Representative Press Blog

9/11 Motives and the 9/11 Commission Report

Chapter Two, Section Two of the 9/11 Commission Report is called "Bin Ladin's Appeal in the Islamic World" The report claims, "Bin Ladin's grievance with the United States may have started in reaction to specific U.S. policies but it quickly became far deeper." When I read this I wondered why they thought that bin Ladin's grievance "became" something more than what he had been stating for years. The report correctly reports that "al Qaeda's answer was that America should abandon the Middle East" but then it includes the notion that America should "convert to Islam, and end the immorality and godlessness of its society and culture"

When I read that I knew the source for asserting that bin Laden had suddenly decided to add this as a grievance he has with the US. It could be no other source but the purported "letter to the American people". The report itself acknowledges that this purported grievance is new and sure enough, if you check the source they use it is and only is the purported "'Letter to America' which first appeared on the Internet in Arabic with the claim that it was written by bin Laden. When did bin Laden's grievance supposedly "become far deeper"? When this letter popped up on the Internet a year after 9/11, this is the only source for this claim. That letter popped up on the Internet a year after 9/11. Taking a good look at the facts we can see that this particular letter is not actually from bin Laden. The newspaper that printed the English translation of the letter reported, "Al-Massari's email and bin Laden's letter show ideological similarities."

Bin Laden has given interviews and made video tapes and audio tapes for years and the message has been consistent. U.S. Investigators have nearly a decade of statements directly from bin Laden that state the motives for the attacks on the US and US interests. Bin Laden has been interviewed by western journalists and has for several years repeatedly broadcast a common list of grievances, which he cites as the reason for his jihad. Most of these statements have been confirmed as those from bin Laden but at least one hasn't, that letter purporting to be written by bin Laden, which appeared on the Internet in Arabic. The letter was reported in a November 24, 2002 article in The Observer, in an article that cites no intelligence-agency estimates about its authenticity, only using journalists' beliefs that it is really a letter from bin Laden explaining the motivations for the attacks. Reasons to question the authenticity of this particular letter include:
* A style different from all the interviews
* A strange intro to the letter that acts like the motives have not been stated before.
* Lack of any other source that includes as motives either "debauchery of Western Civilization" or a "call for conversion to Islam of the infidels."

The letter popped up on the Internet and the Observer published an English translation just 12 days after bin Laden had issued an audio tape

The transcript of bin Laden's audio tape of is consistent with what he had been saying for years. He points out that the attacks were "are only reactions and reciprocal actions."
He said, "Why should fear, killing, destruction, displacement, orphaning and widowing continue to be our lot, while security, stability and happiness be your lot? This is unfair. It is time that we get even" he says, "You will be killed just as you kill, and will be bombed just as you bomb." He makes all this clear in the tape. Then suddenly a letter is posted and it has several things in it not said in all the years before or after?

In another audio tape sent months after in the year 2003, bin Laden is once again stating the same message and even pointing out that the Bush Administration lies about the motives: "... the Mujahideen saw the black gang of thugs in the White House hiding the Truth, and their stupid and foolish leader, who is elected and supported by his people, denying reality and proclaiming that we (the Mujahideen) were striking them because we were jealous of them (the Americans), whereas the reality is that we are striking them because of their evil and injustice in the whole of the Islamic World, especially in Iraq and Palestine and their occupation of the Land of the Two Holy Sanctuaries. Upon seeing this, the Mujahideen decided teach them a lesson and to take the war to their heartland. "

Everything in audio and video has been consistant yet this "letter" pops up on the Internet a year after 9/11 and acts like the motives have never been said before and has in it weird stuff like this: "Who can forget your President Clinton's immoral acts committed in the official Oval office? After that you did not even bring him to account, other than that he 'made a mistake', after which everything passed with no punishment. Is there a worse kind of event for which your name will go down in history and remembered by nations?"

Whoever actually did write the letter really laid it on thick: "Is there a worse kind of event for which your name will go down in history and remembered by nations?"

Anyone is free to believe that Clinton's BJ is the "kind of event" that will make our name "go down in history and remembered by nations" but to think bin Laden suddenly became concerned about Clinton's sex life is silly. It looms large in some people's minds here in American and may point to the real origin of the letter but that is really hard to tell. That Internet letter is bogus. Osama bin Laden has made his case clear and has addressed the American people directly: "The Western regimes and the government of the US bear the blame for what might happen. If their people do not wish to be harmed inside their very own countries, they should seek to elect governments that are truly representative of them and that can protect their interests."-bin Laden, May 1998
" America won't get out of this crisis until it gets out of the Arabian Peninsula, and until it stops its support of Israel." -bin Laden, Oct. 2001 whylie.html