Global Research

This article was originally published on the 9th of September 2003.

Twenty-two years ago, on the 9th of September 2001, the leader of the Northern Alliance Commander Ahmad Shah Masood was mortally wounded in a kamikaze assassination.

It happened two days before the 9/11 attacks on the WTC and the Pentagon. Masood died from wounds suffered in the suicide attack on the Saturday (9/15) following  9/11.

In the wake of the September 11 attacks, the killing of Ahmad Shah Masood was barely mentioned. The broad media consensus was that the two events (9/9 and 9/11)  were totally unrelated.

Yet the Northern Alliance had informed the Bush administration through an official communiqué that Pakistan’s ISI was allegedly implicated in the assassination:

“A Pakistani ISI-Osama-Taliban axis  [was responsible for] plotting the assassination by two Arab suicide bombers.. ‘We believe that this is a triangle between Osama bin Laden, ISI, which is the intelligence section of the Pakistani army, and the Taliban'” (The Northern Alliance’s statement was released on 14 September 2001, quoted in Reuters, 15 September 2001)

“Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Abdullah Abdullah told AFP the assassination bid was plotted by the ruling Taliban militia, bin Laden and their allies in Pakistan’s intelligence agency.

‘This was a premeditated plan. They have tried it several times in the past as well but all of them have been thwarted,’ he said.

‘Pakistan’s ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence), the Taliban and Osama bin Laden appear to be behind this plot.'” (AFP, 10 September 2001)

September 11

Now it just so happens that Pakistan’s ISI was allegedly also implicated in 9/11.

Several intelligence and media reports (including the FBI, Indian Intelligence, and AFP ) have pointed to the role of Pakistan’s ISI in financing the 9/11 attacks.

The FBI confirmed in late September 2001, in an interview with ABC News (which went virtually unnoticed), that the 9-11 ring leader, Mohammed Atta,, had been financed from “unnamed sources” in Pakistan.

(See http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO111A.html )

The findings of the FBI are confirmed by AFP and the Times of India, quoting an official Indian intelligence report (which had been dispatched to Washington). According to these two reports, the money used to finance the 9-11 attacks had allegedly been: “wired to WTC hijacker Mohammed Atta from Pakistan, by Ahmad Umar Sheikh, at the instance of [ISI Chief] General Mahmoud [Ahmad].” (Times of India, 9 October 2001, See also Michel Chossudovsky, War and Globalization, the Truth behind September 11, http://globalresearch.ca/globaloutlook/truth911.html )

According to the AFP (quoting the intelligence source):

“The evidence we have supplied to the U.S. is of a much wider range and depth than just one piece of paper linking a rogue general to some misplaced act of terrorism.”(AFP, 9 October 2001)

These 2001 disclosures by the FBI and Indian Intelligence seem to be corroborated by a recent statement to the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs by the Deputy Head of the FBI’s Counter-Terrorism division, John Pistole, who points to the role of Pakistan in the financing of the September 11 attacks.  (http://globalresearch.ca/articles/SEN308A.html ).

The ISI has consistently supported the Taliban and Al Qaeda. According to the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR): “The role that … the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate ( ISI), played in helping build up the Taliban is now a matter of record.” (Foreign Affairs, January 2002)

What the CFR fails to acknowledge, which is also a matter of public record, is the consistent support provided by the CIA to Pakistan’s ISI.

Connecting the Dots between 9/9 and 9/11

In other words, there is reason to believe that the 9/9 and 9/11 are not isolated and unrelated events.

According to official statements and reports, the ISI was allegedly implicated in both events: the September 9, 2001 assassination of Shah Masood and the financing of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Both these events directly implicate senior officials in the Bush administration.

The head of Pakistan’s ISI, whose organisation allegedly (according to the Northern Alliance) played a role in the assassination of General Shah Masood, was on an official visit to Washington (red carpet treatment) from the 4th to the 13th of September.

While the US media acknowledges the role of Pakistan’s ISI in the assassination of Shah Masood, it fails to dwell upon the more substantive issue: How come the head of the ISI was in Washington, on an official visit, meeting Bush administration officials on the very same day Masood was assassinated?

During his visit to Washington, the head of the ISI had meetings with Colin Powell, Richard Armitage and CIA Drector George Tenet.

On the morning of September 11,  the head of the ISI General Ahmad) was having breakfast with Senator Bob Graham and Rep. Porter Goss, on Capitol Hill, the two Florida lawmen entrusted by the Senate and the House to reveal the truth on 9/11.(For further details see: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO308C.html ) Needless to say, neither the assassination of Shah Masood nor Pakistan’s ISI are mentioned in the 900 page report of the Joint 9/11 Inquiry.

Political Assassination

Had Masood not been assassinated, the Bush administration would not have been able to install their political puppet Hamid Karzai in Kaboul.

Masood rather than Hamid Karzai (a former employee of UNOCAL oil company), would have become the head of the post-Taliban government formed in the wake of the U.S. bombings of Afghanistan.

In other words, the assassination of the leader of the Northern Alliance, was consistent with U.S. foreign policy objectives.

Since the late 1980s, the U.S. had sought to sidetrack and weaken Masood, who was perceived as a nationalist reformer, by providing support both to the Taliban and the Hezb-I-Islami group led by Gulbuddin Hektmayar against Masood.

Moreover, Masood was supported by Moscow. In the wake of his assassination, the Northern Alliance became fragmented into different factions. This also served to weakening Russian influence in Afghanistan.