9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: Full story of studies from America, 'Bozinka' plan and arrest

American intelligence agencies have been referring to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as 'KSM', people do not know KSM like Osama or Ayman al Zawahiri.

Before joining the fight against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Khalid spent four years in the United States and earned a degree from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical University.

In 1987, he fought the battle of Jaji against Soviet troops along with Osama bin Laden.

KSM's family had a long association with extremist activities.

KSM's nephew Ramzi Yusuf had made a failed attempt to destroy the World Trade Center with bombs in 1993. Even though Ramzi's mission failed, it had a great impact on the emerging generation of extremists.

Tom McMillan writes in his book ‘Flight 93: The Story of the Aftermath and the Legacy of American Courage on 9/11’, “The 1993 attack on the WTC helped new extremists realize that attacking American soil was not unusual.”

Thanks to his experience and connections in the training camp in Afghanistan, Yusuf was able to enter America through a fake passport.

He had formed a team of associates and was successful in sending a rented van loaded with bombs to the garage of the North Tower of WTC.

Six people were killed and several hundred people were injured in this blast. The building was not damaged as much as Joseph had thought, but he was successful in spreading terror on the streets of America's largest city.

From here a new era of extremism had started in the world. Yusuf was also successful in escaping from America to Pakistan.

Yusuf's maternal uncle KSM had the role of an advisor in this incident. He once sent Yusuf 660 dollars to help in this campaign.

Lawrence Wright wrote in his book 'The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11', "Yusuf was the first Islamic terrorist to attack on American soil. It would be no exaggeration to say that the foundation of the journey leading to 9/11 was laid the day Yusuf parked his bomb-laden van in the garage of the Twin Towers and walked out safely."

KSM was born on April 14, 1965 in Kuwait. His father was a local Imam and was from Pakistan.

Khalid had taken membership of the Islamic organization ‘Muslim Brotherhood’ at the age of 16.

After passing the secondary school examination in 1983, he went to America to study. When he enrolled at the University of North Carolina, a group of Arab students were already studying there.

Because of their interest in religious matters, this group was called 'Mullaz'.

In December 1986, KSM got the degree of Mechanical Engineering. According to the 9/11 investigation report, “KSM's hostility toward the United States was due to American foreign policy toward Israel.”

After receiving his degree from America, KSM went to Peshawar, a Pakistani city near the border with Afghanistan, where he met Afghan warlord Abdul Rasaf Sayyaf.

Sayyaf had a significant impact on his life. He first sent him to a camp in eastern Afghanistan for military training. During this time, he also worked with Abdullah Azzam, who was said to be the master of Osama bin Laden.

According to the book 'Hunt for KSM', in the year 1994, both uncle and nephew i.e. KSM and Ramzi Yusuf went to Philippines. There, the two began planning to assassinate President Bill Clinton and Pope John Paul II but later canceled the plan because the Philippines increased its security.

There he worked on another conspiracy which was named ‘Bozinka’. In this, 12 American planes were to be destroyed by placing bombs simultaneously in the Pacific region. KSM helped Yusuf collect material to make the bomb.

But on January 6, 1995, this conspiracy failed because the kitchen of the flat where both of them were making bombs caught fire.

Both of them ran away from there but the Philippines police found bomb making material and a laptop, which had the names and addresses of all the people associated with this conspiracy.

But KSM managed to escape to the Middle East while Ramzi Yusuf fled to Pakistan. There, due to the informer of a colleague, Yusuf was arrested by the ISI and FBI team.

He was brought to New York the same day and then taken to another place in a helicopter.

Cathy Scott Clark and Adrian Levy write in their book 'The Exile', "When the helicopter approached the Twin Towers, the FBI agent removed the blindfold from Joseph's eyes and pointed towards the towers and said, look, they are still standing. Ramsey responded to this taunt by saying - 'They wouldn't be standing if I had more money.'"

KSM's next step was to study in detail the flaws in the WTC bombing and the 'Bozinka' conspiracy. Here Osama Bin Laden entered. He had money and a whole army of disciples. Both of them knew each other but had never met since 1989.

Al-Qaeda's military commander Mohammad Atef arranged for the two to meet in Tora-Bora in late 1996.

KSM gave Laden complete information about the 1993 Twin Tower bombings and the Philippines campaign and made him a new offer.

The new conspiracy was so audacious that bin Laden himself began to doubt its success.

Tom McMillan writes, "KSM's plot was to hijack ten American planes simultaneously. Nine of them were to crash on buildings like the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and Capitol Hill. The tenth plane was to be landed at an American airport where KSM would give a speech condemning America's Middle East policy."

Osama bin Laden definitely heard this plan but did not make any promise to KSM but he did not say 'no' to him either.

Two years later, bin Laden called KSM once again.

Bin Laden told KSM that he liked his plan of crashing planes into buildings, but that hijacking ten planes and crashing into famous buildings was too complex and impractical. For this, the number of ships will have to be reduced and specific targets will have to be selected.

Terry McDormet and Josh Meyer write in their book 'The Hunt for KSM', "Bin Laden and KSM agreed that the number of planes should be reduced from ten to four or five."

Meanwhile, four people from Hamburg city of Germany came to join Bin Laden's Afghan camp. They were studying in Germany for years.

He was ready to go to Chechnya and fight but he was told that instead of going to Chechnya, it was better to go to Afghanistan first.

According to the book 'The Hunt for KSM', "What worked in these men's favor was that they had experience of living in the West. They knew other languages ​​besides Arabic. They had no criminal record and no one could suspect them. After some minor physical training, they were sent to KSM in Karachi for a crash course in becoming Americans."

KSM told these people that they would have to become pilots. On KSM's advice, he applied to American training schools to learn to fly planes. They also got American visas.

Within two years, KSM was successful in sending 19 such people to America.

Meanwhile, Bin Laden repeatedly asked KSM to carry out the attack as soon as possible, but he was in no hurry and waited for the summer of 2001.

Terry McDormet and Josh Meyer write, "KSM supported his colleague Mohammed Ata's call to avoid hitting the White House with the fourth plane because it was a smaller location and more difficult to hit. Capitol Hill, the US Capitol, was chosen for the attack, and the attack date was pushed back so that US lawmakers could return there after the recess."

During the hatching of this conspiracy, KSM remained in Karachi and kept himself completely isolated from the al-Qaeda leadership. He used multiple email accounts.

McDormet and Meyer write, "One of his email IDs was silver underscore [email protected]. His second email was gold underscore [email protected]. His password for both accounts was hotmail."

KSM also told his disciples that visas for most of the countries in the world are given on the passport but Pakistan's visa is given on a separate paper.

This visa can be reused by separating it from the iron. Dates printed on visas can also be removed using bleach.

He also informed that students from Algeria and other African countries sell their passports in the black market in Islamabad. They can be purchased from there.

In a way, KSM was in complete charge of the 9/11 operation. Through him, thousands of dollars were distributed for the activities of Al-Qaeda all over the world, in which most of the money was given in cash.

Terry McDormet and Josh Meyer write, "In August 2001, a messenger was sent to Karachi to inform KSM that Ata had chosen September 11 as the date for the attack. At the end of the month, KSM flew to Afghanistan to break the news to bin Laden. KSM watched the plane hit the towers in an Internet café in Karachi."

KSM was very popular among al-Qaeda fighters from the beginning. They considered him to be an intelligent, efficient and balanced manager who concentrated and moved towards his goals.

An American intelligence officer later admitted that KSM worked as the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. He knew how to use the talents and qualities of others very well. He had expertise in building relationships with people and getting the work done.

KSM greatly valued those people who could speak Urdu in addition to Arabic because the top leaders of Al-Qaeda were Arabs but most of the people carrying out the work were Urdu-speaking South Asians.

Another specialty of KSM was to give personal attention to every new fighter recruited into Al-Qaeda.

Yosri Fouda and Nick Yielding write in their book 'Masterminds of Terror', "It was thanks to KSM that he managed to save most of his people from the world's most sophisticated counter-terrorism trap. Shortly before 9/11, bin Laden was often heard boasting that he was about to do something big, but KSM had not the slightest clue about his plans to those around him. He didn't let it happen, rather he spent a lot of his time and energy trying to silence Bin Laden."

Khalid Mohammed Sheikh was not caught by the CIA until 17 months after the 9/11 attacks. On March 1, 2003, on the tip of an informer, Khalid Mohammad Shaikh was arrested from a house in Rawalpindi.

He was interrogated intensively for the next 48 hours but he did not reveal even a single important thing.

Al-Qaeda fighters were trained to remain silent for the first 48 hours after being arrested so that their comrades would get time to change their bases.

Kathy Scott Clark and Adrian Levy write in their book 'The Exile', "KSM was shackled, blindfolded and then covered with a robe. He was then taken to Afghanistan.

After examination by doctors, his hands were tied to a rod hanging from the ceiling. There were three people who questioned him, one man and two women. Ten more guards were standing there with masks on their faces. Whenever he was reluctant to cooperate, they would pelt him with bribes. Four days later, he was taken to Poland in a Gulf Stream plane.

Dr. James Mitchell, who was present there, told Kathy Scott Clark and Adrian Levy, "Whenever he did not cooperate, he was made to stand against a wall and punched his body, face and mouth."

KSM later told the Red Cross, “A flexible plastic collar was placed around my neck and the guards would hold it and repeatedly bang my head against the wall.”

An instrument was tied to KSM's finger to keep track of whether various parts of his body were working or not. After this he was immersed in water until his breathing stopped. After a break this process would be repeated again.

His face was placed under water at least 183 times. “The worst day was when I was beaten continuously for half an hour,” KSM recalled in an interview with the Red Cross. My head hit the wall so hard that it started bleeding. After this, ice cold water was poured on my naked body.”

When news of these CIA tortures came to light, KSM was sent to Guantanamo Bay in 2006.

Even after so much torture, the CIA could not get KSM to reveal the whereabouts of Bin Laden and Zawahiri.

Terry McDormet and Josh Meyer write, "KSM likely had knowledge of Zawahiri's whereabouts because he met with Zawahiri the day before his arrest."

KSM is still lodged in Guantanamo Bay prison.