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Al Qaeda provided training to Somali tribes who were fighting UN and U.S. forces, and Mohamed took part in this effort. More significantly, he was in the country during the U.S. intervention. In October 1993 Somali forces trained by al Qaeda— most likely including Mohamed—shot down a U.S. helicopter in the notorious “Black Hawk Down” incident that left eighteen Americans dead.

Bin Laden wasn’t done punishing the United States for having the temerity to try to save lives in Somalia. He asked Mohamed to start casing targets for another African attack. The former U.S. soldier dutifully surveilled a dozen locations in Nairobi, Kenya, taking pictures, drawing maps, and writing up reports on the security of each installation. He took his reports back to Khartoum. Bin Laden zeroed in on the photos Mohamed had taken of the U.S. embassy, pointing out where a truck bomb could be most effectively deployed. A second team selected the U.S. embassy in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, for a simultaneous attack. After the targets were chosen, Mohamed took teams back to Kenya to conduct advanced surveillance. They took their time—it would be nearly five years from surveillance to attack.16

As part of its covert war on the United States, al Qaeda wanted to obtain weapons of mass destruction. Bin Laden especially coveted a nuclear bomb. Another trusted American was dispatched to handle this effort: Mohamed Loay Bayazid, the American citizen jihadist from Kansas City who had been present at al Qaeda’s founding. It should be noted that Bayazid, who declined to be interviewed for this book, has denied all of what follows.17

In late 1993 or early 1994, Jamal Al Fadl, one of Al Qaeda’s earliest members who had been recruited by the Al Kifah Center in Brooklyn (see chapter 3), got a call from the head of al Qaeda’s financial committee. Someone in Khartoum had uranium to sell, and the asking price was $1.5 million. Al Fadl was sent to check it out and set up a meeting.

Bayazid was brought in to oversee the proposed transaction. Al Fadl and Bayazid went to meet the seller, switching cars along the way to foil any possible surveillance. At the meeting place, the seller brought out a cylinder two or three feet tall, engraved with technical details about the supposed contents. Bayazid carefully checked the information against the requirements to build a working nuclear bomb. It was a match. After the meeting, Bayazid arranged for a machine to be shipped from Kenya to test the material itself.

Al Fadl said that he was praised for his work and sent on his way. He never heard whether the material checked out or whether the purchase had been completed. Bayazid subsequently returned to the United States, where he became involved with the Benevolence International Foundation in Chicago, a charity that provided money and logistical assistance to al Qaeda.18

Al Qaeda needed cash badly. Osama bin Laden had been hemorrhaging money since he arrived in Sudan. Some of it was simply lost due to bad business decisions. More was lost to corruption, which included his own employees stealing from him. And running a global war—even an improvised war—involves substantial costs.19

In early 1995 Bin Laden dispatched his second-in-command, Ayman Al Zawahiri, to the United States on a fund-raising trip. Ali Mohamed was responsible for making the trip safe. Zawahiri traveled under an assumed name—Abd-al-Mu’izz—and, using forged documents obtained by Mohamed, toured several mosques in northern California. By one account, he raised as much as $500,000, although most people put the figure considerably lower: $3,000 or less.20

Despite his close relationship with both bin Laden and Zawahiri, not everyone in al Qaeda trusted Mohamed. Mohamed Atef, al Qaeda’s military commander at the time, told another al Qaeda member, L’Houssaine Kherchtou, not to disclose his travel plans to Mohamed. El Hage explained to Kherchtou that Atef feared Mohamed was working for the U.S. government.21

The nature