Operation Bojinka

The Bojinka plot ( ar, بوجينكا; tl, Oplan Bojinka) was a large-scale, three-phase terrorist attack planned by Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for January 1995. They planned to assassinate Pope John Paul II; blow up 11 airliners in flight from Asia to the United States with the goal of killing approximately 4,000 passengers and shutting down air travel around the world; and crash a plane into the headquarters of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Fairfax County, Virginia.

Despite careful planning, the Bojinka plot was disrupted after a chemical fire drew the attention of the Philippine National Police – Western Police District (PNP-WPD, now known as Manila Police District PNP-MPD) on January 6–7, 1995. Yousef and Mohammed were unable to stage any of the three attacks. The only fatality resulted from a test bomb planted by Yousef on Philippine Airlines Flight 434, which killed one person and injured 10 others. They also planted two other bombs in a shopping mall and theater in the southern Philippines. Elements of the Bojinka plot (including the plan to crash a plane into the CIA headquarters) would be later used in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, six years later.

Terminology and etymology

The plot is also known as Oplan Bojinka, Operation Bojinka, Project Bojinka, and Bojinga. FBI officials described Operation Bojinka as "48 hours of terror".

Several news media outlets, including ''Time Asia'',"Asia's Own Osama"
''Time Asia''. April 1, 2002. incorrectly stated that the word ''Bojinka'' means "loud bang" or "explosion" in the Serbo-Croatian language. Endnote 7 of Chapter 5 of the ''9/11 Commission Report'' states that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed "says bojinka is not Serbo-Croatian for 'big bang', as has been widely reported, but rather a nonsense word he adopted after hearing it on the front lines in Afghanistan."

Financing

Funding for the Bojinka plot came from Osama bin Laden and Hambali, and from front organizations operated by Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, bin Laden's brother-in-law.

Wali Khan Amin Shah was the financier of the plot. He funded the plot by laundering money through his girlfriend and other Manila women, several of whom were bar hostesses and one of whom was an employee at a KFC restaurant. They were bribed with gifts and holiday trips so that they would open bank accounts to stash funds.

The transfers were small, equivalent to about 12,000 to 24,000 Philippine pesos ($500 to $1,000 US), and would be handed over each night at a Wendy's or a karaoke bar. The funds went to "Adam Sali", an alias used by Ramzi Yousef. The money came through a Filipino bank account owned by Jordanian Omar Abu Omar, who worked at International Relations and Information Centre, an Islamic organization run by Mohammed Jamal Khalifa.

A company called Konsojaya also provided financial assistance to the Manila cell by laundering money to it. Konsojaya was a front company that was started by the head of the group Jemaah Islamiyah, an Indonesian named Riduan Isamuddin, also known as Hambali. Wali Khan Amin Shah was on the board of directors of the company.

Planning

As soon as Yousef arrived in Manila, along with other "Arab Afghans" who were creating cells in Manila, he began work making bombs. Yousef had shown up in Singapore with Shah earlier in the autumn of 1994. The two got their Philippine visas in Singapore.

He left Manila for several days, but was met by Islamist emissaries upon his return to Metro Manila. They asked him to attack United States President Bill Clinton, who was due to arrive in the Philippines on November 12, 1994, as part of a five-day tour of Asia. Yousef thought of several ways to kill the president, including placing nuclear bombs on Clinton's motorcade route, firing a Stinger missile at Air Force One or the presidential limousine, launching theater ballistic missiles at Manila and or killing him with phosgene, a chemical weapon. He abandoned the idea, as it would be too difficult to kill the President. However, he incorporated his plan to kill the Pope into the Bojinka plot.

In 1994, Yousef and Khalid Sheik Mohammed started testing airport security. Yousef booked a flight between Kai Tak International Airport in Hong Kong and Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport near Taipei. Mohammed booked a flight between Ninoy Aquino International Airport near Manila and Kimpo International Airport near Seoul. The two had already converted 14 bottles of contact lens solution into bottles containing nitroglycerin, which was readily available in the Philippines. Yousef had taped a metal rod to the arch of his foot, which would serve as a detonator. The two wore jewelry and clothing with metal to confuse airport security. To support their claim that they were meeting women, they packed condoms in their bags.Ressa, Maria (2003
Philippines: U.S. missed 9/11 clues years ago
CNN

On December 8, Yousef moved into the Doña Josefa Apartments under the alias "Najy Awaita Haddad" and purported himself to be a Moroccan. Edith Guerrera, the manager, laughed with the receptionist after the two men asked for new registration forms. "Perhaps they have forgotten their names", she said as the first ones were torn up. Yousef had accidentally put his actual name on the first form.Transcript o
an interview
with Abdul Hakim Murad, obtained on January 22, 2004 ( GMT).

Yousef had booked Room 603 in advance. He had made an Php 80,000 (Philippine peso) deposit, and added Php 40,000 more upfront before taking the elevator to Room 603.

A conspirator named Abdul Hakim Murad went to Manila with Yousef and stayed at the same apartment.

The apartments are located in the Malate district, away from the Apostolic Nunciature, the Holy See's diplomatic mission in the Philippines, and down the street from Manila Police Station No. 9 on Quirino Avenue. One of the windows of Room 603 looks down on the path that the Papal motorcade was to take.

People were suspicious of the men in Room 603, who were described as being very secretive. According to Guerrera, "They gave me the impression that they were here to study", said Mrs Guerrera. "They looked like students. They double-locked the door when they were inside or out. They didn't ask the room boy to clear up the room." The men, who had chemical burns on their hands, were carrying boxes and never hired other people to carry them up. The boxes contained chemicals bought from suppliers in Manila and Quezon City in Metro Manila. Yousef used these to make his bombs.199
Plane terror suspects convicted on all accounts
CNN

Mohammed purported himself to be a Saudi or Qatari plywood exporter named "Abdul Majid". In reality, Yousef and Mohammed had already started planning Operation Bojinka.

According to Abdul Hakim Murad, Yousef got an idea for crashing a plane into the CIA's headquarters from Murad while at the apartments. According to Murad, Yousef replied, "OK, we will think about it", before heading off with Mohammed to Puerto Galera for scuba diving.

Test bombs: mall, theater, 747 airliner

Yousef's first operational test of his bomb was inside a mall in Cebu City. The bomb detonated several hours after he put it in a generator room. It caused minor damage, but it proved to Yousef that his bomb was workable.

On December 1, Ramzi placed a bomb under a seat in the Greenbelt Theatre in Manila to test what would happen if a bomb exploded under an airline seat. The bomb went off, injuring several patrons.

On December 11, 1994, Yousef built another bomb, which had one-tenth of the power that his final bombs were planned to have, in the lavatory of an aircraft. He left it inside the life jacket under his seat (26 K) and got off the plane when it arrived in Cebu. Yousef had boarded the flight under the assumed name of Armaldo Forlani, using a false Italian passport. The aircraft was Philippine Airlines Flight 434 on a Manila to Narita route, stopping partway at Cebu. Yousef had set the timer for four hours after he got off the aircraft.

The bomb exploded while the aircraft was over Japan's Minamidaitō Island, part of Okinawa Prefecture. A Japanese businessman named Haruki Ikegami occupying the seat was killed and an additional 10 passengers were injured. The flight was carrying 273 passengers in total. The blast blew a hole in the floor and the cabin's rapid expansion severed several control cables in the ceiling, cutting off control of the plane's right aileron, as well as both the captain and first officer's steering controls. Usually, 26K, the seat that Yousef chose to plant the bomb, would be positioned directly over the centre fuel tank, and the detonation of the bomb would have caused a crippling explosion, but on this particular airframe, a former Scandinavian Airlines aircraft, the seat was two rows forward from normal. The flight crew kept control of the Boeing 747-200 and brought it into an emergency landing at Okinawa's Naha Airport