[ejlo]

He seems to have completely missed the reason for 9/11, which is not strange since it was not until the 2004 speech (http://worldpress.org/Americas/1964.cfm) that bin Laden explained the reason for the attacks, namely "bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy".

In this light it must be regarded as a great success, not a failure, especially since the self bleeding politics continued without much opposition long after 2004.

[namdnay]

It seems likely that this was a post hoc justification by Bin Laden.

[tristanj]

No, he only started saying that after the US occupied Iraq. Before the invasion his justification against America had strong religious basis. It's especially clear from his earlier writings.

http://www.mideastweb.org/osamabinladen1.htm

[ejlo]

It would have been quite stupid, though, to reveal the plan too early.

[tristanj]

The thesis "Bin Laden destroyed the 9/11 towers to bankrupt America" makes very little sense when you dig into it. It would mean Bin Laden planned to:

- destroy the twin towers so

- the U.S. would justify an invasion of Iraq and

- actually invade Iraq

- and occupy Iraq for a prolonged period of time (and not quickly pull out)

- so America would devote resources here

- thus bankrupting itself

Steps 2 and 3 (and possible 4) are huge leaps of faith. It's absurd to believe he planned all that out. It clearly fails Occam's Razor. Plus, it doesn't fit with the historical context of what he said and wrote at the time.

[ejlo]

Of course, things turned out way better for him than he could have planned, but that doesn't rule out that there was some plan behind it.

Step 1. He also attacked pentagon and Washington. Imaging if the latter had succeeded! It's not hard to predict the reaction to such an event.

Step 2. I think he tried to provoke the attack on Afghanistan. Iraq was later.

Step 4. With the terrain in Afghanistan, a quick war is not possible.

[tristanj]

I'm not sure why you're clinging to this? The motivations behind the September 11 attacks have been widely discussed, see here for a summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motives_for_the_September_11_a.... You'll see bankruptcy or causing economic damage is not mentioned anywhere. Bankruptcy came into the picture after 9/11, when then US was prepping invasion of Iraq.

If you really believe "Bin Laden destroyed the 9/11 towers to bankrupt America", do find some pre-9/11 evidence of this and update the Wiki page so others can know.

[marcosdumay]

How do you know this isn't post-fact rationalization from him?

I'll agree that 9/11 was successful. Bin Laden clearly wanted to damage the US in some way, and got deeper damages than he could dream about. But I doubt he had any intention of "bleeding them at the point of bankruptcy" at the planning stage.

[ejlo]

Of course, it's difficult to know for sure if that was the original plan or not. However the actions seem to be quite consistent with that strategy: Choosing Afghanistan (the grave of empires) as the base of operations, and the selection of targets in the attack looks like an attempt to enrage, not just to cause fear.

Whatever the actual plan was, I do think it involved provoking US to attack Afghanistan.