Al-Qaeda's Hand In Istanbul Plot
Turks Met With Bin Laden
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, February 13, 2007; A01

ISTANBUL -- About a week before Sept. 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden sat down to a breakfast meeting in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar. His Turkish guests had arrived with a plan for a spectacular terrorist strike, but according to accounts two of the visitors later gave investigators, there was no talk of business over the meal.

Instead, bin Laden held forth for an hour about the injustices Muslims were suffering at the hands of Israel and the United States, standard motivational remarks tailored slightly for the occasion: He told the visitors that one of his grandmothers was Turkish.

Afterward, outside the one-story house guarded by high walls and men with Kalashnikov rifles, it was al-Qaeda's military commander who gave the visitors $10,000 in cash and crucial words of guidance.

So began a plot that ended in November 2003 with the staggered detonation of four powerful truck bombs in Istanbul, Turkey's largest city. The attacks, which killed 58 people and wounded 750, may have been the last terrorist strikes specifically authorized by bin Laden. Two months after breakfasting with the Turks, bin Laden was making for his base at Tora Bora as U.S.-led forces attacked across Afghanistan.

In the fevered days after the Istanbul explosions, Turkish investigators swept up suspects by the dozens. In police interrogation rooms, many spoke at length about the conspiracy and the motivations driving it. Transcripts of those interrogations, as entered into evidence in the continuing trial of about 70 defendants in Istanbul, provide a rare, fine-grained look at the inner workings of a terrorist bomb plot. This report is based on those documents and interviews with those who knew the accused plotters.

"The aim of this organization is to take action against American and Israeli targets and to break their dominance over Islamic countries," said one suspect, explaining a conspiracy conceived long before the United States sent troops to Iraq.

"The Islamic umma are being oppressed," said another, using the Arabic word for the global Muslim community.

According to the transcripts, bin Laden's breakfast guests had already organized themselves into a cell before they approached al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. There they specifically declined to pledge allegiance to the organization, but asked for its help and blessing. The only al-Qaeda operative charged in the case is a flamboyant Syrian, Louai Sakka, who delivered to the conspirators $100,000 rolled in a sock.

But the youthful Turks who stealthily carried the plot forward were hardly international men of mystery. Those who agreed to die in the truck bombings first had to be taught how to drive. "We are different from al-Qaeda in terms of structure," said Yusuf Polat, who told police he served as a lookout at the first target, a synagogue. "But our views and our actions are in harmony."

A Written Pledge
In 2000, four men gathered on the outdoor terrace of a textile factory in the center of Istanbul. One by one, they vowed to fight what they saw as the international oppression of Islam. Polat, a fair-haired Turk who made a living selling socks and toys at an open-air bazaar, recalled that their written pledge ended with the words "or else there will be punishment."

The setting was fitting. Most of Istanbul's 12 million residents are economic migrants from Turkey's conservative Anatolian heartland. Many find work in textile mills.

Another common thread, at least for the group's leaders, was travel to Afghanistan for military training in the 1990s. Turkey is officially secular. But in the 1980s and '90s, when Turkey was waging a dirty war against ethnic Kurdish separatists, the government secretly encouraged violent religious organizations that opposed the rebels. Officials looked away when Turks traveled to fight alongside Muslim militants in Chechnya or Bosnia, whose populations retained ties to Turkey dating to the Ottoman Empire.

Habib Aktas, black-haired and sturdy, was said to have fought in Chechnya and Bosnia, in addition to attending Afghan training camps. A native of Mardin, an ancient Turkish city where Arabic is still spoken, he became head of the group formed on the terrace of Haksan Co. He hosted study groups dedicated to memorizing the Koran and indoctrinating new members "in how beautiful Osama bin Laden's path was, making jihad," said one attendee. Aktas showed videos excoriating Israel and the United States and charged attendees $3 to attend jihadist picnics in the hills above the Black Sea.

"You don't have to go abroad to fulfill your duties," he declared at one meeting, a suspect recalled. "You can also make jihad here."

The original plan involved no bombs. Aktas's group would stage a spectacular assault on a gathering of the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen's Association, a group known as TUSIAD that one suspect noted included "a lot of Jewish bosses."

"The idea," said Baki Yigit, one of the men who met bin Laden, "was to bust into a TUSIAD meeting with 10 or 15 people and ask for ransom for all members, to collect a million dollars, provide a plane and come back to Afghanistan. If anything went wrong, they would kill all the TUSIAD members and martyr themselves."

In Kandahar, al-Qaeda's military chief, Muhammad Atef, who was known to the Turks by his alias, Abu Hafs al-Masri, observed that 15 men would be a lot to lose in one operation. He suggested truck bombs. Aktas deferred to the expert, then hastened back to Turkey after Sept. 11, anticipating the American attack on Afghanistan that would leave Atef dead.

By May 2002, the Istanbul plot was underway. After toying with purchasing a quarry as an excuse for buying explosives, Aktas rented an industrial workshop for $850 a month in a part of Istanbul that lies on the European side of the Bosporus Strait. "Rainbow Detergent" read the sign out front. The windows were painted over.

"They were not friendly at all. They were very closed people, " said Ulku Yerlikaya, who tended a shop across the road. "They came to work at night."

Inside, Aktas set up a boiler, cooking down an acid into which he spooned hydrogen peroxide, following a recipe apparently learned in the Afghan training camps. The mixture was spread on the floor to dry, then packed into 100-pound fertilizer bags. Each was fitted with a fuse fashioned from wires and aluminum pipe by Gurcan Bac, another camp veteran, who spent hours on the Internet gathering information "from chats," one confederate told investigators.

The end product was loaded onto four covered pickup trucks purchased with cash Aktas kept in a safe-deposit box. Each truck, registered to relatives of the conspirators, carried two tons of the explosive concoction.

Cell leaders enforced a strict tradecraft. When plot participants gathered for meetings, usually late at night, they turned off cellphones, removed their batteries and unplugged radios against the possibility these devices might be used for surveillance by Turkish intelligence.

"Don't put your nose in other people's business," Fevzi Yitiz said he was told after asking about the cost of the bombs that he slept beside in the warehouse.

There were other precautions. In March 2003, after the capture in Pakistan of Khalid Sheik Mohammad, who investigators say was an architect of the Sept. 11 plot, cell leaders cut off contact with the one Turk who had remained in Pakistan as a contact point with al-Qaeda.

"Secrecy is important," said defendant Adnan Ersoz. "You wouldn't know who studied in which study group. Suicide bombers were approached privately."

The Four Bombers
Yitiz was approached three times -- first in August 2003 by Aktas, a few days later by Bac, then by both "together, insistently."

"But I did not accept," he said.

Of the four who did, two were from the same town in eastern Turkey. Mesut Cabuk and Gokhan Elaltuntas had traveled together to Pakistan and returned wearing beards and gowns. Before the bombings they told their families they were going to Istanbul to open a computer shop.

In an apartment in Istanbul, a third bomber, Feridun Ugurlu, spent hours underlining passages in what his brother described to police as "radical Islamic books." Since returning from Pakistan in 1996, Ugurlu had been a sullen presence in his parents' home. He spoke little, except to press on his relatives volumes that promoted a purist line of Islam known as Salafism.

"I'm old enough to make the distinction between good and bad," his brother Suleyman recalled Ugurlu telling his father. "Don't put your nose in my life."

The fourth bomber was Ilyas Kuncak, 47, a spice merchant. Bearded and pious, he gave no hint of a secret life. "It's funny, because when he came back from military service, he was a communist," Abdullah Karadag, a family friend, said in an interview. "He had long hair. In these fights, left versus right, he was on the left, fighting against what he became."

In his final days Kuncak ate little, spoke less and laughed not at all, his wife noticed. But "the family is innocent," Karadag said. "The guilt lies only with brother Ilyas, and there's nothing much left of him to blame either."

'The Time Has Come'
"Dress like a groom," Aktas said, pressing the Turkish lira equivalent of $100 in the hand of Yusuf Polat. It was a few days before the first attack. Next, Aktas handed over a new Nokia cellphone, model 3315, gunmetal gray. The speed dial was programmed with three names: Mahmut, Ahmet and Rashit -- coded, like the words the sock salesman was to speak into the phone.

"The time has come," Aktas announced.

Polat's job was to stand outside the Beth Israel synagogue in the busy commercial neighborhood known as Sisli. If the road in front of the temple was clear, he was to hit the speed dial and say, "Mahmut Bey, come and take your 1 billion."

If the road was blocked and the truck was to head instead toward the rear entrance, the amount to mention was "2 billion."

"I got it," Polat told Aktas. Aktas gave Polat another $1,500 for getaway money and a new ID.

On Saturday, Nov. 15, Polat watched as Jewish worshipers arrived for the weekly service. At 9 a.m. the road was clear. He dialed. "Come and take your 1 billion." The voice in his ear replied with a Turkish saying that has a religious overtone: "If we don't see each other again, we're all square."

"We're square," Polat replied.

A moment later, another leader called to say there would be no more contact. Following instruction, Polat opened the Nokia and removed an electronic card containing subscriber information. He broke it and threw it away. Eight minutes later he felt the earth shake, then sirens. The phone he also broke in two on his way home, tossing the pieces into the garden of a bread factory.

At his home, he changed clothes and turned on the television. It showed scenes of carnage created by a second explosion, this one at another synagogue, where a bar mitzvah was underway. "And I started to regret, watching the pictures on TV," Polat said.

Ugurlu phoned him and came to see him, edgy. The police had already broken down the door of his father. Ugurlu talked about the men who had driven the trucks. "He said one of these people was going to be married a month later," Polat later told police. "He said, 'He's married to the angels now.' "

The final two bombs were detonated five days later. Just before 11 a.m. on Nov. 20, with the city still on edge, Ugurlu steered a pickup truck packed with explosives into the front gate of the British Consulate, killing 17 people, including the British consul. Kuncak blew up his truck outside the London-based HSBC Bank, killing 11.

By then, Aktas was in Syria with other organizers, one of whom crossed the frontier with a load of underwear meant to make him look like a merchant headed to market. They made their way to Aleppo, where Sakka, the Syrian al-Qaeda man, had a house. Hiding in it, they cheered the televised coverage of the bombings. They laid low for five months, then made their way into Iraq, according to evidence from two suspects interrogated in Iraq's notorious Abu Ghraib prison.

In Iraq, Sakka served as a senior lieutenant to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq. Sakka, his features altered by plastic surgery, was captured in the Turkish resort town of Antalya while allegedly making final preparations for an attack on a cruise ship. He apparently planned to survive by escaping on an underwater scooter.

The Abu Ghraib prisoners said Aktas later died in Fallujah, scene of repeated fighting between Sunni insurgents and U.S. troops.

Equipped with a Hotmail address for Aktas and $1,200, Yitiz went by bus to Tehran, where he met another fleeing conspirator. For hours, the two wandered in a park talking about the carnage. Within days, each returned to Turkey to surrender. "I had no idea that innocent people were going to be hurt," Yitiz maintained. "I did not even guess that."

Polat was arrested trying to leave Turkey.

The man whose job it was to awaken the four drivers on the day of their deaths, Harun Ilhan, was captured in southwest Turkey. He told police he had traveled overland, staying with friends along the way.

"In these friendly circles, people were talking about the explosions. Nobody knew anything about them other than me," he said. "People were saying that people who did this could not be Muslims. I did not say anything. I remained silent."

Monday, February 12, 2007
editor@sddt.com
http://www.sddt.com
Source Code: 20070212tza
 
 
Dr. Hendrix? This is NASA calling!

By LARRY STIRLING
Monday, February 12, 2007

It is too late for NASA to undo the wreck that astronaut, U.S. Navy Captain Lisa Nowak, has made of her life.

Press reports indicate Capt. Nowak, having marital problems at home, had separated from her husband of many years. He was also father of her three children.

It is not clear which came first, the marital estrangement or her infatuation with Hollywood handsome, co-astronaut William Oefelein.

Either way, police in Orlando arrested this remarkable woman for attempted murder of a perceived rival for Oefelein's attentions.

Capt. Nowak is by any measure extremely capable. One does not become a Navy captain and a successful astronaut who traveled 5.3 million miles and returned safely in a space shuttle without being conspicuously competent.

How could such a highly able woman throw it all away on an ill-conceived shenanigan that was doomed at the outset?

Capt. Nowak is not the first and will not be the last mere human to be involved in a "love triangle" that any other person could predict will end up in a catastrophe.

Just two weeks ago in Brussels, Belgium, veteran skydiver Els Van Doren fell to her death because both her main and reserve parachutes had been sabotaged. The police investigation has since focused on a fellow female skydiver who perceived Ms. Van Doren as a love rival for a local heartthrob identified only as "Marcel."

I remember two San Diego cases in which all three members of the triangle died.

A former Los Angeles Police woman left that department to take a position with the La Mesa Police Department, most likely to put distance between her and an ex-LAPD boyfriend.

Once here, she began dating a La Mesa officer. The ex-boyfriend came to town, found them together, killed them and then himself.

Another tragedy involved three Annapolis graduates undergoing additional career training at the Amphibious Base on Coronado. Each of the three naval officers had distinguished themselves while at Annapolis as outstanding students and athletes.

But, because of a "love triangle," all three ended up dead in the BOQ.

How could "love" result in so much pain and death?

Even the smartest man in the history, Albert Einstein, abandoned his first wife upon meeting his second. He was mystified by his passion for the uneducated hometown lass. He divorced his highly intelligent and well-educated first wife who never forgave him and did her best to alienate his sons.

Napoleon, master of Europe, was a love victim of Josephine. The Duke of Wellington, victor over Napoleon at Waterloo, was reputed to have suffered a personal Waterloo when he met his wife to be.

The San Diego Association of Governments recently reported calls that result in the most injuries to police officers are domestic-disturbance dispatches.

What is it about the human psyche, male and female, that can trigger romantic ruination among even the most competent among us?

With so much at stake for NASA and for millions of lesser mortals caught up in the cycle of domestic violence, it seems we should figure this out.

Enter Dr. Harville Hendrix. Dr. Hendrix and his wife Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt urge us to become familiar with the notion of the limbic "imago."

In his remarkable book "Getting the Love You Want" and based on decades of marriage counseling, Dr. Hendrix concludes there is much more to human relationships than is explained by the normal, superficial psychological mumbo jumbo.

Hendrix posits that during infancy, our limbic brain accumulates a holistic picture of our life-sustaining infant nurturer. He names that likeness the "imago."

We are already familiar with the notion of "imprinting" the process by which animals come to believe who their parents are.

Just as them, we carry around an image of the ideal (for each of us) person, hoping to regain the lost assurance of life itself.

The old song "I Want a Girl, Just Like the Girl That Married Dear Old Dad" is more than Oedipal. It is a subconscious mandate for men as is "Dad" for women.

Since an ideal match is rare, we settle for something less -- relationships that require a lot of work. Ambiguous pairings are forever memorialized in such evergreen plays as "Phantom of the Opera," "Elephant Man" and "The Hunchback of Notre Dame."

But heaven help us if we stumble across "the one."

Suddenly every country-and-western song makes sense and all literally becomes "fair in love and war."

Fortunately, most of us have learned to be more artful in our courting and able to cope with "broken hearts" if we lose.

But for the romantically maladroit few, disaster looms.

We can all "Get the Love We Want" without killing anyone, thanks to the pioneering work of Dr. Hendrix.

I hope NASA gives him a call.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stirling is a retired judge who authored the book "Leading at a Higher Level." He is a former Army officer, member of the San Diego City Council, the California State Assembly and the State Senate. Send comments to larry.stirling@sddt.com. Comments may be published as letters to the Editor

Trade Reduces Tension in Pacific Region, Pace Says
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service
JAKARTA, Indonesia, Feb. 13, 2007 – Trade ties will help bind the Pacific together and will help reduce threats in the region, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said here today.

U.S. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, conducts a news conference in Jarkarta, Indonesia, Feb. 13. Photo by Staff Sgt. D. Myles Cullen, USAF  '(Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.Marine Gen. Peter Pace said during a news conference that trade specifically lessens the threat China may pose to the region, and he he is optimistic about relations with China.

"Trade between the United States and China has grown exponentially in the last several years. That is good," he said. "I think the more nations trade with each other and become dependent on each other, the less likely they are going to find their way into some kind of a conflict."

Pace said he looks at China with military eyes. He told reporters that military personnel define threats through two issues: capacity and intent. "Certainly the Chinese are increasing their capacity," Pace said.

China is modernizing its armed forces and successfully conducted an anti-satellite test recently. China also is building a blue-water navy and is operating more submarines. The Chinese also have built and fielded more missiles.

"So, their capacity is certainly increasing," Pace said. "But I'm not aware of any intent on their part to use any of those capacities in an aggressive manner."

The United States, the general said, needs to be aware of the fact that the Chinese are gaining capacity and of ways to counter that growth. But more important is developing ties that make the countries of the Pacific Rim more dependent on each other "so that a decision to do something militarily would be not in anybody's interest."

Biographies:
Gen. Peter Pace, USMC

IRANIAN WORKERS PROTEST OVER UNPAID WAGES. Workers from Qazvin, a
city near Tehran, have recently protested over difficult financial
conditions and their frustration with unfulfilled presidential
promises, Radio Farda reported on February 10. It stated that 35
workers from the Pushineh-Baft textile factory in Qazvin gathered
"last week" outside the presidential offices in Tehran, and
"hundreds" from the ceramics factory in Chini-Alborz blocked the main
road to Qazvin before police ended the protest. Qazvin labor
representative Abdali Karimi told Radio Farda on February 10 that
some 5,000 workers are in a "state of uncertainty" in Qazvin. He said
that a group of workers from Qazvin "came to Tehran to convey their
grievances including nonpayment of their wages and, after their
protest outside the presidential office, officials promised that all
their claims would be paid in three weeks." Karimi added that workers
from Chini-Alborz have not been paid for five months, although the
company is functioning normally. He said, "its problem is managerial
and [that it is being transferred] to the private sector," Radio
Farda reported. VS

NEWS MIDDLE EAST
Lamani: Iraqis must negotiate
By Ahmed Janabi



Lamani: The situation in Iraq is far more
serious than what the media shows

Mokhtar Lamani, the former representative of the Arab League in Iraq, resigned from his post last week, protesting against the absence of an Arab will, vision, and plan to help Iraqis out of their ordeal.

The Moroccan diplomat, 56, was the only Arab ambassador based in Baghdad. The others tackle their duties from the Jordanian capital, Amman.

He said in his letter of resignation that it is nearly impossible to achieve anything in the troubled country.

Al Jazeera.net spoke to him about his experience in Iraq.

Al Jazeera.net: How bad is the sectarian strife in Iraq, and do you classify it as a civil war?

In terms of violence, the situation in Iraq is far more serious than what the media shows, simply because media cover only the main incidents. On the ground there are many tragedies that go untouched by the media.

However, I cannot say that it is a civil war. The people of Iraq are fine with each other, they love each other. I have met people who were forced out of their houses; they are still hoping to go back; they realise that their ordinary fellow citizens have nothing to do with it, it is all about some extremists who claim themselves as representatives of their respective sects and/or ethnicities. Iraqi people realise that. It is not a civil war because ordinary people are still keeping themselves away from it.

Do you not think the Arab countries stood short of supporting your mission in Iraq because the legitimacy of the current Iraqi government is still questioned?

"I believe that Iraqis should move as soon as possible from arguing to negotiation, where a plan must be agreed and applied on the ground to save the country."

Mokhtar Lamani
Maybe, but here the question is why the members of the Arab League approved the opening of an Arab League office there if they do not believe in the political process in Iraq?

What is the support that your mission should have received?

First of all, Arab countries dealt with the opening of the Arab League's office in Baghdad as an objective, while in fact it was just a start. They considered it an achievement, but I think it was the first step of a journey through a long, dark tunnel, and they were required to do much more to see the light at the end of it.

After the US mid-term elections, there have been several changes inside the US, and those changes left their marks on the Iraqi situation and on the regional situation in the Middle East.

Arabs should have called for an extraordinary summit that would seriously treat the situation in Iraq. I would like to emphasise that I requested a serious summit come up with executable resolutions, not a summit ending with a useless communique of sympathy. This did not happen during my service in Iraq, and I cannot see it happening.

During my mission in Iraq, I was left alone. Arab countries did not help much. For example, I did not succeed in having an armoured car, which is necessary for everyone in Iraq nowadays. Most of the time I used to have President [Jalal] Talabani's armoured car, or sometimes it is borrowed from one of the ministers.

That was about Arabs, what about Iraqis. How do you see them helping themselves?

Definitely the solution should come from inside Iraq in the first place. I can say that the comprehensive and nationalistic political programme in Iraq has not been achieved yet, and it is unlikely to come in the near future. Factional duels are still controlling the Iraqi political scene.

I believe that Iraqis should move as soon as possible from arguing to negotiation, where a plan must be agreed and applied on the ground to save the country.

How serious is the Iran influence in Iraq?

Lamani says he received indications of
Iranian presence in Iraq

I can say it is definitely there. Its influence is clear on all aspects of life. We received many indications that even Italaat [Iranian intelligence] is working in Iraq.

Is it true that Iraqi Shia are loyal to Iran?

I have seen, heard and read much about this, but I never felt it in my one-year mission in Iraq. Actually, I received delegations from many Arab Shia tribes, some of them live in the most powerful Shia strongholds of Najaf and Karbala; all of them stressed the fact that they are loyal to their country, and they are proud of being part of the Arab world.

Did you discuss the death squads with Iraqi officials?

We did raise the issue several times with the Iraqi officials. They seemed fully aware of the problem, in terms of sectarian killing, crime, and forced relocation of citizens. They promised to work on it. I really cannot judge if they are going to handle this or not.

Obviously the Palestinians have been facing a hard time in Iraq since the US-led invasion in 2003. Did you raise this issue with Iraqis?

The most important detail on this issue is that no Palestinian ever came to me while in Baghdad asking for protection in order to continue living in Iraq. In fact, all of them came to me asking for the league's help to get them out of Iraq to any Arab country. The reason for that is they [Palestinians] hold travel documents not passports. Most countries do not recognise this type of documents and require a proper passport to grant an individual a visa.

We did raise the issue with Iraqi officials, they told us that everybody in Iraq is a target, not only the Palestinians.

If you are asked to go back to Iraq, what would you request?

First of all, seriousness. If I am promised an urgent Arab summit that would study the Iraqi situation in detail and come up with crucial recommendations and techniques to implement them, believe me I would go back.