Hate club

"You know that al-Qaeda exists from Algeria to the Philippines ... it's everywhere."
—from a conversation secretly taped by the Italian police on March 22; the speaker was Essid Sami ben Khemais, a Tunisian arrested the next month for alleged terrorist offenses

It was the worst crime in American history, and it has triggered the greatest dragnet ever known. The investigation into the atrocities of Sept. 11 has involved police forces across the U.S. and around the world. From Michigan to Malaysia, from San Diego to Ciudad del Este, Paraguay, law-enforcement agencies have been trying to figure out how the terrorists carried out their attacks, who helped them—and what they might do next. Along the way, the American public has been introduced to a confusing mass of names and faces and has learned of more links between them than any but the most nimble fingered could ever untangle. After nearly two months, there is much that we know about the global terrorist network that goes by the name of al-Qaeda—but an awful lot that is still hunch. Still, an international investigation by TIME into al-Qaeda's structure reveals that it is more global in its range, and more ruthless in its ideology, than all but its most dedicated students could have ever imagined.

MORE STORIES Kabul: Eking out an Existence Baghran: Into Taliban Country Taliban: Why the bad guys get away More Stories >>> PHOTO ESSAYS Burden of Sanctuary Afghanistan's Women A Country Divided More Photos >>> CNN.com Asia Latest news on the War on Terror IN THIS WEEK'S ISSUE Inside Tora Bora Jan. 14, 2002 Past Issues Person of the Year Dec. 31, 2001 ----------------- Inside Tora Bora Dec. 24, 2001 ----------------- The Manhunt Dec. 17, 2001 ----------------- Qala-i-Jangi Dec. 10, 2001 ----------------- Unveiled at Last Dec. 3, 2001 ----------------- Hunting bin Laden Nov. 26, 2001 ----------------- First Blood Nov. 19, 2001 ----------------- Al-Qaeda's Reach Nov. 12, 2001 ----------------- War On   Two Fronts Nov. 5, 2001 ----------------- The Fear Factor Oct. 29, 2001 ----------------- The War   on Terror Oct. 22, 2001 ----------------- Facing the Fury Oct. 15, 2001 ----------------- Preparing   for Battle Oct. 8, 2001 ----------------- Target: Bin Laden Oct. 1, 2001 ----------------- America United Sept. 24, 2001 ----------------- Day of Infamy Sept. 14, 2001   INTERACTIVE GRAPHICS The World of Al-Qaeda Ramping Up the Ground War Mission Into Afghanistan More Graphics Workplace Safety Afghan Targets Anthrax Pathogen A Ground War An Uneasy Ally Targets Hit Search & Destroy Firepower & Food Frozen Assets Safety Guide Middle East Leaders Agents of Death Afghanistan Military Buildup Terrorist Cells Our Weapons Paths of Destruction Twin Terrors

The essential story of Sept. 11 is straightforward. A group of 19 men spent months in the U.S. preparing for the hijackings. The cell had earlier been headquartered in Hamburg, Germany, where its alleged ringleader, an Egyptian named Mohamed Atta, 33, had lived off and on for eight years. Atta is thought to have piloted Flight 11, the first to make impact; two of the other suspected pilots, Marwan Al-Shehhi and Ziad Samir Jarrah, were also residents of the Hamburg region. The Hamburg cell, in turn, is thought to have been an operating unit of a worldwide network of terrorists called al-Qaeda, the name of whose reclusive leader is now known all over the world: Osama bin Laden.

Al-Qaeda had its origins in the long war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. After Soviet troops invaded the country in 1979, Muslims flocked to join the local mujahedin in fighting them. In Peshawar, Pakistan, which acted as the effective headquarters of the resistance, a group whose spiritual leader was a Palestinian academic called Abdallah Azzam established a service organization to provide logistics and religious instruction to the fighters. The operation came to be known as al-Qaeda al-Sulbah—the "solid base." Much of its financing came from bin Laden, an acolyte of Azzam's who was one of the many heirs to a huge Saudi fortune derived from a family construction business. Also in Peshawar was Ayman Al-Zawahiri, an Egyptian doctor who had been a constant figure in the bewildering mosaic of radical Islamic groups since the late 1970s. Al-Zawahiri, who acted primarily as a physician in Peshawar, led a group usually called Al Jihad; by 1998, his organization was effectively merged into al-Qaeda.

In 1989, while on his way with his two sons to Friday prayers in Peshawar, Azzam was killed by a massive explosion. His killers have never been identified; Azzam had many enemies. But by the time of his death, the group around al-Qaeda were debating what to do with the skills and resources that they had acquired. The decision was taken to keep the organization intact and use it to fight for a purer form of Islam. The initial target was not the U.S. but the governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which al-Qaeda claimed were corrupt and too beholden to the U.S. It was only after the Gulf War, by which time bin Laden had moved his operations to Sudan (he would later be forced to shift back to Afghanistan), that he started to target Americans. To all but insiders, he first became notorious in 1998, when al-Qaeda operatives exploded truck bombs at the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, killing 12 Americans and hundreds of locals. Since then there has been a steady drumbeat of attacks linked to al-Qaeda—some successful, some not—on American targets and those of U.S. allies around the world.