Osama bin Laden Not Involved in 9/11 Attacks

Is it possible that Osama bin Laden was not involved in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center? It is curious that Osama bin Laden initially denied involvement.

World Trade Center towers burning on September 11, 2001

From CNN, dated September 17, 2001:

In a statement issued to the Arabic satellite channel Al Jazeera, based in Qatar, bin Laden said, “The U.S. government has consistently blamed me for being behind every occasion its enemies attack it.

“I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons,” bin Laden’s statement said.¹

From Fox News, dated September 16, 2001:

Bin Laden has denied any connection to the attacks, though he has praised them. On Sunday, he reiterated his denial in a statement read by Qatar’s al-Jazeera satellite television channel.²

Despite multiple indictments and multiple requests for extradition by the United States, the Taliban refused to extradite Osama bin Laden until after the bombing of Afghanistan began in October 2001. The Taliban offered to turn over Osama bin Laden to a third-party country for trial, in return for the US ending the bombing and providing evidence that Osama bin Laden was involved in the 9/11 attacks. This offer was rejected by George W. Bush stating, “There’s no need to discuss innocence or guilt. We know he’s guilty.”³

Why would Bush so fervently reject an apparently peaceful proposal, where both sides would get what they want? I understand that I am looking at the situation with hindsight, seeing that Bush’s administration would have gone over much better if Osama bin Laden was captured, the Afghan invasion was declared a true success, and most parties were left happy with the American-NATO military action. But if Bush was really given this chance to get the man responsible for the attacks, why not just provide the unflappable evidence, receive bin Laden, and end the invasion? Instead, “The U.S. rejected this offer as an insufficient public relations ploy.”⁴

Why not make that wall of insurmountable evidence that justifies the beginning of an international manhunt and a War on Terror public? The US’s and UK’s intelligence agencies both came to the same conclusion, so the evidence should be good.

Osama's admits in 2004

It was not until late October 2004 that Osama bin Laden claimed responsibility for the World Trade Center attacks. No one can be sure why it took three years. One might say it was simply lack of courage to face the force of the most powerful army in the world, but was it that same lack of courage that drove him to plan, finance, and carry out the World Trade Center, Pentagon, and Shanksville (Flight 93) attacks on September 11, 2001? Perhaps Osama bin Laden did not want to become a figurehead for Al-Qaeda. There was already a hunt for his head, so if he was captured and killed this would bring humiliation to his group. I do not know his ideas regarding these matters, but considering the possibility that evidence is not available to the common citizen proving Osama bin Laden’s guilt, and the fact that he denied allegations for three years, it would sure be interesting if Osama bin Laden was never actually involved.

1. “Bin Laden says he wasn’t behind attacks”, published by CNN [HTML] [↩]
2. “Pakistan to Demand Taliban Give Up Bin Laden as Iran Seals Afghan Border”, by Carl Cameron, Marla Lehner, Paul Wagenseil and the Associated Press, published by Fox News. [HTML] [↩]
3. “Bush rejects Taliban offer to hand Bin Laden over”, published by The Guardian. [HTML] [↩]
4. Quoting Wikipedia’s Taliban article, “The stated intent of military operations was to remove the Taliban from power because of the Taliban’s refusal to hand over Osama bin Laden for his alleged involvement in the 11 September attacks, and disrupt the use of Afghanistan as a terrorist base of operations. On 14 October the Taliban offered to discuss handing over Osama bin Laden to a neutral country if the US halted bombing, but only if the Taliban were given evidence of Bin Laden’s involvement in 9/11. The U.S. rejected this offer as an insufficient public relations ploy and continued military operations.” [↩]