Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (sometimes also spelled Shaykh; also known by at least 50

pseudonym A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true meaning ( orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individual's o ...

s; born 14 April 1965), often known by his initials KSM, is a

terrorist Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...

, and the former head of propaganda for the

pan-Islamist Pan-Islamism () is a political movement which advocates the unity of Muslims under one Islamic country or state – often a caliphate – or an international organization with Islamic principles. Historically, after Ottomanism, which aimed at t ...

militant group

al-Qaeda , image = Flag of Jihad.svg , caption = Jihadist flag, Flag used by various al-Qaeda factions , founder = Osama bin Laden{{Assassinated, Killing of Osama bin Laden , leaders = {{Plainlist, * Osama bin Lad ...

. He is currently held by the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

at the

Guantanamo Bay detention camp The Guantanamo Bay detention camp, also known as GTMO ( ), GITMO ( ), or simply Guantanamo Bay, is a United States military prison within Naval Station Guantanamo Bay (NSGB), on the coast of Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. It was established in 2002 by p ...

under

terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...

-related charges. He was named as "the principal architect of the

9/11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

" in the 2004 ''

9/11 Commission Report ''The 9/11 Commission Report'', officially the ''Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States'', is the official report into the events leading up to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. It was prep ...

''. Mohammed was a member of Osama bin Laden's terrorist organization al-Qaeda, leading al-Qaeda's

propaganda Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded l ...

operations from around 1999 until late 2001. Mohammed was captured on 1 March 2003, in the Pakistani city of

Rawalpindi Rawalpindi is the List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, third-largest city in the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab. It is a commercial and industrial hub, being the list of cities in P ...

by a combined operation of the U.S.

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

(CIA) and Pakistan's

Inter-Services Intelligence The Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is the premier Pakistani Intelligence community, intelligence agency of Pakistan. It is responsible for gathering, processing, and analyzing any information from around the world that is deemed relevant t ...

(ISI). Immediately after his capture, Mohammed was extraordinarily rendered to secret CIA prison sites in

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

, then

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

, where he was interrogated and tortured by U.S. operatives. By December 2006, he had been transferred to military custody at

. Mohammed is widely regarded as the chief planner of the

11 September attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

. He also participated in planning the

Richard Reid Richard Colvin Reid (born 12 August 1973), also known as the "Shoe Bomber", is a British terrorist who perpetrated the failed shoe bombing attempt against a transatlantic flight in 2001. Born to a father who was a career criminal, Reid convert ...

shoe bombing attempt to blow up an airliner; the

2002 Bali bombings The 2002 Bali bombings were a series of terrorist attacks on 12 October 2002 in the tourist district of Kuta on the Indonesian island of Bali. The attacks killed 202 people (including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians, 23 Britons, and people ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

; the

1993 World Trade Center bombing The 1993 World Trade Center bombing was a terrorist attack carried out by Ramzi Yousef and associates against the United States on February 26, 1993, when a van bomb detonated below the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex in Manhat ...

; the murder of

Daniel Pearl Daniel Pearl (October 10, 1963 – February 1, 2002) was an American journalist who worked for ''The Wall Street Journal.'' On January 23, 2002, he was kidnapped by Jihadism, jihadist militants while he was on his way to what he had expected wou ...

and various foiled attacks as well as numerous other crimes.Chris McGreal, "Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: former military prosecutor denounces trial"
, ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'', May 4, 2012 He was charged in February 2008 with

war crimes A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hos ...

and murder by a U.S. military commission at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, which could carry the

death penalty Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...

if convicted. In 2012, a former military prosecutor criticized the proceedings as insupportable due to confessions gained under

torture Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons including corporal punishment, punishment, forced confession, extracting a confession, interrogational torture, interrogation for information, or intimid ...

. A 2008 decision by the

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...

had also drawn into question the legality of the methods used to gain such admissions and the admissibility of such admissions as evidence in a criminal proceeding. On 30 August 2019, a military judge set a date of 11 January 2021 for Mohammed's death penalty trial. His trial was further postponed on 18 December 2020, due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. Mohammed's trial restarted on 7 September 2021 but was postponed again for years of plea deal negotiations. On 31 July 2024, Mohammed agreed to plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence rather than a death-penalty trial. His plea deal was revoked by Secretary of Defense

Lloyd Austin Lloyd James Austin III (born August 8, 1953) is a retired United States Army four-star General (United States), general who served as the 28th United States Secretary of Defense, United States secretary of defense from 2021 to 2025. Before ...

two days later. In November 2024, a military judge ruled that plea deal is "valid and enforceable."

Early life and education

Mohammed was born on 14 April 1965, in

Kuwait Kuwait, officially the State of Kuwait, is a country in West Asia and the geopolitical region known as the Middle East. It is situated in the northern edge of the Arabian Peninsula at the head of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to Iraq–Kuwait ...

. His father, Shaikh Muhammad Ali Dustin al-Baluchi, was a

Deobandi The Deobandi movement or Deobandism is a revivalist movement within Sunni Islam that adheres to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence. It was formed in the late 19th century around the Darul Uloom Madrassa in Deoband, India, from which the nam ...

imam in Al Ahmadi, who moved with his family from Balochistan to Kuwait in the 1950s. His mother was Halema Mohammed. Mohammed was raised in Badawiya, a neighborhood of the

Fahaheel Fahaheel () is an area in Kuwait, located in the Ahmadi Governorate in the country's south. Located on the coast of the Persian Gulf, it lies east of the Ahmadi area. The Fahaheel Fish Market, a major fish market in Kuwait, is located on the seas ...

suburb of

Kuwait City Kuwait City (; ) is the capital and largest city of Kuwait. Located at the heart of the country on the south shore of Kuwait Bay on the Persian Gulf, it is the political, cultural and economic center of the emirate, containing Kuwait's Seif Pal ...

. Mohammed is the uncle of

Ramzi Yousef Ramzi Ahmed Yousef (; born 27 April 1968) is a Pakistani convicted terrorist who was one of the main perpetrators and the mastermind behind the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the bombing of Philippine Airlines Flight 434; he was also a co- ...

, who was convicted on terrorism charges for his part in the

, and

Ammar Al Baluchi Ammar al-Baluchi or Amar Baloch; born Ali Abdul Aziz Ali on 29 August 1977) is a Pakistani citizen who has been in American custody at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp since 2006. He was arrested in the Pakistani former capital city of Karachi ...

, who is accused of involvement in multiple terror plots. According to U.S. federal documents, in 1982 he had heard

Abdul Rasul Sayyaf Abdulrab Rasul Sayyaf ( ; ; born 1946) is an exiled Afghan politician and former Afghan mujahideen, mujahideen commander. He took part in the war against the Marxist–Leninist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) government in the 198 ...

's speech in which a call for jihad against the

Soviets The Soviet people () were the citizens and nationals of the Soviet Union. This demonym was presented in the ideology of the country as the "new historical unity of peoples of different nationalities" (). Nationality policy in the Soviet Union ...

was declared. At age 16, he joined the

Muslim Brotherhood The Society of the Muslim Brothers ('' ''), better known as the Muslim Brotherhood ( ', is a transnational Sunni Islamist organization founded in Egypt by Islamic scholar, Imam and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna in 1928. Al-Banna's teachings s ...

. After graduating from high school in 1983, Mohammed travelled to the

and enrolled in

Chowan University Chowan University ()
, from the North Carolina Collection's website at the

Murfreesboro, North Carolina Murfreesboro is a town in Hertford County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 2,835 at the 2010 census. The town is home to Chowan University. Geography Murfreesboro is located in northwestern Hertford County on high ground sou ...

. He later transferred to

North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. Etymology The word ''north'' ...

and received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

(BS) in

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines and mechanism (engineering), mechanisms that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and engineering mathematics, mathematics principl ...

in 1986. The following year, he went to

Peshawar Peshawar is the capital and List of cities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa by population, largest city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It is the sixth most populous city of Pakistan, with a district p ...

, Pakistan, where he and his brothers, including Zahed, joined the

mujahideen ''Mujahideen'', or ''Mujahidin'' (), is the plural form of ''mujahid'' (), an Arabic term that broadly refers to people who engage in ''jihad'' (), interpreted in a jurisprudence of Islam as the fight on behalf of God, religion or the commun ...

forces engaged in the

Soviet–Afghan War The Soviet–Afghan War took place in the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan from December 1979 to February 1989. Marking the beginning of the 46-year-long Afghan conflict, it saw the Soviet Union and the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic o ...

. He attended the Sada training camp run by Sheikh

Abdallah Azzam Abdullah Yusuf Azzam () was a Palestinian-Jordanian Islamist jihadist and theologian. Belonging to the Salafi movement within Sunni Islam, he and his family fled from what had been the Jordanian-annexed West Bank after the 1967 Six-Day War an ...

, and after that he worked for the magazine ''al-Bunyan al-Marsous'', produced by Sayyaf's rebel group, the Islamic Union for the Liberation of Afghanistan. In 1992, he received a master's degree in Islamic Culture and History through correspondence classes from

Punjab University Punjab University may refer to: India * Punjab Agricultural University, a state agricultural university in Ludhiana, Punjab * I. K. Gujral Punjab Technical University, a state university in Kapurthala, Punjab * Maharaja Ranjit Singh Punjab Techn ...

in Pakistan. By 1993, Mohammed had married and moved his family to

Qatar Qatar, officially the State of Qatar, is a country in West Asia. It occupies the Geography of Qatar, Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it shares Qatar–Saudi Arabia border, its sole land b ...

, where he took a position as project engineer with the Qatari Ministry of Electricity and Water. He began to travel to different countries from that time onward. The United States 9/11 Commission Report notes that, "By his own account, KSM's animosity toward the United States stemmed not from his experiences there as a student, but rather from his violent disagreement with

U.S. foreign policy The officially stated goals of the foreign policy of the United States of America, including all the bureaus and offices in the United States Department of State, as mentioned in the ''Foreign Policy Agenda'' of the Department of State, are ...

favoring

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

." However, on August 29, 2009, ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'' reported from U.S. intelligence sources that Mohammed's time in the U.S. contributed to his

radicalization Radicalization (or radicalisation) is the process by which an individual or a group comes to adopt increasingly radical views in opposition to a political, social, or religious status quo. The ideas of society at large shape the outcomes of rad ...

"KSM's limited and negative experience in the United States—which included a brief jail stay because of unpaid bills—almost certainly helped propel him on his path to becoming a terrorist," according to this intelligence summary. "He stated that his contact with Americans, while minimal, confirmed his view that the United States was a debauched and racist country."

Philippines 1994–1995

Mohammed was in the

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

in late 1994 and early 1995; he then identified as a

Saudi Saudi or Saudi Arabian may refer to: * Saudi Arabia * Saudis, people from Saudi Arabia * Saudi culture, the culture of Saudi Arabia * House of Saud, the ruling family of Saudi Arabia See also *Saud (disambiguation) The House of Saud The H ...

or a

plywood Plywood is a composite material manufactured from thin layers, or "plies", of wood veneer that have been stacked and glued together. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured boards, which include plywood, medium-density fibreboa ...

exporter and used the aliases "Abdul Majid" and "Salem Ali."

Qatar, avoiding arrest

In early 1996, Mohammed returned to

to avoid capture by U.S. authorities. In his flight from

, he was sheltered by Sheikh Abdullah Al Thani, who was the Qatari Minister of Religious Affairs in 1996.

Alleged terrorist activities

Operation Bojinka

Mohammed traveled to the

in 1994 to work with his nephew

on the Bojinka plot, a

Manila Manila, officially the City of Manila, is the Capital of the Philippines, capital and second-most populous city of the Philippines after Quezon City, with a population of 1,846,513 people in 2020. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on ...

-based plot to destroy 12 commercial airliners flying routes between the United States,

East Asia East Asia is a geocultural region of Asia. It includes China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan, plus two special administrative regions of China, Hong Kong and Macau. The economies of Economy of China, China, Economy of Ja ...

, and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

. The 9/11 Commission Report says that "this marked the first time KSM took part in the actual planning of a terrorist operation." Bojinka plans included renting or buying a

Cessna Cessna () is an American brand of general aviation aircraft owned by Textron Aviation since 2014, headquartered in Wichita, Kansas. Originally, it was a brand of the Cessna Aircraft Company, an American general aviation aircraft manufactu ...

, packing it with explosives and crash landing it into CIA headquarters, with a backup plan to hijack the twelfth airliner in the air and use that instead. This information was reported in detail to the U.S. at the time. In December 1994, Yousef had engaged in a test of a bomb on

Philippine Airlines Flight 434 Philippine Airlines Flight 434, sometimes referred to as PAL434 or PR434, was a scheduled flight on December 11, 1994, from Manila to Tokyo with a quick stopover in Cebu on a Boeing 747-283B that was seriously damaged by a bomb, killing one pas ...

using only about ten percent of the explosives that were to be used in each of the bombs to be planted on U.S. airliners. The test resulted in the death of a Japanese national on board a flight from the Philippines to Japan. Mohammed conspired with Yousef in the plot until it was uncovered on 6 January 1995. Yousef was captured 7 February of that same year. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was indicted on terrorism charges in the

United States District Court for the Southern District of New York The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (in case citations, S.D.N.Y.) is a federal trial court whose geographic jurisdiction encompasses eight counties of the State of New York. Two of these are in New York Ci ...

in January 1996 for his alleged involvement in Operation Bojinka, and was subsequently on 10 October 2001 listed as one of the FBI's 22 Most Wanted Terrorists.

Relationship with Osama bin Laden

By the time the

Bojinka plot The Bojinka plot ( ; ) 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 Unite ...

was discovered, Mohammed had returned to Qatar and his job as a project engineer at the country's Ministry of Electricity and Water. He traveled in 1995 to

Sudan Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopi ...

Yemen Yemen, officially the Republic of Yemen, is a country in West Asia. Located in South Arabia, southern Arabia, it borders Saudi Arabia to Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, the north, Oman to Oman–Yemen border, the northeast, the south-eastern part ...

Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...

, and

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

to visit elements of the worldwide

jihadist Jihadism is a neologism for modern, armed militant Political aspects of Islam, Islamic movements that seek to Islamic state, establish states based on Islamic principles. In a narrower sense, it refers to the belief that armed confrontation ...

community, although no evidence connects him to specific terrorist actions in any of those locations. On his trip to Sudan, he attempted to meet with

Osama bin Laden Osama bin Laden (10 March 19572 May 2011) was a militant leader who was the founder and first general emir of al-Qaeda. Ideologically a pan-Islamist, Bin Laden participated in the Afghan ''mujahideen'' against the Soviet Union, and support ...

, who was at the time living there, aided by Sudanese political leader Hassan al-Turabi. After the U.S. asked the Qatari government to arrest Mohammed in January 1996, he fled to

, where he renewed his alliance with Abdul Rasul Sayyaf. Later that year, he formed a working relationship with Bin Laden, who had settled there. Bin Laden and his colleagues relocated their operations to Afghanistan at this time.

Mohammed Atef Mohammed Atef (; born Sobhi Abd Al Aziz Mohamed El Gohary Abu Sitta, also known as Abu Hafs al-Masri and al-Khabir; 1944 – November 2001) was an Egyptian militant and prominent military chief of al-Qaeda, and a deputy of Osama bin Laden, althou ...

, bin Laden's chief of operations and also known at the time as Abu Hafs al-Masri, arranged a meeting between bin Laden and Mohammed in

Tora Bora Tora Bora (, "Black Cave") is a cave complex, part of the Spin Ghar (White Mountains) mountain range of eastern Afghanistan. It is situated in the Pachir Aw Agam District of Nangarhar, approximately west of the Khyber Pass and north of the ...

sometime in mid-1996, in which Mohammed outlined a plan that would eventually become the quadruple hijackings in 2001. Bin Laden urged Mohammed to become a full-fledged member of al-Qaeda, but he continued to refuse such a commitment until around early 1999, after the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in

Nairobi Nairobi is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Kenya. The city lies in the south-central part of Kenya, at an elevation of . The name is derived from the Maasai language, Maasai phrase , which translates to 'place of cool waters', a ...

and

Dar es Salaam Dar es Salaam (, ; from ) is the largest city and financial hub of Tanzania. It is also the capital of the Dar es Salaam Region. With a population of over 7 million people, Dar es Salaam is the largest city in East Africa by population and the ...

. In 1997, Mohammed moved his family from

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

Karachi, Pakistan Karachi is the capital city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Sindh, Pakistan. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, largest city in Pakistan and 12th List of largest cities, largest in the world, with a popul ...

. That year, he tried unsuccessfully to join mujahideen leader Ibn al-Khattab in

Chechnya Chechnya, officially the Chechen Republic, is a Republics of Russia, republic of Russia. It is situated in the North Caucasus of Eastern Europe, between the Caspian Sea and Black Sea. The republic forms a part of the North Caucasian Federa ...

, another area of special interest to Mohammed. Unable to travel to Chechnya, he returned to Afghanistan. He ultimately accepted bin Laden's invitation to move to

Kandahar Kandahar is a city in Afghanistan, located in the south of the country on Arghandab River, at an elevation of . It is Afghanistan's second largest city, after Kabul, with a population of about 614,118 in 2015. It is the capital of Kandahar Pro ...

and join al-Qaeda as a full-fledged member. Eventually, he became leader of al-Qaeda's media committee.

Plan for 11 September 2001 attacks

The first hijack plan that Mohammed presented to the leadership of al-Qaeda called for several airplanes on both US east and west coasts to be hijacked and flown into targets. His plan evolved from an earlier foiled plot known as the Bojinka plot (see above). Bin Laden rejected some potential targets suggested by Mohammed, such as the

U.S. Bank Tower U.S. Bank Tower, known locally as the Library Tower and formerly as the First Interstate Bank World Center, is a skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles, California. It is, by structural height, the third-tallest building in California, the sec ...

in Los Angeles, as he wished to simplify the attacks. In late 1998 or early 1999, bin Laden approved for Mohammed to organize the plot. Meetings in early 1999 took place with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed,

, and his military chief,

. Bin Laden led the plot and provided financial support. He was also involved in selecting the participants, including choosing

Mohamed Atta Mohamed Atta (1 September 196811 September 2001) was an Egyptian terrorist hijacker for al-Qaeda. Ideologically a Pan-Islamism, pan-Islamist, he was the ringleader of the September 11 attacks and served as the Aircraft hijacking, hijacker-pi ...

as the lead hijacker. Khalid Sheikh provided operational support, such as selecting targets and helping arrange travel for the hijackers. Atef directed the hijackers' actions. After Atta was chosen as the leader of the mission, "he met with Bin Laden to discuss the targets: the

World Trade Center World Trade Centers are the hundreds of sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may also refer to: Buildings * World Trade Center (1973–2001), a building complex that was destroyed during the September 11 at ...

, which represented the U.S. economy;

the Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense, in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. The building was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As ...

, a symbol of the U.S. military; and the U.S. Capitol, the perceived source of U.S. policy in support of Israel. The

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...

was also on the list, as Bin Laden considered it a political symbol and wanted to attack it as well." If any pilot could not reach his intended target, he was to crash the plane. According to testimony by Philip Zelikow, bin Laden was motivated by a

desire to punish Desires are states of mind that are expressed by terms like "wanting", " wishing", "longing" or "craving". A great variety of features is commonly associated with desires. They are seen as propositional attitudes towards conceivable states of a ...

the US for supporting Israel and wanted to move up the attack date. Mohammed argued for ensuring the teams were prepared.

in Laden IN, In or in may refer to: Dans * India (country code IN) * Indiana, United States (postal code IN) * Ingolstadt, Germany (license plate code IN) * In, Russia, a town in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast Businesses and organizations * Independen ...
allegedly told KSM it would be sufficient simply to down the planes and not hit specific targets. KSM stood his ground, arguing that the operation would not be successful unless the pilots were fully trained and the hijacking teams were larger.

In a 2002 interview with

Al Jazeera Al Jazeera Media Network (AJMN; , ) is a private-media conglomerate headquartered in Wadi Al Sail, Doha, funded in part by the government of Qatar. The network's flagship channels include Al Jazeera Arabic and Al Jazeera English, which pro ...

journalist

Yosri Fouda Yosri Fouda ( ', ), is an Egyptian investigative reporter, author, and television host. He established Al Jazeera Media Network, Al Jazeera's office in London and was one of the star figures in the channel until he resigned in 2009. Fouda also wo ...

, Mohammed admitted that he and

Ramzi bin al-Shibh Ramzi Mohammed Abdullah bin al-Shibh (; born May 1, 1972) is a Yemenis, Yemeni Terrorism, terrorist who served as al-Qaeda's communications officer. He has been detained by the United States in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp (NSGB) since 200 ...

were involved in the "Holy Tuesday operation". ("Holy Tuesday operation" was the terrorists' code name for the 9/11 attacks, and the attacks actually did take place on a Tuesday.) KSM, however, disputes this claim via his Personal Representative: "I never stated to the Al Jazeera reporter that I was the head of the al-Qaeda military committee." In an April 2002 interview with Al Jazeera correspondent Yosri Fouda, KSM, and Ramzi bin al-Shibh described the preparations for 9/11 attacks and said that they first thought of "striking at a couple of nuclear facilities" in the U.S. but then "it was eventually decided to leave out nuclear targets for now."

Daniel Pearl murder

According to a

CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...

interview with intelligence expert

Rohan Gunaratna Professor Rohan Gunaratna (born 1961) is a threat specialist of the global security environment. Professor Gunaratna has over 30 years of academic, policy, and operational experience in national and international security. He is Professor of Se ...

, "

was going in search of the al-Qaeda network that was operational in Karachi, and it was at the instruction of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed that Daniel Pearl was killed."Ressa, Maria. ''CNN.com'', December 6, 2003. On 12 October 2006, ''

Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...

'' magazine reported that "KSM confessed under CIA interrogation that he personally committed the murder." On 15 March 2007,

stated that Mohammed had confessed to the murder. The statement quoted Mohammed as saying, "I decapitated with my blessed right hand the head of the American

Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

, Daniel Pearl, in the city of

Karachi Karachi is the capital city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Sindh, Pakistan. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, largest city in Pakistan and 12th List of largest cities, largest in the world, with a popul ...

Pakistan Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the Islam by country# ...

. For those who would like to confirm, there are pictures of me on the Internet holding his head." This confession was gained under torture, and Mohammed listed many other crimes at the same time. According to an investigative report published in January 2011 by

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private Jesuit research university in Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic higher education, Ca ...

, the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

used vein matching to determine that the perpetrator in the video of the killing of Pearl was most likely Mohammed, notably through identifying a "bulging vein" running across his hand. Concerned that the confession obtained through

waterboarding Waterboarding is a form of torture in which water is poured over a cloth covering the face and breathing passages of an immobilized captive, causing the person to experience the sensation of drowning. In the most common method of waterboard ...

would not hold up in court, federal officials used this forensic evidence to bolster their case.

Capture, interrogation, and torture

On 11 September 2002, members of Pakistani

(ISI) claimed to have killed or captured Sheikh Mohammed during a raid in

that resulted in bin al-Shibh's capture. This claim was then subsequently proven as baseless. Mohammed was captured in

(about 20 kilometres southwest of Islamabad), on 1 March 2003, by the Pakistani ISI, possibly in a joint action with the CIA's

Special Activities Division The Special Activities Center (SAC) is the center of the United States Central Intelligence Agency responsible for covert operations. The unit was named Special Activities Division (SAD) prior to a 2015 reorganization. Within SAC there are at le ...

paramilitary operatives and officers of the American

Diplomatic Security Service The Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) is the principal Specialist law enforcement agency, law enforcement and security agency of the United States Department of State (DOS). Its primary mission is to protect diplomatic assets, personnel, and info ...

. He has been in U.S. custody since that time. Initially, Mohammed was held in the CIA's

Salt Pit The Salt Pit and Cobalt were the code names of an isolated clandestine CIA black site prison and interrogation center outside Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. It was located north of Kabul and was the location of a brick factory prior to the A ...

(''Cobalt'') prison in

. After just a "few minutes" of questioning at ''Cobalt'', he was subject to "

enhanced interrogation techniques "Enhanced interrogation techniques" or "enhanced interrogation" was a program of systematic torture of detainees by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and various components of the U.S. Armed Forces at ...

." He was slapped, grabbed in the face, placed in

stress positions A stress position, also known as a submission position, is a form of punishment that places the human body in such a way that a great amount of weight is placed on very few muscles. For example, a subject may be forced to stand on the balls of t ...

, placed in standing

sleep deprivation Sleep deprivation, also known as sleep insufficiency or sleeplessness, is the condition of not having adequate duration and/or quality of sleep to support decent alertness, performance, and health. It can be either Chronic (medicine), chronic ...

, doused with water, and subjected to rectal rehydration multiple times, without a determination of medical need. During 2003, Mohammed was held at a secret CIA prison, or black site, in

, where the CIA

waterboarded Waterboarding is a form of torture in which water torture, water is poured over a cloth covering the face and breathing passages of an immobilized captive, causing the person to experience the sensation of drowning. In the most common method ...

him at least 183 times. He was then transferred to another secret CIA prison in

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

In September 2006, the U.S. government announced it had moved Mohammed from a secret CIA prison (or black site) to military custody at the

. The

Red Cross The organized International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is a Humanitarianism, humanitarian movement with approximately 16million volunteering, volunteers, members, and staff worldwide. It was founded to protect human life and health, to ...

Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Headquartered in New York City, the group investigates and reports on issues including War crime, war crimes, crim ...

and Mohammed consider that the harsh interrogation techniques, including

, which he received from U.S. agents amount to

. Mohammed was also subject to

for a period of days, during much of which he was forced to stand. According to later reports, Mohammed initially told American interrogators he would not answer any questions until he was provided with a lawyer, which was refused. He claims to have been kept naked for more than a month during his isolation and interrogations, and said he was "questioned by an unusual number of female handlers". A CIA document reveals that

Jane Harman Jane Margaret Harman (née Lakes, June 28, 1945) is an American former politician who served as the U.S. representative for from 1993 to 1999 and again from 2001 to 2011. A member of the Democratic Party, she was the ranking member on the ...

(D-CA) and

Porter Goss Porter Johnston Goss (; born November 26, 1938) is an American politician who served as the head of the Central Intelligence Agency from 2004 to 2006. He was the last Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) from 2004 to 2005, then became the fir ...

(R-FL) of the

House Intelligence Committee The United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), also known as the House Intelligence Committee, is a committee of the United States House of Representatives, currently chaired by Rick Crawford. It is the primary comm ...

were briefed on 13 July 2004, by the CIA

Deputy Director for Operations The deputy director of the CIA for operations is a senior United States government official in the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency who serves as head of the Directorate of Operations (CIA), Directorate of Operations. The position was established ...

James Pavitt James L. Pavitt (born February 19, 1946 – died December 22, 2022) was Deputy Director for Operations (DDO) for the CIA from June 23, 1999, until July 12, 2004, when he resigned a day after George Tenet. The CIA said the resignations was for perso ...

, General Counsel Scott Muller, and CIA Inspector General John L. Helgerson on the status of the interrogation process of Mohammed. The document states: On 12 October 2004,

reported that 11 suspects, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, had "

disappeared An enforced disappearance (or forced disappearance) is the secret abduction or imprisonment of a person with the support or acquiescence of a state followed by a refusal to acknowledge the person's fate or whereabouts with the intent of placing ...

" to a semi-secret prison in

Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...

, and may have been tortured there under the direction of the CIA. At the time, Jordanian and American officials denied those allegations. In October 2006, Mohammed described his mistreatment and torture in detention, including the waterboarding, to a representative of the

International Committee of the Red Cross The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is a humanitarian organization based in Geneva, Switzerland, and is a three-time Nobel Prize laureate. The organization has played an instrumental role in the development of rules of war and ...

. Mohammed said that he had provided a lot of false information, which he had supposed the interrogators wanted to hear, in order to stop the mistreatment. In the 2006 interview with the Red Cross, Mohammed claimed to have been waterboarded in five different sessions during the first month of interrogation in his third place of detention. While the Justice Department memos did not explain exactly what the numbers represented, a U.S. official with knowledge of the interrogation programs explained the 183 figure represented the number of times water was applied to the detainee's face during the waterboarding sessions, rather than separate sessions. In March 2007, after four years in captivity, including six months of detention and alleged torture at Guantanamo Bay, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, as it was claimed by a

Combatant Status Review Tribunal The Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRT) were a set of tribunals for confirming whether detainees held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp had been correctly designated as " enemy combatants". The CSRTs were establi ...

Hearing in Guantanamo Bay, confessed to masterminding the 11 September attacks, the

shoe bombing attempt to blow up an airliner over the Atlantic Ocean, the

Bali nightclub bombing The 2002 Bali bombings were a series of terrorist attacks on 12 October 2002 in the tourist district of Kuta on the Indonesian island of Bali. The attacks killed 202 people (including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians, 23 Britons, and people o ...

, the

and other various foiled attacks. "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation from A to Z," Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said in a statement read Saturday during a Combatant Status Review Tribunal at the

. According to the "unclassified summary of evidence" presented during the CSRT hearing, a computer hard drive seized during the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed contained the following: * information about the four airplanes hijacked on 11 September 2001, including code names, airline company, flight number, target, pilot name and background information, and names of the hijackers * photographs of 19 individuals identified as the 11 September 2001 hijackers * a document that listed the pilot license fees for Mohamed Atta and biographies for some of the 11 September 2001 hijackers * images of passports and an image of

* transcripts of chat sessions belonging to at least 1 of 11 September 2001 hijackers * three letters from Osama bin Laden * spreadsheets that describe financial assistance to families of known al-Qaeda members * a letter to the United Arab Emirates threatening attack if their government continued to help the United States * a document that summarized operational procedures and training requirements of an al-Qaeda cell * a list of killed and wounded al-Qaeda militants. At the hearing, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said the computer belonged not to him, but to Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi, arrested together with him. On 5 February 2008, the CIA Director Michael Hayden told a Senate committee that his agents had used

on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. In June 2008, a ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' article, citing unnamed CIA officers, claimed that Mohammed had been held in a black site or secret facility in

near Szymany Airport, about 100 miles north of

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

. There he was interrogated under waterboarding before he began to "cooperate". In 2009, Mohammed described his actions and motivations in a document publicly released and known as ''The Islamic Response to the Government's Nine Accusations.'' In April 2011, the British newspaper ''

The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are often names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * The Telegraph (Adelaide), ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaid ...

'' said it received leaked documents regarding the Guantanamo Bay interrogations of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The documents cited Mohammed as saying that, if

is captured or killed by the

Coalition of the Willing A ''coalition of the willing'' is a temporary international partnership created for the purpose of achieving a particular objective, usually of military or political nature. Origin The term was coined in the early 1970s by MIT professor Linco ...

, an al-Qaeda

sleeper cell A clandestine cell system is a method for organizing a group of people, such as resistance fighters, spies, mercenaries, organized crime members, or terrorists, to make it harder for police, military or other hostile groups to catch them. In ...

would detonate a "weapon of mass destruction" in a "secret location" in Europe, and promised it would be "a nuclear hellstorm".

Report that interrogators abused his children

Ali Khan, the father of Majid Khan, another one of the 14 "high-value detainees," released an unsubstantiated affidavit on 16 April 2006, that reported that interrogators subjected Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's children, aged 6 and 8 years old, to abusive interrogation. Khan's affidavit quoted another of his sons, Mohammed Khan:

Transfer to Guantanamo and hearing before his Combatant Status Review Tribunal

On 6 September 2006, American President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...

confirmed, for the first time, that the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

had held "high-value detainees" for interrogation in secret prisons around the world. He also announced that fourteen senior captives, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, were being transferred from CIA custody, to military custody, at

and that these fourteen captives could now expect to face charges before Guantanamo military commissions. In a 29 September 2006, speech, Bush stated: In March 2007, Mohammed testified before a closed-door hearing in Guantanamo Bay. According to transcripts of the hearing released by the Pentagon, he said, "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z." The transcripts also show him confessing to: * Organizing the

* The Bali nightclub bombings * Richard Reid's attempted shoe bombing * Planning the attacks on

Heathrow Airport Heathrow Airport , also colloquially known as London Heathrow Airport and named ''London Airport'' until 1966, is the primary and largest international airport serving London, the capital and most populous city of England and the United Kingdo ...

and Big Ben clock tower in London * Daniel Pearl's murder in 2002 * Planned

assassination Assassination is the willful killing, by a sudden, secret, or planned attack, of a personespecially if prominent or important. It may be prompted by political, ideological, religious, financial, or military motives. Assassinations are orde ...

attempts on

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II (born Karol Józef Wojtyła; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 16 October 1978 until Death and funeral of Pope John Paul II, his death in 2005. In his you ...

Pervez Musharraf Pervez Musharraf (11 August 1943 – 5 February 2023) was a Pakistani general and politician who served as the tenth president of Pakistan from 2001 to 2008. Prior to his career in politics, he was a four-star general and appointed as ...

and

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...

On 15 March 2007,

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...

reported that "Transcripts of his testimony were translated from Arabic and edited by the U.S. Department of Defense to remove sensitive intelligence material before release. It appeared, from a judge's question, that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had made allegations of torture in US custody." In the Defense Department transcript, Mohammed said his statement was not made under

duress Coercion involves compelling a party to act in an involuntary manner through the use of threats, including threats to use force against that party. It involves a set of forceful actions which violate the free will of an individual in order to i ...

but Mohammed and human rights advocates have alleged that he was tortured. CIA officials have previously told

ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...

that "Mohammed lasted the longest under waterboarding, two and a half minutes, before beginning to talk."CIA's Harsh Interrogation Techniques Described: Sources Say Agency's Tactics Lead to Questionable Confessions, Sometimes to Death
, ABC News, November 18, 2005 Legal experts say this could taint all his statements. Forensic psychiatrist Michael Welner, M.D., an expert in false confessions, observed from the testimony transcript that his concerns about his family may have been far more influential in soliciting Mohammed's cooperation than any earlier reported mistreatment. One CIA official cautioned that "many of Mohammed's claims during interrogation were 'white noise' designed to send the U.S. on wild goose chases or to get him through the day's interrogation session." For example, according to Mike Rogers, a former FBI agent and the top Republican on the terrorism panel of the

, he admitted responsibility for the Bali nightclub bombing, but his involvement "could have been as small as arranging a safe house for travel. It could have been arranging finance." Mohammed also made the admission that he was "responsible for the 1993 World Trade Center Operation," which killed six and injured more than 1,000 when a bomb was detonated in an underground garage, Mohammed did not plan the attack, but he may have supported it. Michael Welner noted that by offering legitimate information to interrogators, Mohammed had secured the leverage to provide misinformation as well. In an article discussing the reliability of Khalid's confession and the motive for giving misinformation under torture,

Ali Soufan Ali H. Soufan (born 1971) is Lebanese American former FBI agent who was involved in a number of high-profile anti-terrorism cases both in the United States and around the world. A 2006 ''New Yorker'' article described Soufan as coming closer th ...

, a former FBI special agent with considerable experience interrogating al-Qaeda operatives, pointed out that: His words are echoed by the U.S. Army Training Manual's section on interrogation, which suggests that: As an example of this the article discloses that although the

George W. Bush administration George W. Bush's tenure as the 43rd president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2001, and ended on January 20, 2009. Bush, a Republican from Texas, took office following his narrow electoral college vict ...

made claims that the water-boarding (simulated drowning) of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed produced vital information that allowed them to break up a plot to attack the

(formerly Library Tower and First Interstate Bank World Center) in Los Angeles in 2002, this has been proven to be untrue. In 2002 Sheikh Mohammed was busy evading capture in Pakistan. Likewise the claim by former George W Bush Attorney General

Michael Mukasey Michael Bernard Mukasey (; born July 28, 1941) is an American lawyer and jurist who served as the 81st Attorney General of the United States from 2007 to 2009 and as a U.S. district judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of N ...

and former CIA

director of the National Clandestine Service The deputy director of the CIA for operations is a senior United States government official in the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency who serves as head of the Directorate of Operations. The position was established December 1, 1950 and from Janua ...

, Jose Rodriguez, that the torture of Khalid Mohammed produced the most significant lead in finding Osama bin Laden, has also been shown to be false. According to U.S. Senator

John McCain John Sidney McCain III (August 29, 1936 – August 25, 2018) was an American statesman and United States Navy, naval officer who represented the Arizona, state of Arizona in United States Congress, Congress for over 35 years, first as ...

, "The trail to bin Laden did not begin with a disclosure from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was waterboarded 183 times ... not only did the use of 'enhanced interrogation techniques' on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed not provide us with key leads on bin Laden's courier, Abu Ahmed; it actually produced false and misleading information."

List of confessions

Mohammed has made at least 31 confessions: * The February 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City * The

on the

and

using hijacked commercial airliners * A failed "shoe bomber" operation * The October 2002 attack in Kuwait *The beheading of ''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...

'' reporter

* The

, Pady's and Sari's club bombings in Bali, Indonesia * A plan for a "second wave" of attacks on major U.S. landmarks after the 9/11 attacks, including the

Library Tower U.S. Bank Tower, known locally as the Library Tower and formerly as the First Interstate Bank World Center, is a skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles, California. It is, by structural height, the third-tallest building in California, the sec ...

in Los Angeles, the

Willis Tower The Willis Tower, formerly and still commonly referred to as the Sears Tower, is a 110-storey, story, skyscraper in the Chicago Loop, Loop community area of Chicago in Illinois, United States. Designed by architect Bruce Graham and engineer F ...

(formerly Sears Tower) in Chicago, the

Empire State Building The Empire State Building is a 102-story, Art Deco-style supertall skyscraper in the Midtown South neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, United States. The building was designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon and built from 1930 to 1931. Its n ...

in New York City, and what has been reported as the Plaza Bank Building in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...

, although there is no Plaza Bank Building; there is a Safeco Plaza and

Columbia Center The Columbia Center or Columbia Tower, formerly named the Bank of America Tower and Columbia Seafirst Center, is a skyscraper in downtown Seattle, Washington (state), Washington, United States. The 76-story structure is the tallest building in ...

, the city's tallest skyscraper * Plots to attack oil tankers and U.S. naval ships in the

Straits of Hormuz The Strait of Hormuz ( ''Tangeh-ye Hormoz'' , ''Maḍīq Hurmuz'') is a strait between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. It provides the only sea passage from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean and is one of the world's most strategica ...

, the

Straits of Gibraltar The Strait of Gibraltar is a narrow strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Europe from Africa. The two continents are separated by 7.7 nautical miles (14.2 kilometers, 8.9 miles) at its narrowest point. Fe ...

and in

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

* A plan to blow up the

Panama Canal The Panama Canal () is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean. It cuts across the narrowest point of the Isthmus of Panama, and is a Channel (geography), conduit for maritime trade between th ...

* Plans to assassinate

Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...

* A plot to blow up suspension bridges in New York City * A plan to destroy the

Sears Tower The Willis Tower, formerly and still commonly referred to as the Sears Tower, is a 110- story, skyscraper in the Loop community area of Chicago in Illinois, United States. Designed by architect Bruce Graham and engineer Fazlur Rahman Khan ...

in Chicago with burning fuel trucks * Plans to destroy

London Heathrow Airport Heathrow Airport , also colloquially known as London Heathrow Airport and named ''London Airport'' until 1966, is the primary and largest international airport serving London, the capital and most populous city of England and the United Kingd ...

Canary Wharf Canary Wharf is a financial area of London, England, located in the Isle of Dogs in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The Greater London Authority defines it as part of London's central business district, alongside Central London. Alongside ...

and

Big Ben Big Ben is the nickname for the Great Bell of the Great Clock of Westminster, and, by extension, for the clock tower itself, which stands at the north end of the Palace of Westminster in London, England. Originally named the Clock Tower, it ...

in London * A planned attack on many nightclubs in

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

* A plot targeting the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is the List of stock exchanges, largest stock excha ...

and other U.S. financial targets * A plan to destroy buildings in

Eilat Eilat ( , ; ; ) is Israel's southernmost city, with a population of , a busy port of Eilat, port and popular resort at the northern tip of the Red Sea, on what is known in Israel as the Gulf of Eilat and in Jordan as the Gulf of Aqaba. The c ...

* Plans to destroy U.S. embassies in Indonesia, Australia and Japan in 2002 * Plots to destroy

i embassies in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a Boundaries between the continents, transcontinental and landlocked country at the boundary of West Asia and Eastern Europe. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by ...

, the

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

* Surveying and financing an attack on an

El-Al EL AL Israel Airlines Ltd. (), trading as EL AL (, "Upwards", "To the Skies", or "Skywards", stylized as ELAL; ) is the flag carrier of Israel. Since its inaugural flight from Geneva to Tel Aviv in September 1948, the airline has grown to serve ...

flight from

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estim ...

* Sending several "mujahideen" into Israel to survey "strategic targets" with the intention of attacking them * The November 2002 suicide bombing of a hotel in

Mombasa Mombasa ( ; ) is a coastal city in southeastern Kenya along the Indian Ocean. It was the first capital of British East Africa, before Nairobi was elevated to capital status in 1907. It now serves as the capital of Mombasa County. The town is ...

, Kenya, and failed attempt to shoot down an

i passenger jet leaving

Mombasa Airport Moi International Airport is an international airport in Mombasa, the second-largest city in Kenya. In 2020, the airport was heralded as the "Best Airport in Africa" (with under 2 million passengers annually) by Airports Council International ...

* Plans to attack U.S. targets in South Korea * Providing financial support for a plan to attack U.S., British and

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

targets in

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

* Surveillance of U.S. nuclear power plants in order to attack them * A plot to attack

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

's headquarters in Europe * Planning and surveillance in a 1995 plan (the "Bojinka plot") to bomb 12 American passenger jets * The planned assassination attempt against then-U.S. President

during a mid-1990s trip to the

* "Shared responsibility" for a plot to kill

Pope The pope is the bishop of Rome and the Head of the Church#Catholic Church, visible head of the worldwide Catholic Church. He is also known as the supreme pontiff, Roman pontiff, or sovereign pontiff. From the 8th century until 1870, the po ...

John Paul II Pope John Paul II (born Karol Józef Wojtyła; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 16 October 1978 until Death and funeral of Pope John Paul II, his death in 2005. In his you ...

* Plans to assassinate Pakistani President

* An attempt to attack a U.S. oil company in

Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of islands by area, sixth-largest island in the world at 482,286.55 km2 (182,812 mi. ...

, Indonesia, "owned by the Jewish former .S. Secretary of State

Henry Kissinger Henry Alfred Kissinger (May 27, 1923 – November 29, 2023) was an American diplomat and political scientist who served as the 56th United States secretary of state from 1973 to 1977 and the 7th National Security Advisor (United States), natio ...

After Mohammed arrived at Guantanamo, a team of FBI and military interrogators tried to elicit from him the same confessions that the CIA had obtained about the 9/11 plot, but by using only legal means of interrogation. By 2008, the Bush administration believed that this so-called "Clean Team" had compiled sufficient evidence to charge Mohammed and the others with capital murder. The

Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and supervising the six U.S. armed services: the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Force, ...

announced on 9 August 2007, that all fourteen of the "high-value detainees" who had been transferred to Guantanamo from the CIA's black sites, had been officially classified as "enemy combatants".
mirror
Although judges

Peter Brownback Peter E. Brownback III is a retired military officer and lawyer. He was appointed in 2004 by general John D. Altenburg as a Presiding Officer on the Guantanamo military commissions. The Washington Post reported: "...that Brownback and Altenbur ...

and Keith J. Allred had ruled two months earlier that only "''illegal'' enemy combatants" could face military commissions, the Department of Defense waived the qualifier and said that all fourteen men could now face charges before

Guantanamo military commission The Guantanamo military commissions were established by President George W. Bush through a military order on November 13, 2001, to try certain non-citizen terrorism suspects at the Guantanamo Bay prison. To date, there have been a total of eight ...

Confession used in Sheikh Omar's defense

On 19 March 2007,

Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh (; sometimes known as Umar Sheikh, Sheikh Omar,Note that this term is more commonly used in reference to Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman Sheik Syed or by the alias Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad;''CNN.com'' 6 October 2001. born 23 Dece ...

's lawyers cited Mohammed's confession in defense of their client. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, also known as Sheikh Omar, was

sentenced to death Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...

in a Pakistani court for the murder of Daniel Pearl. Omar's lawyers recently announced that they planned to use Mohammed's confession in an appeal. They had always acknowledged that Omar played a role in Pearl's murder, but argue that Mohammed was the actual murderer.

Prosecution in France

In 2009, the French government decided to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed ''

in absentia ''In Absentia'' is the seventh studio album by British progressive rock band Porcupine Tree, first released on 24 September 2002. The album marked several changes for the band, with it being the first with new drummer Gavin Harrison and the f ...

'' on terrorism charges with respect to the

Ghriba synagogue bombing The Ghriba synagogue bombing was carried out by Niser bin Muhammad Nasr Nawar on the El Ghriba synagogue in Tunisia in 2002. Bombing On 11 April 2002, a natural gas truck fitted with explosives drove past security barriers at the ancient El ...

on the

Tunis Tunis (, ') is the capital city, capital and largest city of Tunisia. The greater metropolitan area of Tunis, often referred to as "Grand Tunis", has about 2,700,000 inhabitants. , it is the third-largest city in the Maghreb region (after Casabl ...

ian island of

Djerba Djerba (; , ; ), also transliterated as Jerba or Jarbah, is a Tunisian island and the largest island of North Africa at , in the Gulf of Gabès, off the coast of Tunisia. Administratively, it is part of Medenine Governorate. The island h ...

in 2002, which killed 14 German tourists, five Tunisians and two French nationals. They intended to charge him along with the captured German national

Christian Ganczarski Christian Ganczarski (born 1966, in Gliwice, Poland) is a German terrorist who was alleged to be a top Al-Qaeda leader. Background Ganczarski is a convert to Islam, and is of Polish ancestry. He is thought to have been involved in jihadist activ ...

and Tunisian Walid Nawar. French judges later decided to separate Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's case from those of Ganczarski and Nawar and try him separately at a later date.

Trial for role in 9/11 attacks

On 11 February 2008, the

United States Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and superv ...

charged Mohammed,

, Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi,

Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali Ammar al-Baluchi or Amar Baloch; born Ali Abdul Aziz Ali on 29 August 1977) is a Pakistani citizen who has been in American custody at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp since 2006. He was arrested in the Pakistani former capital city of Karachi ...

and

Walid Bin Attash Walid Muhammad Salih bin Mubarak bin Attash (; born 1978) is a Yemeni prisoner held at the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camp under terrorism-related charges and is suspected of playing a key role in the early stages of the 9/11 attacks. ...

for the 11 September 2001 attacks under the military commission system, as established under the

Military Commissions Act of 2006 The Military Commissions Act of 2006, also known as HR-6166, was an Act of Congress signed by President George W. Bush on October 17, 2006. The Act's stated purpose was "to authorize trial by military commission for violations of the law of ...

. They have reportedly been charged with the murder of almost 3,000 people, terrorism and

providing material support for terrorism In United States law, providing material support for terrorism is a crime prohibited by the USA PATRIOT Act and codified in title 18 of the United States Code. Penalties include fines and up to 15 years in prison, per sectio2339A and up to 20 ye ...

and plane hijacking; as well as attacking civilian objects, intentionally causing serious bodily injury and destruction of property in violation of the law of war. The charges against them list 169 overt acts allegedly committed by the defendants in furtherance of the 11 September events. The charges include 2,973 individual counts of murder—one for each person killed in the 9/11 attacks. The prosecution is seeking the

, which would require the unanimous agreement of the commission judges.

Human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...

groups, including

Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says that it has more than ten million members a ...

and the

Center for Constitutional Rights The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR; formerly Law Center for Constitutional Rights) is an American progressive non-profit legal advocacy organization based in New York City. It was founded in 1966 by lawyers William Kunstler, Arthur Kin ...

, and U.S. military defense lawyers have criticised the military commissions for lacking due process for a fair trial. Critics generally argue for the trials to be held in a

federal district court The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district. Each district covers one U.S. state or a portion of a state. There is at least one feder ...

, with defendants treated as criminal suspects, or by

court-martial A court-martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the arme ...

as a prisoner under the

Geneva Conventions upright=1.15, The original document in single pages, 1864 The Geneva Conventions are international humanitarian laws consisting of four treaties and three additional protocols that establish international legal standards for humanitarian t ...

, which prohibit civilian trials for prisoners of war. Mohammed could face the death penalty under any of these systems. The case is progressing through the legal system. In August 2019 the trial date was tentatively set for 11 January 2021, by Judge W. Shane Cohen, but this date was postponed on 18 December 2020, due to the

. Mohammed's trial restarted on 7 September 2021. On July 31, 2024, a guilty plea was reached with U.S. officials, which spared him from the death penalty in exchange for life in prison. However, the plea deal was rescinded by Defense Secretary

two days later.

Legal rulings affecting him

In ''

Boumediene v. Bush ''Boumediene v. Bush'', 553 U.S. 723 (2008), was a writ of ''habeas corpus'' petition made in a civilian court of the United States on behalf of Lakhdar Boumediene, a naturalized citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, held in military detention by t ...

'' (2008), the

ruled that detainees had the right of access to US federal courts to petition under ''

habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a legal procedure invoking the jurisdiction of a court to review the unlawful detention or imprisonment of an individual, and request the individual's custodian (usually a prison official) to ...

'' to challenge their detentions, and that the

Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 The Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (DTA) is an Act of the United States Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on December 30, 2005. Offered as an amendment to a supplemental defense spending bill, it contains provisions ...

and the

were flawed. A revised Military Commissions Act was passed by Congress in 2009 to address court concerns. Mohammed, in a letter submitted to the court on 26 July 2019, communicated the willingness to help the 9/11 attack victims and their families in their lawsuit against Saudi Arabia. The mastermind is said to have demanded the elimination of his death sentence in the exchange for his cooperation. On 16 August 2023, the Pentagon and the FBI told families of the victims of the 11 September terrorist attacks that none of the alleged organizers of the attacks would face the death penalty as part of ongoing plea agreement considerations.

Release of new images

On 9 September 2009, photographs of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and

Ammar al Baluchi Ammar al-Baluchi or Amar Baloch; born Ali Abdul Aziz Ali on 29 August 1977) is a Pakistani citizen who has been in American custody at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp since 2006. He was arrested in the Pakistani former capital city of Karachi ...

were published on the Internet and widely in US and international media. Camp authorities have strict controls over the taking and distribution of images of the Guantanamo captives. Journalists and VIPs visiting Guantanamo are not allowed to take any pictures that show the captives' faces. Journalists may see " high value" captives such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed only when they are in the court room, where cameras are not allowed. But, on 9 September 2009, independent counter-terrorism researchers found new images of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his nephew Ammar al Baluchi on "jihadist websites". According to

Carol Rosenberg Carol Rosenberg is a senior journalist at ''The New York Times.'' Long a military-affairs reporter at the ''Miami Herald'', from January 2002 into 2019 she reported on the operation of the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camps, at its nav ...

, writing in ''

The Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by The McClatchy Company and headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Founded in 1903, it is the fifth-largest newspaper in Florida, serving Miami-Dade, Broward, and Monroe countie ...

'': "The pictures were taken in July, said

spokesman Bernard Barrett, under an agreement with prison camp staff that lets Red Cross delegates photograph detainees and send photos to family members." In November 2014, a Turkish manufacturer of over-the-counter

hair removal cream A chemical depilatory is a cosmetic preparation used to remove hair from the skin. Common active ingredients are salts of thioglycolic acid and thiolactic acids. These compounds break the disulfide bonds in keratin and also hydrolyze the hair so ...

was found to be using an image of a disheveled Mohammed in adverts for their product.

Manifesto

In January 2014, a 36-page "nonviolence manifesto" written by KSM was declassified and released by the US government. The title is "Khalid Sheikh Mohammad's Statement to the Crusaders of the Military Commissions in Guantanamo." The document outlines 3 parts, but appears to be just the first section, describing "the path to happiness." The subject writes to his captors and appears interested in converting his wider audience to Islam. The notes contain eight books with three Western authors and penciled initials with the date 31 October 2013.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Sulaiman Abu Ghaith

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has participated as a witness in the trials of two alleged al-Qaeda members,

Zacarias Moussaoui Zacarias Moussaoui (, '; born 30 May 1968) is a French member of al-Qaeda who pleaded guilty in a U.S. federal court to conspiring to kill citizens of the United States as part of the 9/11 attacks. He is serving life imprisonment without the ...

and

Salim Hamdan Salim Ahmed Salim Hamdan (; born February 25, 1968) is a Yemeni man, captured during the invasion of Afghanistan, declared by the United States government to be an illegal enemy combatant and held as a detainee at Guantanamo Bay from 2002 to No ...

. ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' reporter Richard Serrano wrote: "In 2006, his interrogation summaries were read aloud in the capital murder trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called 20th hijacker, and Moussaoui was spared the death penalty. Two years later, different Mohammed statements were read in a military commission trial, or tribunal, that led to the release from Guantanamo Bay of Osama bin Laden's chauffeur, Salim Hamdan." Stanley Cohen, an attorney for

Sulaiman Abu Ghaith Sulaiman Jassem Sulaiman Ali Abu Ghaith (; born 14 December 1965) is a Kuwaiti regarded as one of al-Qaeda's spokesmen. He is marriage in Islam, married to one of Osama bin Laden's daughters. In 2013, Gaith was arrested in Jordan and extradite ...

, requested to interview Mohammed, who they described as "the most qualified person alive" to assist in Abu Gaith's defense. Mohammed, through his attorney David Nevin, agreed to be interviewed, but only "in the absence of government personnel whether physically present or by listening or recording remotely." Mohammed instead drafted a 14-page statement response to 451 interrogatories submitted by Cohen. In the response, Mohammed called Abu Ghaith, a "pious man" and "spellbinding speaker" who, to the best of his knowledge, did not play any military role in al-Qaeda operations and had no military training. Mohammed argued that Western foreign policy has been hypocritical in that it allowed for the rise of the Mujahideen in the Soviet War, but that Western media has since branded the Mujahideen "terrorists" or "foreign fighters". He further claimed that the Taliban's strict Islamic rule had restored security to Afghanistan in the 1990s. U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan ruled that neither Mohammed's statement nor testimony were relevant to Abu Ghaith's trial, and thus inadmissible.

Personal life

Mohammed is fluent in Balochi,

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

, and

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

. He has two sons, aged seven and nine at the time of his arrest in 2002.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mohammed, Khalid Sheikh 1965 births Al-Qaeda leaders Anti-American sentiment in the Middle East Chowan University alumni Detainees of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp FBI Most Wanted Terrorists Islamist mass murderers Living people North Carolina A&T State University alumni Pakistani al-Qaeda members Pakistani engineers Pakistani exiles Pakistani extrajudicial prisoners of the United States Pakistani mass murderers Pakistani Muslims Pakistani torture victims People associated with the September 11 attacks People subject to extraordinary rendition by the United States University of the Punjab alumni