The self-portrait of an Al Qaeda leader
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed put the murder of reporter Daniel Pearl on his long list of terrorist acts.
By Warren Richey | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the March 16, 2007 edition
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Most Americans know him from the unflattering picture taken shortly after his arrest in Pakistan in 2003. Disheveled and drowsy, alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed appeared as anything but a stoic Islamic warrior engaged in a heroic struggle.
This week a more complete – and complex – portrait of the man began to emerge. He knows Islam does not support wanton killing, but he rationalizes that Muslims are under siege by America.
He boasts of involvement in the 9/11 and other attacks and then expresses remorse for the loss of life – particularly the deaths of children.
He acknowledges involvement in what amount to gigantic international crimes, then takes exception to an Al Jazeera press report that misidentified his rank and position in Al Qaeda.
In one breath he admits to decapitating American reporter Daniel Pearl, and in another he complains that the American military is misspelling his name.
Overall, the portrait that emerges of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is that of an individual who represents the worst kind of enemy – a man who believes with certainty that his cause is just and that God is on his side.
These new details about Mr. Mohammed come via a transcript released by the Pentagon of a proceeding conducted last Saturday at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.
A panel of military officers convened at the base to determine whether there was enough evidence to classify Mohammed as an enemy combatant. Mohammed did not dispute that classification.
"For sure," he told the tribunal, he was America's enemy.
"When we say we are enemy combatant, that['s] right. We are," he said.
But he didn't stop there. He admitted to an encyclopedic list of terror attacks and attempted or planned attacks worldwide. Some had never been previously disclosed. Others were long suspected.
"I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z," he told the panel in a written statement.
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