9/11 Architect Lied About Montana Recruitment Plot During Waterboard Sessions

9/11 architect lied about Montana recruitment plot during waterboard sessions

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12/10/2014

The al-Qaida mastermind of the 9/11 attacks fabricated a story he told his CIA torturers about recruiting terrorists in Montana to set fire to forests, according to a report released Tuesday by the Senate Intelligence Committee.

U.S. Forces captured Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the man named as the architect of the Sept. 11 attacks by the 9/11 Commission, on March 1, 2003.

During the following month, he was waterboarded 183 times, according to the Senate’s report, citing CIA records.

Suspecting that al-Qaida was recruiting terrorists living inside the U.S., CIA agents specifically waterboarded Mohammed for not confirming that he had instructed another al-Qaida member, known as Abu Issa al-Britani, to do the recruitment.

“One hour after the waterboarding session, (Mohammed) stated that he told Issa ‘to make contact with black U.S. citizen converts to Islam in Montana,’ and that he instructed Issa to use his ties … to facilitate his recruitment efforts,” reads the report.

Mohammed also told CIA interrogators that he instructed Issa to identify forests that al-Qaida could start on fire and that Montana had been identified as the location because Issa’s bodyguards had families living in Montana.

The Senate report explains that in a June 2003 conversation with a CIA interrogator, Mohammed claimed he made up the story about recruitment in Montana because he thought that was what the interrogators wanted to hear.

CIA doubted Mohammed had fabricated the Montana plot and urged interrogators to press him into revealing the identity of his contact in Montana.

By June 30, 2005, the intelligence team that tracked Osama bin Laden concluded that Mohammed’s reporting about terrorists in Montana was “an outright fabrication,” reads the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on CIA torture.

The CIA repeatedly told the Senate Intelligence Committee that the waterboard interrogation technique was particularly effective in getting Mohammed to talk.

The information elicited from Mohammed led the FBI to conduct extensive investigations and the CIA to capture and detain suspects, some later found to be innocent, according to the Senate report.

In 2012, al-Qaida’s magazine “Inspire” gave detailed instruction on starting forest fires and recommended Montana as a possible locale.