Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, is a Kuwaiti-born Pakistani militant, and the former head of propaganda for al-Qaeda., he is held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp under terrorism-related charges. He was named as "the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks" in the 2004 9/11 Commission Report.
Mohammed was a member of Osama bin Laden's militant organization al-Qaeda, leading al-Qaeda's propaganda operations from around 1999 until late 2001. Mohammed was captured on 1 March 2003, in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi by a combined operation of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence. Immediately after his capture, Mohammed was extraordinarily rendered to secret CIA prison sites in Afghanistan, then Poland, where he was interrogated and tortured by U.S. operatives. By December 2006, he had been transferred to military custody at Guantanamo Bay detention camp.
Mohammed is widely regarded as the chief planner of the September 11 attacks. He also participated in planning Richard Reid’s shoe bombing attempt to blow up an airliner; the 2002 Bali bombings in Indonesia; the 1993 World Trade Center bombing; the murder of Daniel Pearl and various foiled attacks as well as numerous other crimes. He was charged in February 2008 with war crimes and murder by a U.S. military commission at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, which could carry the death penalty if convicted. In 2012, a former military prosecutor criticized the proceedings as insupportable due to confessions gained under torture. A 2008 decision by the United States Supreme Court 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. 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 His plea deal was revoked by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin two days later. In July 2025, the plea deal was voided by a D.C. appeals court in a 2–1 ruling.
Early life and education
Mohammed was born on 14 April 1965, to Baloch parents, in Kuwait. His father, Shaikh Muhammad Ali Dustin al-Baluchi, was a Deobandi imam in Al Ahmadi, who moved with his family from Balochistan, Pakistan; to Kuwait in the 1950s. His mother was Halema Mohammed. Mohammed was raised in Badawiya, a neighborhood of the Fahaheel suburb of Kuwait City. Mohammed is the uncle of Ramzi Yousef, who was convicted on terrorism charges for his part in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and Ammar Al Baluchi, who is accused of involvement in multiple terror plots. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is one of at least five siblings -- four boys and a girl. His brothers' names are Zahed ; Abed, and Aref. Mohammed is fluent in Balochi, Urdu, Arabic, and English.According to U.S. federal documents, in 1982 he had heard Abdulrab Rasul Sayyaf's speech in which a call for jihad against the Soviets was declared. At age 16, he joined the Muslim Brotherhood. After graduating from high school in 1983, Mohammed travelled to the United States and enrolled at Chowan University in Murfreesboro, North Carolina. He later transferred to North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and received a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering in 1986.
The following year, he went to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he and his brothers, including Zahed, joined the mujahideen forces engaged in the Soviet–Afghan War. He attended the Sada training camp run by Abdallah Azzam, 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 in Pakistan. By 1993, Mohammed had married and moved his family to Qatar, 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 favoring Israel."
However, on 29 August 2009, The Washington Post reported from U.S. intelligence sources that Mohammed's time in the U.S. contributed to his radicalization:
"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."
Terrorist activities
Operation Bojinka
Mohammed traveled to the Philippines in 1994 to work with his nephew Ramzi Yousef on the Bojinka plot, a Manila-based plot to destroy 12 commercial airliners flying routes between the United States, East Asia, and Southeast Asia. He identified as a Saudi or a Qatari plywood exporter and used the aliases "Abdul Majid" and "Salem Ali." The 9/11 Commission Report says that "this marked the first time KSM took part in the actual planning of a terrorist operation."In December 1994, Ramzi Yousef had engaged in a test of a bomb on Philippine Airlines Flight 434 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.
Mohammed was indicted on terrorism charges in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York 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. In early 1996, Mohammed returned to Afghanistan to avoid capture by U.S. authorities. In his flight from Qatar, he was sheltered by Sheikh Abdullah Al Thani, who was the Qatari Minister of Religious Affairs in 1996.
Relationship with Osama bin Laden
By the time the Bojinka plot 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, Yemen, Malaysia, and Brazil to visit elements of the worldwide jihadist 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, 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 Afghanistan, 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, 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 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 and Dar es Salaam.
In 1997, Mohammed moved his family from Iran to Karachi, Pakistan. That year, he tried unsuccessfully to join mujahideen leader Ibn al-Khattab in Chechnya, 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 and join al-Qaeda as a full-fledged member. Eventually, he became leader of al-Qaeda's media committee.
Plan for the 11 September 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. Bin Laden rejected some potential targets suggested by Mohammed, such as the U.S. Bank Tower 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, Osama bin Laden, and his military chief, Mohammed Atef. Bin Laden led the plot and provided financial support. He was also involved in selecting the participants, including choosing Mohamed Atta 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, which represented the U.S. economy; the Pentagon, 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 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 the USA for supporting Israel and wanted to move up the attack date. Mohammed argued for ensuring the teams were prepared:
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 journalist Yosri Fouda, Mohammed admitted that he and Ramzi bin al-Shibh were involved in the "Holy Tuesday operation". 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 another interview, in April 2002, with Yosri Fouda, Mohammed and 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."