. Former slain Prime Minister,
Benazir Bhutto in an interview with Robert Frost on Al-Jazeera after returning
to Pakistan in 2007 claimed that Osama Bin Laden was murdered by Omar Sheikh
who was a close aide to Masood Azhar head of Jaish-e-Mohammad.
Likewise,
a number of Head of States from all over world had their own views on the death
of Bin Laden. President Mahmud Ahmadinejad in an interview to ABC news said Bin
Laden is living quietly in Washington under the nose of CIA.
In
2001, it was said that Osama has died of dialysis. Amir Ali, a Pakistani doctor,
in a interview to Pakistani news channel says, “I had met Osama in November of
2001. He had neither shown any signs of kidney failure nor any signs of
dialysis. He was fit and running. He didn’t have any water near or with him
while a dialysis patient cannot do without water for a long time.”
Then
on 2nd May, 2011, in early hours in Pakistan, came the official statement of
President Barak Obama exactly after 10 years of search for Osama.
“Tonight
I can report to American people and to the world, United States has conducted
an operation that killed Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaeda,” he said. Still
a number of mysteries surround this official statement from the US President as
well.
Waziristan Haveli
Osama’s
Abbottabad compound was locally known as Waziristan Haveli. It was an upper
class mansion that was used as a safe house in which he was hiding when he was brutally
killed by American elite forces. This mansion was located just 1.3 km from the famous
Pakistan Military Academy in Bilal Town, Abbottabad, Pakistan.
On
May 2, 2011, a 24-member team of the United States Naval Special Warfare
Development Group arrived by helicopter, breached a wall using explosives, and
entered the compound and killed Sheikh Osama after a brief firefight of nearly
50 minutes. Pakistan demolished the structure in February 2012.
Al-Qaeda and Nukes
With
Bin Laden dead, the most concerning question which remains is that in the
lifetime or after the death of Bin Laden, did Al-Qaeda acquire nuclear weapons?
In
November 2001, Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir was the last man to interview Bin
Laden. In that interview, Bin Laden claimed that Al-Qaeda has nuclear and
chemical weapons. “Bin Laden clearly admitted that yes we have nuclear as deterrence
and if Americans use it, then we have every right to respond to it in the same
manner. When I asked the same question to him in 1998 he simply ignored the
question but this time around he was confident of using nukes against US.”
Former
bodyguard of Osama, Naseer Al-Bahri in an interview said: “Americans did find some
documents in the media centre in Kandahar. They found the copies of training
manuals relating to the use of certain gases and toxins. Our brother Abu Khabab
focused on poisonous gas. He led training in these things due to his chemistry subject
experience. The aim was to acquire a weapon with a devastating and instant effect.
Tests were made on dogs and rabbits. Many fighters received training. Abu
Khabab operated a secret camp where people were trained. But no-one knew who
was trained there. They had secret budget. Only Abu Khabab knew who was trained
there.”
