Bin Laden's schools for terror
November 26, 2001
BY JACK KELLEY
JALALABAD, Afghanistan--Plastic explosives, timing devices and
sketches of the best places to hide a bomb on an airplane filled the
files of Osama bin Laden's terrorist training camps near here. Gas
masks, cyanide and recipes for biological agents lined the shelves
and floors of his chemical weapons laboratory.
Kalashnikov rifles, targets and lesson plans on how to teach
children to shoot at victims' faces lay among the toys and near the
swing set at bin Laden's elementary school.
The terrorist camps around this eastern Afghan city apparently
were abandoned sometime in the last few weeks as bin Laden's
al-Qaida terrorist network fled U.S. bomb attacks and Northern
Alliance fighters. The camps offer clear evidence of the systematic
way bin Laden and his lieutenants have been pursuing their efforts
to wage jihad, or holy war, against the United States.
Last week, reporters--with permission of Jalalabad's new
governor, alliance ally Haji Abdul Qadir--visited two of bin Laden's
former camps. One is about 12 miles south of the city. The other is
about 15 miles west.
Both are guarded by alliance troops sent by Qadir. Neither has
been searched yet by U.S. troops or intelligence agents because,
U.S. officials say, the area is still considered too dangerous for
such work.
U.S. and alliance officials say bin Laden and up to 1,500 of his
fighters, as well as some Taliban troops, may still be hiding in the
hundreds of caves south of Jalalabad.
In Washington, Marine Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of U.S.
operations in Afghanistan, says U.S. forces have begun ''the
business of checking those sites as they fall under our control.''
Once they get to the camps, U.S. officials say, some of the
information gathered there could provide a ''windfall'' of
intelligence.
Reporters were escorted into the sites by Jalalabad security
officials. Ominous lesson plans for war were everywhere, out for
display as if the camps were museums of some kind.
The evidence shows that recruits at bin Laden's two main camps,
at least those visited by reporters, were trained in conventional,
biological and even atomic warfare, according to class manuals. They
came from at least 21 countries, including Bosnia, Egypt, France,
Great Britain, Jordan, Kuwait, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and
other U.S. allies, enrollment records show.
Nearly all of the students were told to return to their countries
after training and ''await orders'' to carry out attacks against the
United States, class notes revealed.
''These materials provide circumstantial evidence that
corroborates the suspicion that Osama bin Laden had been seriously
pursuing weapons of mass destruction,'' says military analyst Rifaat
Hussein of Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, Pakistan. ''They
give us a clue as to what this guy was up to. You're dealing with an
enemy that has to be taken seriously.''
Another target identified
Many of the buildings and barracks at the Darunta camp, a former
Soviet military base, were destroyed by U.S. air strikes Oct. 28.
But the most important building at the camp, which contains a
one-room laboratory lit by a single light bulb, was untouched.
A drawer in the lab contained three manuals. One appears to be an
18-chapter, 179-page training book written by bin Laden operatives.
It identifies ''buildings, bridges, embassies, schools, [and]
amusement parks'' as targets for destruction in the West. Another
chapter discusses the destruction that can be wreaked by ''atomic
explosions.'' Hand-drawn sketches of bombs filled the margins of
those pages.
The two other manuals, printed in the United States, are titled
''Middle Eastern Terrorist-Bomb Designs'' and ''Advanced Techniques
for Making Explosives and Time-Delay Bombs.'' There also were 84
pages of bomb-building techniques involving dynamite and C3 and C4
plastic explosives that appear to have been downloaded from the
Internet.
In another drawer were several fake visa and immigration stamps,
one purporting to be from the Pakistani Embassy in Rome and another
from the Tajikistan Consulate in Islamabad.
On one shelf of the laboratory was a long metal box lined with
wood shavings. It held 18 bottles of liquids with labels identifying
them as lead acetate, nitric acid, carbolic acid and glycerin, all
of which are highly toxic. On another shelf were several plastic
containers, including one labeled cyanide. A dozen gas masks were on
the floor.
Perhaps most telling about the minds of those who trained here is
a document found at the camp. ''I am interested in suicide
operations,'' wrote Damir Bajrami, 24, an ethnic Albanian from
Kosovo, on his April 2001 entry application. ''I have Kosovo
Liberation Army combat experience against Serb and American forces.
I need no further training. I recommend operations against parks
like Disney.''
'Sickening' lessons
More than 5,000 recruits, including at least four of the 19
hijackers involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, received
training at bin Laden's camps, U.S. officials say. Muslim militants
involved in the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen and the
1998 bombing of two U.S. embassies in east Africa also graduated
from the camps, they say.
''It is from these camps that much of the world's terror has
originated,'' Qadir says. ''What was taught at these camps is
sickening. The more I learn, the more I am in disbelief at what was
going on here.''
Qadir has designated the camps ''crime scenes'' and ordered
police to seal them off to prevent intruders from disturbing them.
Bin Laden operated at least six terrorist training camps near
Jalalabad. He also owned or rented at least six homes and dozens of
apartments and ran one elementary school for the children of his
fighters here.
The camp at Farm Hadda was one of the largest. The camp was
abandoned quickly by its 600 recruits after a major U.S. bombardment
in late October. Tanks, photos and even a pair of dentures were left
behind.
Amid the rubble were dozens of copies of a 26-page booklet,
''Jihad Against America.'' The booklet, which Pakistani officials
say was given to all new recruits, contains speeches and statements
by bin Laden.
''We can defeat the infidels from here,'' bin Laden writes. ''I
will give you the training so you can carry on after we are gone.
Our struggle will never end; it will grow stronger and more lethal
by the year.''
Nerve gas tested
At the lab in Darunta are other reminders of the lengths to which
bin Laden and his associates apparently are willing to go.
Outside the lab are four metal poles with chains attached to
their bases. At the end of one of the chains are the remains of what
appears to be a dead animal with white fur.
U.S. officials, citing satellite photos taken of the camp and
intelligence gathered from local residents, say a 60-year-old Saudi,
Abu Khabab, experimented with nerve gas on dogs, rabbits and other
animals here.
Khabab's neighbors said they saw large trucks delivering
chemicals and other supplies to the camp at least once a week.
Similar chemicals, weapons and manuals were also found among the
rubble of bin Laden's palatial home and his elementary school,
leading U.S. and Pakistani officials to wonder what his recruits
took with them.
''I fear there's a lot more out there that we just don't know
about,'' Qadir says. ''I'm afraid what happened at the World Trade
Center and Pentagon was just the beginning. The worst terror may be
yet to come.''
Gannett News Service
