Pakistan said to have unearthed 9/11 style Al Qaeda memo

By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: If suicide bombers come to America, they are likely to be carrying biological, chemical or nuclear weapons with them, according to an Al Qaeda memo discovered by Pakistani authorities, claims a report.

Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, an online subscription intelligence news service, says that Pakistan President Pervez Musharaf, under heavy American pressure, has once again instructed his security and intelligence chiefs to focus on jihadi suicide volunteers – this time because of a memo showing they will be used to carry weapons of mass destruction.

The report says, “The President, himself under the constant shadow of militants threatening to assassinate him, reacted to a coded memo discovered during a recent raid on pro-Al Qaeda activists in Karachi, by sharing parts of the memo’s alarming contents with friendly governments. Topping the memo’s list stands the US, although European countries are also specified as preferred targets. Unlike many other discoveries of terrorist documents, this memo has an added factor causing more than the usual concern.”

The memo details a number of ideas and options for attacking the West with WMDs by using suicide volunteers. Related to this memo is a Spanish decision, voiced by Interior Minister Antonio Alonzo, to assign close to 2,000 security agents to a training and deployment programme on the danger of nuclear, chemical and bacteriological terror attacks. Information from Russia passed on to the Pakistani intelligence and security service, following the disaster at the Beslan school, has contributed even more tension to the situation. The Russians claim many of the so-called “Arab mujahideen” killed during the attack on the school had visited Pakistan and neighbouring Afghanistan on several occasions. Similar claims and information came from the UK where law-enforcement agencies are still in the midst of their recent anti-terror operation that began last month. Several of those apprehended in the UK are of Pakistani origin with strong ties to anti-Musharaf forces.

The report quotes a “well-connected source in Islamabad” as having told Western diplomats that he captured document included phrases not immediately and correctly analysed. One such phrase says: “Aamaliat b’anika.” It was later learned that “b’anika” actually means “Panica,” or “panic,” and “Aamaliat” means “operation.” Experts on terror attempts to hit the US with WMDs further analysed the sentence and associated it to a 1968 Hollywood production titled “Panic in the City.” The movie describes in detail a terrorist plan to build a nuclear bomb by using easily available materials and working in the basement of a Los Angeles home. In the movie, an agent sacrifices his life to fly the bomb away from the city to the open ocean where it explodes, sparing Los Angeles.

The report also quotes “supporters of Osama Bin Laden” to have said on “numerous occasions” that their chief had studied over the years a variety of Western fictional material, and it is quite possible this movie was one of the Hollywood productions he actually viewed. In recent years, several TV and movie productions dealt with similar scenarios, such as in the TV series “24” and the movie titled “The Sum of All Fears.” According to the report, “Interest in suicide bombers who may be carrying WMDs has increased since the discovery of the memo and evidence of a possible Pakistani terrorist connection to Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Egypt. Western intelligence agencies are convinced Pakistan is now the No. 1 producer of jihadi suicide candidates and that many of Pakistan’s madrassas and militant mosques are hosting an ever-growing number of Muslim foreigners. The presence of non-Pakistanis in the militant milieu of many mosques and religious schools, mostly those near and in the Peshawar region, is a reason for major concern. Recently Pakistani mullahs and imams have begun to describe suicide attacks in India in terms such as ‘a three-year success story,’ making it clear to their disciples suicide bombings are a morale booster to the larger Muslim world.”

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