In March 2003, after this article was ready for press, Pakistan announced the simultaneous arrests in Rawalpindi of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, the financier of them. If true, this would discredit the oft-repeated FBI identification of "al-Hawsawi" as Saeed Sheikh, reported in my article. At the same time it would validate my hypothesis of a Pakistan/rump ISI epicenter for the 9/11 plot. (Robert Fisk has since written that Shaikh Mohammed, like Saeed Sheikh, "was an ISI asset" [Toronto Star, 3/3/03]; and the arrests allegedly followed that of Muhammad Abdel-Rahman, son of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman who was involved in the 1993 WTC bombing.

However the official version of the arrests is most dubious. Journalists immediately found so many problems and contradictions that a Guardian reporter commented, "The story appears to be almost entirely fictional." (Guardian, 3/6/03). Problems with the story were collected on March 4 in a telling on-line essay by Paul Thompson (http://www.complete911timeline.org/main/essayksmcapture.html). ISI then followed up with an unprecedented press conference showing an alleged video of the arrests. But according to Reuters, "few of journalists present were convinced the video -- which did not show Mohammed's face nor any sign of a struggle -- was genuine. Many said it looked like a crude reconstruction…. In the video, an ISI officer is seen briefing half a dozen agents about the impending raid -- in English, as opposed to Pakistan's Urdu mother tongue. Officials explained this was a reconstruction of the original Urdu briefing, but said the rest of the video was genuine" (http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/ISL285340). Paknews also transmitted skeptical comments on the video's failure to show the faces of the two plotters at the time of their alleged arrest (http://www.paknews.com/flash.php?id=26&date1=2003-03-11).

With respect to the alleged arrest of al-Hawsawi, Paul Thompson has succinctly summarized the conflicting accounts:

Initially he was described as an Egyptian. [Reuters, 3/2/03] Later officials were suggesting he might be Saif Adel [an Egyptian], Osama bin Laden's security chief. [Los Angeles Times, 3/3/03] Then, Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat said the third man was Somali, but gave no details. [Reuters, 3/3/03] Most recently, senior US intelligence officials are claiming the third man is Mustafa Ahmed Al-Hawsawi, a native of Saudi Arabia. He is said to be the main money man behind the 9/11 attacks. [Reuters, 3/3/03 (C), MSNBC, 3/3/03, MSNBC, 3/3/03 (B)] ….Considerable evidence suggests no such person by this name exists but was in fact an alias. Shortly after 9/11 it was reported that a man who had at least ten aliases, multiple birthdates, social security numbers and so forth transferred money to the hijackers using the name "Mustafa Ahmed." [Newsweek, 10/15/01]

The last point is a telling one: whatever the real name of the financier, it was probably not Mustafa Ahmed. (MSNBC still carries his name on the Web as "actually Shayk Saiid.")

The bottom line of this addendum is identical to that of my article. Whatever the truth about Saeed/al-Hawsawi, it is still being obscured by disinformation and/or cover-up, for reasons which probably implicate the ISI, and perhaps the CIA. It may be that the US role in this cover-up is part of a deal to secure Musharraf's cooperation in the pursuit of al-Qaeda. But this would only be one more example of how far the past abuses of CIA power have corrupted our processes of open government.