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Terror On Tape: Tapes Show al Qaeda Training

Aired August 19, 2002 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: It has been almost a year since September 11, the terrorist attacks, and since then, we have learned much about Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, names many were not familiar with, just a year ago. But now, in a five-part series that begins today, and will run at this time through the next five days, CNN's Nic Robertson will show you video of Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda terror network that you have never seen before: behind-the-scenes of al Qaeda's terror training, and its deadly tactics.
Nic was taken to a secret location in Afghanistan to get the videos from what he was told was a private al Qaeda videotape library. First, we want to warn you. Some of the images on this tape are extremely graphic and very difficult to watch. It is not recommended for children, and some adults will not want to watch it as well. We are showing you this because we think it is important that the video is shown.

Here now is Nic Robertson with part one of this CNN Special Report, "Terror on Tape."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hardest to watch of all the tapes in what experts say is al Qaeda's video library this one; apparent testing of a poison gas on dogs. Exactly who taped it and where may never be known. The dog tape just one in a broad and deep range of carefully catalogued material contained in 64 tapes CNN obtained from a secret location in Afghanistan shortly after they'd been dug up from a hiding place in the desert.

We have shown the tapes to many experts, including Rohan Gunaratna, a leading al Qaeda analyst who, in his consultation with the Western governments, has interviewed al Qaeda members and viewed more than 200 terror group's previous tapes. But until now, none of these.

ROHAN GUNARATNA, AUTHOR, "INSIDE AL QAEDA": The collection has al Qaeda videos taken by al Qaeda of events. Many where Osama bin Laden met with foreign journals. He always had his own tape, his own cameraman, and it is those tapes that are there. Because that itself shows that this is the al Qaeda library, this is not the library of someone else and this is the registry, the record room of Osama bin Laden.

ROBERTSON: Perhaps most revealing about Osama bin Laden, these never before seen pictures show in graphic detail the al Qaeda leaders' personal security arrangements; all this material and much more discovered in an Afghan house said to have been used by the al Qaeda leader; a video archive spanning more than a decade giving new insight to al Qaeda's planning, tactics and mind set.

GUNARATNA: Those videos are not for public conception. They are only for the al Qaeda leadership, not even for their members. It is the al Qaeda memory. You have taken a part of the al Qaeda memory.

ROBERTSON: In the collection a three-hour tape of how to make purified TNT from easy to get ingredients, sophistication and planning and explosive skills that scare government bomb experts. Terrorists and training, not the made for camera al Qaeda promos we've seen before, but detailed demonstrations of how to kill, hijack and ambush.

Experts we have talked with say no terrorist organization has ever put this much expertise on videotape before. No terror organization has ever disseminated its knowledge this way.

(on camera): Although we cannot know with 100 percent certainty that this material came from Osama bin Laden's video library, the extent of the collection and its nature, that some items appear of high importance to the al Qaeda leader present a compelling case. It represents a chilling reminder of the preparation and commitment of al Qaeda and its leader.

(voice-over): We begin with possibly the saddest and scariest tape of all, showing the death of three dogs.

Calling out to each other to hurry, several individuals wearing Afghan-style sandals rush from the room. As they leave, a white liquid giving off a gas slowly seeps from the left and we discover these men are executioners and this is a death chamber. We never find out their identity, but they laugh as they leave the dog to his fate.

The video you're about to see is very disturbing and is not suitable for children. Some adults, too, may want to turn away. Coalition intelligence sources who have examined this tape say this appears to be an Al Qaeda lethal weapons experiment at its remote Afghan Darunta camp. Those sources say no intelligence agency has seen this before. The experimentation by Al Qaeda with poison gas. Already the dog reacts, licking his lips, a sign of increased salivation, a sign, say some of the experts we asked to examine the tapes, of a nerve agent.

John Gilbert is chemical weapons a specialist who advises the U.S. Government.

JOHN GILBERT, SCIENCE APPLICATIONS INTERNATIONAL CORPORATION: The first impression I had is that it's a task or a demonstration of a very powerful and quick-acting chemical that behaves like a nerve agent, such as sarin, which was used in the Tokyo subway terrorist attacks in the 1990s.

ROBERTSON: Watching the tape is David Kay, formerly a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, for whom the tape raises the specter of weapons of mass destruction. DAVID KAY, FMR. UNSCOM WEAPONS INSPECTOR: It's a powerful segment of tape. First of all, the emotional response to seeing it is there. Second one is horror. Here again is another group that has managed to open the door to serious WMD capability.

I'm above a reasonable doubt convinced this is a nerve agent that they developed, either improvised, one, or they may have developed actually sarin in some form to use.

ROBERTSON: Al Qaeda documents examined by CNN last fall from the bombed out ruins of Darunta Camp showed chemical formulated for sarin. Other documents connect Al Qaeda's Darunta Camp, a series of modern building, not unlike this room, to chemical testing.

KAY: You're looking at the classic simple tomorrows that the dog demonstrates. For example, he loses certain muscles control, his eyes as they react, the way his muscles react, and then the gradual loss of voluntary muscles, and the final, the wracking loss of diaphragm lung capacity as he dies is the normal progression of a nerve agent.

ROBERTSON: We also asked chemical and biological weapons specialist Jonathan Tucker from the Monterey Institute to examine the tape. He, too, says he is shocked by what he sees, but he cautions that, for him, the dog's symptoms indicate not a nerve agent, but a form of cyanide.

JONATHAN TUCKER, MONTEREY INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: We saw visible fumes from the material that you probably would not see from a nerve agent, but is consistent with production of crude hydrogen cyanide gas by mixing cyanide crystals and acid. We saw a flask that had some white material in it that is suggestive of powdered cyanide. And I think what we have here is a very crude weapon binary weapon that terrorists -- would be attractive to terrorists because it's extremely low tech, and also very safe to use.

ROBERTSON: Dr. Frederick Sidell, another of the dozen experts consulted by CNN, says evaluation of the chemical is difficult.

DR. FREDERICK SIDELL, U.S. ARMY INSTITUTE OF CHEMICAL DEFENSE: The most common chemical agent is something called mustard, which is a blister agent, and it's certainly not -- it could be a nerve agent or cyanide, but they characteristically -- the effects come on sooner. This was vapor. Those dogs appeared to be conscious until the end, which they aren't with nerve agent and cyanide. Those two don't cause selective paralysis of the hindquarters, as that agent did. So we can almost say that it wasn't those, either. So I don't know what it is.

ROBERTSON: On this tape, more experiments, and close-ups cataloging symptoms of death. The metal boxes in the corner manufactured in the Afghan style given an additional indication the experiments took place inside Afghanistan. The implication of the rudimentary laboratory test is unmistakable for our experts.

GILBERT: The implication is that al Qaeda or another terrorist group could create a number of different ways of attacking people. You know, for example, in an enclosed area, such as an airport lobby or in a theater, or a train or a bus. Another is that it could be used against individuals, selectively, who are targeted for assassination.

ROBERTSON (on camera): How significant do you think the discovery of this tape is?

GILBERT: I think it's probably extremely significant, if not profound. I know there's been a lot of speculation about the state of technology and how far they may have advanced toward having a usable chemical weapon. The fact that they were able to repeat tests or demonstrations on this tape indicates that they clearly have a way to produce a predictably lethal chemical.

ROBERTSON (voice-over): Until now, intelligence agencies have had only fragmentary information to help build their picture of al Qaeda's chemical threat. Satellite images of Darunta camp showed dead dogs, according to coalition intelligence sources. In the 11th volume of al Qaeda's encyclopedia of jihad, obtained by CNN, detailed timings of how long it takes to kill a rabbit with cyanide, and recent testimony in federal court about activities at the Darunta camp by Ahmed Ressam, a man trained by al Qaeda and who pled guilty in 2001 to attempting to bomb Los Angeles Airport. This is an excerpt of that testimony.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You watched as your chief put a dog in a box, correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. We were all present there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your chief put cyanide in the box, is that correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He added sulfuric acid to the cyanide, is that correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And the dog shortly thereafter died from that experiment, correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Correct.

ROBERTSON: Al Qaeda expert Rohan Gunaratna interviewed an al Qaeda member who said he had been involved in al Qaeda's chemical weapons program.

(on camera): Do we know where they did that?

GUNARATNA: No, we do not know. But it is very likely that it was in the Darunta complex or a safe house near that complex.

The tapes CNN obtained are disturbing, but at the same time they are hugely informative about al Qaeda's current threat. They add much detail. Like the Egyptian accents of the men testing the chemicals on the dogs in keeping with information that al Qaeda's chemical weapons chief Abu Khabab preferred to work with Egyptians. Still, the tapes hide as much as they reveal.

KAY: Only in one instance do you actually see the liquid, which appears to be either poured or pumped out, going out. You don't see it the rest of the time. So you don't know at what level they are in terms of weaponizing it. There are a lot more questions this tape leaves than answers, unfortunately, but all of the questions are really bad questions.

ROBERTSON (voice-over): Questions, however, that if answered could help thwart the threat.

GILBERT: If the actual locations where those demonstrations were conducted can be found, there might be some residual material available that could be analyzed and might show, definitively, which chemicals were used.

ROBERTSON: Among those who evaluate terrorist groups, the equation of threat equals ability times intent. What is clear is that the al Qaeda equation now totals much more than it did before.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: And, Nic Robertson joins us right here in Atlanta with more on that remarkable footage, and how he came to acquire it. Nic, congratulations. This is really an amazing coup for you.

Before we get to your journey, I would like to find out from you, what is your assessment, then, after looking at these video tapes of what al Qaeda's ability -- what is their ability to build a weapon of mass destruction?

ROBERTSON: Well, first of all, a weapon of mass destruction in the context of the chemical tests that we have seen, a weapon of mass destruction would be a nerve agent, and only a few of our analysts thought it might be a nerve agent, sarin.

Others thought it might be cyanide, and cyanide wouldn't be classed as a weapon of mass destruction. But what the experts say to us about that -- that material is that it shows that al Qaeda knows how to control it, and can repeat this at will, and it shows an intent, they believe, to use it on humans, and coalition intelligence sources around the world do believe that al Qaeda do intend to use chemical agents of some description.

LIN: Is there any indication in the tapes that they have learned how to disperse it over a wide area, say in a public theater, or a train station?

ROBERTSON: The implication is that they know on these -- from these tapes, experts say, is that they know how to disperse it in a confined environment. We don't learn anything else from these tapes per se about how they could disburse it in urban environment, in an outdoor environment, but certainly what they are demonstrating here is yes, that they can do it in a confined environment. LIN: What really struck you about the tapes that you saw there? In particular, the death of this dog?

ROBERTSON: When I first saw it, it was very, very disturbing. I had a lot of other material and tapes to look through at the same time, so I wanted to move on, I was trying to do my professional job as a journalist, move on. put my emotions to one side. The next day, however, when I saw a dog on the side of road, it really struck me. It was a Labrador, and it just immediately came back to me with a full force, the horror of what I had seen the day before, and it did take several days to shake that feeling off.

LIN: It is amazing what you've been able to view through these videotapes. I am wondering, this came through a old contact of yours in Kabul who came to the office at CNN to seek you out. Why is it that this person wanted you to know about the tapes, and have the tapes?

ROBERTSON: My contact is somebody who is familiar with the media -- he is familiar with the Western media, familiar with West, in fact. So he would understand that what was contained on these tapes is of global significance, and of global importance, and I think by coming to me, by coming, more to the point, to CNN, it was his way of bringing the material to the world.

LIN: How widely dispersed do you think this information has been to al Qaeda around the world?

ROBERTSON: That is one of the things that concerns the experts who have looked at this material. The full library of 64 tapes we have contain many training tapes on how to make explosives, how to perform guerrilla tactics, assassinations, hijackings, that type of thing. Some of those tapes were made four years ago, and some of those tapes have been clearly made for disseminating information. They clearly -- for disseminating their knowledge. They go hand in hand with textbook manuals that CNN retrieved from an al Qaeda safehouse in Kabul earlier this year. The implication is, because, many of these tapes recorded several years ago, the information has been dispersed to al Qaeda and perhaps other terrorist organizations over the last few years.

LIN: Well, as you said, coming up throughout week, we are going to learn more about al Qaeda, as well as the mind set of Osama bin Laden. Good to see you, Nic. Thank you very much for the report.

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