NYT : Military Panel Sentences bin Laden Driver to a Short Term

Military Panel Sentences bin Laden Driver to a Short Term

By WILLIAM GLABERSON | August 8, 2008

GUANTÁNAMO BAY, Cuba — Rejecting a prosecution request for a severe sentence, a panel of military officers sentenced the convicted former driver for Osama bin Laden to five and a half years in prison on Thursday. The sentence means that the first detainee convicted after a war crimes trial here could complete his punishment by the end of this year.

The military judge, Capt. Keith J. Allred of the Navy, had already said that he planned to give the driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, credit for at least the 61 months he has been held since being charged, out of more than six years in all. That would bring Mr. Hamdan to the end of his criminal sentence in five months. After that his fate is unclear, because the Bush administration says that it can hold detainees here until the end of the war on terror.

The unexpectedly short sentence came after Mr. Hamdan was acquitted Wednesday of the most serious charge against him, conspiracy, having been convicted only of material support for terrorism. The extraordinary conclusion to the first of the post-Sept. 11 war crimes trials — a case that led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling in 2006 blocking a prior effort to prosecute him — once again raised many of the questions that have long surrounded the Bush administration’s military commission system here, which it plans to use to try another 80 detainees.

The sentence was far less than military prosecutors had sought. Through more than five years of proceedings, prosecutors had pursued a life sentence. Earlier in the day, faced with Mr. Hamdan’s acquittal on the most serious charge against him, the prosecutors recommended a sentence of at least 30 years and had said life might still be appropriate.

“Your sentence,” a prosecutor, John Murphy, told the panel, “should say the United States will hunt you down and give you a harsh but appropriate sentence if you provide material support for terrorism.”

Supporters of the military commission system and military prosecutors here said the sentence proved that the Bush administration’s system for trying detainees was legitimate and fair. David Rivkin, a Washington lawyer who has been a consistent supporter of the administration’s detention policies, said it would be difficult for anyone to criticize the system after the sentence.

“This is an enormously compelling indication of how independent the process has been,” Mr. Rivkin said.

The prosecutors said they would have preferred a longer sentence, but noted that they had won a conviction. “That’s the way a fair, open system works,” said one of the prosecutors, Maj. Omar Ashmawy. “The sentence isn’t always what the government asks for.”

Defense lawyers described the verdict as a victory propelled by the military officers on the panel, but they said it did not remedy what they have described as the system’s flaws.

“What ultimately happened, in spite of the system, was justice,” said Charles D. Swift, a former Navy lawyer who has forged a close relationship with Mr. Hamdan through more than five years of battles as his lawyer.

After just over an hour of deliberations on the sentence, the panel of six senior military officers returned to the windowless tribunal room with their sentence on the single war crimes charge on which they convicted him, providing material support to a terrorist organization.

After the president of the panel, the most senior officer, read the sentence, Mr. Hamdan rose at the defense table, collected himself and spoke. Referring to an apology he had made to victims of terrorism on Thursday morning in the same room, he began, “I would like to apologize one more time.”

Earlier he had told the military panel that he had continued working for Mr. bin Laden only because he felt he had no options and was trapped “between two fires,” fearing arrest for his ties to Mr. bin Laden or further involvement in his activities.

Because the Bush administration has not announced its long-term intentions for Mr. Hamdan, Judge Allred said he was not certain of Mr. Hamdan’s fate after the end of the criminal sentence. “After that, I don’t know what happens,” said Judge Allred, who had developed a warm relationship with Mr. Hamdan during months of pretrial hearings.

Asked after the sentence if Mr. Hamdan would continue to be held after the completion of his sentence, a Pentagon spokesman, Cmdr. Jeffrey D. Gordon, said he “would not speculate on that.”

Under military rules, a Pentagon official who has broad power over the military commission system here, Susan J. Crawford, has the power to reduce a military panel’s sentence but not to increase it. Ms. Crawford, who has the title of convening authority, is to review the decision here.

After the panel members filed out, Mr. Hamdan, who was captured in the Afghan war on Nov. 24, 2001, hugged Mr. Swift, who helped take his case to the Supreme Court. As he left the sparsely attended courtroom here, Mr. Hamdan, who at times has shown a mischievous sense of humor, raised his arms and said a good-natured, “Bye, bye everybody.”

During pretrial proceedings, Mr. Hamdan, a father of two daughters in Yemen, and the judge, a career Navy lawyer, had regularly exchanged smiles and, on occasion, chats. Before he left the bench, Judge Allred said a few parting words to the man he had gotten to know in a most unusual way.

“Mr. Hamdan,” Judge Allred said, “I hope the day comes that you are able to return to your wife and daughters and your country.”

“Inshallah,” Mr. Hamdan said in Arabic, before an interpreter gave the English translation of “God willing.”

“Inshallah,” Judge Allred responded.

The panel’s decision was the second short sentence handed down here. Last year, in the only other military commission case that has been completed, an Australian detainee, David Hicks, pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorism in exchange for a nine-month sentence.

Mr. Hamdan’s sentence immediately provoked a new discussion of the viability of the system here.

After years of legal battles, “this relatively light sentence could not possibly have been what the prosecution was hoping for — especially after all of the time, money and resources expended,” said Glenn M. Sulmasy, a law professor at the Coast Guard Academy who is an expert on national security law.

Critics of the system said their concerns about its fairness were underscored by the fact that even the judge and the prosecutors were unsure whether Mr. Hamdan would be freed at the completion of his sentence. “It was all for show if Mr. Hamdan does not go home in December,” Mr. Swift said.

In his final closing statement in the case, Mr. Swift told the panel members that he had been assigned the case while a Navy lawyer, and added that Mr. Hamdan had cooperated with interrogators, providing information about places in Afghanistan linked to Mr. bin Laden.

At the trial, the defense portrayed Mr. Hamdan as eager to work with his American captors, even helping in their hunt for Mr. bin Laden.

After the sentence, the lawyers were asked if it would be safe for Mr. Hamdan to return to his native Yemen. Charles Schmitz, a college professor who has worked for years as the defense team’s Arabic translator, said Mr. Swift had asked Mr. Hamdan that long ago.

Mr. Hamdan’s answer, Professor Schmitz said, was: “Look, you guys get me out of Gitmo. I’ll take care of Yemen.”

NYT : Bin Laden’s Former Driver Is Sentenced to 5 1/2 Years

Bin Laden’s Former Driver Is Sentenced to 5 1/2 Years

By WILLIAM GLABERSON | August 8, 2008

GUANTÁNAMO BAY, Cuba — Salim Ahmed Hamdan, the convicted former driver for Osama bin Laden, was sentenced Thursday to 66 months in prison by the military panel that convicted him of a war crime Wednesday.

The unexpectedly short sentence was far less than military prosecutors had sought. Through more than five years of legal proceedings against Mr. Hamdan, prosecutors had pursued a life sentence, and earlier in the day, faced with Mr. Hamdan’s acquittal on the most serious charge against him, prosecutors recommended a sentence of at least 30 years and said life may be appropriate.

Mr. Hamdan’s lawyers had recommended 45 months, or less than four years, as a reasonable sentence.

The military judge, Capt. Keith J. Allred of the Navy, had already said that he planned to give Mr. Hamdan credit for the 61 months he had been held, meaning that Mr. Hamdan could complete his criminal sentence in five months. After that his fate is unclear, because the Bush administration says that it can hold detainees here until the end of the war on terror.

After just over an hour of deliberations on the sentence, the panel of six senior military officers returned to the windowless tribunal room with their sentence on the single war crimes charge for which they convicted him Wednesday, providing material support to a terrorist organization.

After the president of the panel, the most senior officer, read the sentence, Mr. Hamdan rose at the defense table, collected himself for a moment and spoke. Referring to an apology he had made to victims of terrorism Thursday morning in the same room, he began: “I would like to apologize one more time to all the members. And I would like to thank you for what you have done for me.”

After Captain Allred explained the sentence to Mr. Hamdan, he said he was not certain of Mr. Hamdan’s fate after the end of the criminal sentence, in January. “After that, I don’t know what happens,” said Captain Allred, who had developed a warm relationship with Mr. Hamdan during months of pre-trial hearings.

In the courtroom after the military panel members filed out, Mr. Hamdan, who was captured in the middle of the Afghan war on Nov. 24, 2001, hugged the former American military lawyer, Charles Swift, who has represented him here for four years and helped take his case to the Untied States Supreme Court.

The sentence came after the first war crimes trial here in a system the administration says it plans to use to try about 80 other detainees here. Twenty other detainees are already facing charges.

Supporters of the military commission system immediately said the sentence proved that the Bush administration’s system for trying detainees here was legitimate and fair. David Rivkin, a Washington lawyer who has been a consistent supporter of the administration’s detention policies, said it would be difficult for anyone to criticize the system after the sentence.

“This is an enormously compelling indication of how independent the process has been,” Mr. Rivkin said. He added that the defense had been successful in portraying Mr. Hamdan as a marginal player in al Qaeda who had no involvement in terror planning.

Mr. Hamdan’s trial featured dueling images of the former bin Laden driver, with prosecutors portraying him as an unrepentant “Al Qaeda warrior,” and the defense portraying him as a poorly educated Yemeni who drove for Mr. bin Laden, often with a weapon, because he “had to earn a living.”

The panel appeared persuaded by an aggressive defense. On Wednesday it rejected the broader of the two prosecution charges, which asserted that Mr. Hamdan, a Yemeni with a fourth-grade education, conspired with Mr. bin Laden and other top Qaeda leaders.

It was not immediately clear how the Pentagon would handle Mr. Hamdan after the sentence. For years administration officials have maintained that, because detainees facing war crimes charges here are all classified as unlawful enemy combatants, they could continue to hold an accused even if he had completed a sentence or were acquitted by a military commission panel.

The sentence, which came Thursday afternoon, came after a brief hearing in the morning at which Mr. Hamdan stood surrounded by his exhausted legal team and delivered a statement apologizing to the victims of terror in a brief statement at a sentencing hearing on Thursday.

“It was a sorry or sad thing to see innocent people killed,” he said as he leaned on the defense table and gestured gently at the military tribunal here. “I personally present my apologies to them if anything what I did have caused them pain.”

He told the military panel deciding his sentence that he had continued working for Mr. bin Laden after a terror attack in 2000 only because he felt he had no options and was trapped “between two fires,” fearing arrest for his ties to Mr. bin Laden or further involvement in his activities.

As he left the sparsely attended courtroom in the hilltop courtroom here, Mr. Hamdan, who at times has shown a mischievous sense of humor, raised his arms and said a good-natured “bye, bye” to the small group.

During pretrial proceedings, Mr. Hamdan, a father of two daughters in Yemen, and the judge, a career Navy lawyer, had regularly exchanged smiles and, on occasion, chats. Before he left the bench, Judge Allred, said a few parting words to the man he had gotten to know in a most unusual way.

“Mr. Hamdan,” Judge Allred said, “I hope the day comes that you are able to return to your wife and daughters and your country.”

“God willing,” Mr. Hamdan said in the rudimentary English he picked up while in American custody.

“Insh-allah,” said Judge Allred, repeating the same phrase in Arabic.

The sentence was the second relatively short sentence handed down here. Last year an Australian detainee, David Hicks, pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorism in exchange for a nine-month sentence.

Mr. Hamdan’s sentence immediately provoked a new discussion of the viability of the system here.

After years of legal battles, “this relatively light sentence could not possibly have been what the prosecution was hoping for – especially after all of the time, money and resources expended,” said Glenn M. Sulmasy, a law professor at the Coast Guard Academy who is an expert on national security law.

But Professor Sulmasy said that an unintended, positive consequence of this sentence might be to strengthen the arguments of supporters of the administration’s system for war crimes trials that Mr. Hamdan’s trial demonstrated the fairness of the commissions.

Before they began deliberations, the panel members indicated they were considering rejecting the prosecution’s request for a severe sentence. The president of the panel, a Navy Captain who is the most senior member, sent the judge a note asking how they would credit Mr. Hamdan for the nearly seven years he has been in detention. The note asked, hypothetically, how the time served would be accounted for if the sentence were 10 years.

Under the rules here, four votes were required to impose a sentence of ten years or less. A sentence of more than ten years would require a vote of five of the six panel members.

Under military rules, a Pentagon official who has broad power over the military commission system here, Susan J. Crawford, has the power to reduce a military panel’s sentence but not to increase it. Ms. Crawford, who has the title of convening authority, is to review the decision here. After her decision, Mr. Hamdan’s lawyers can begin an appeals process at a military appeals court and then in civilian federal courts.

Mr. Hamdan’s statement was an unsworn plea for mercy permitted by the rules here. An unsworn statement is permitted to an accused instead of taking the witness chair and risking cross examination.

Mr. Hamdan, looking worn after a two-week trial, spoke in the makeshift courtroom here, saying his ties to Mr. bin Laden were “a work relationship only” and claiming that he had been troubled by the bombing of the American destroyer Cole in 2000 that killed 17 sailors.

He said he had once had a relationship of mutual respect with Mr. bin Laden but that after the Cole bombing, his views about his boss “changed a lot.” He said he needed money and had returned to work with Mr. bin Laden because he felt he had few options.

But a prosecutor, John Murphy, ridiculed the idea that a man would work for a killer instead of seeking other employment. He argued that there was no place for mercy, urging the panel to impose a sentence of no less than 30 years and possibly life, the maximum.

“Your sentence,” Mr. Murphy said, “should say the United States will hunt you down and give you a harsh but appropriate sentence if you provide material support for terrorism.” He argued for justice for the victims of al Qaeda’s terror attacks.

A defense lawyer, Charles Swift, reminded the panel members that Mr. Hamdan had cooperated with interrogators, providing information about places in Afghanistan linked to Mr. bin Laden.

He said a long sentence would discourage other potential sources of information about terror organizations from working with American forces. “The reward for cooperation is life?” Mr. Swift asked. “Does that help us in this struggle?”

Mr. Swift, who has represented Mr. Hamdan through years of legal battles, did not offer a proposed sentence. But he noted that the only detainee who has been sentenced by a military commission here, Mr. Hicks, received a sentence of nine months. Mr. Hicks pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorism last year and is now free.

Mr. Swift suggested that if the panel determined that Mr. Hamdan were five times more culpable than Mr. Hicks, the sentence would be 45 months, less than four years.

Mr. Swift, a former Navy lawyer, argued that a sentence in proportion to Mr. Hamdan’s participation as a driver would help make meaningful some future verdict against the planners of the 2001 terror attacks.

“At some point,” he said, “we will bring the people who conspired, the people who brought those buildings down, and that’s going to be a great day.”

Mr. Swift said that a sentence that is modest by comparison to a potential sentence against the Sept. 11 plotters would help give that eventual sentence its proper significance. “And it will be all the more meaningful because we got the guys who did it, not the driver.”

NYT : Panel Convicts bin Laden Driver in Split Verdict

Panel Convicts bin Laden Driver in Split Verdict

By WILLIAM GLABERSON | August 7, 2008

GUANTÁNAMO BAY, Cuba — A panel of six military officers convicted a former driver for Osama bin Laden of one of two war crimes charges on Wednesday but acquitted him of the other, completing the first military commission trial here and the first conducted by the United States since the aftermath of World War II.

In a setback for the military prosecutors, the commission acquitted the former driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, of a conspiracy charge, arguably the more serious of the two charges he faced. At a trial that included references to the landmark Nuremberg war-crimes trials of Nazi leaders in the 1940s, Mr. Hamdan was convicted on a separate charge of providing material support for terrorism.

The split verdict gave both sides in the long debate over the procedures here grounds for their competing claims. Supporters said the system’s fairness was illustrated by the careful verdict, while critics said the trial, which featured secret evidence and closed proceedings, demonstrated the injustice of the Bush administration’s military commission system.

Mr. Hamdan, who has said he is about 40, could be sentenced by the panel to anything from no imprisonment to a life term. The sentence is to be determined after a separate proceeding before the same panel, which began Wednesday afternoon, after the announcement of the verdict. At that hearing, the defense worked to portray Mr. Hamdan sympathetically as a man with few choices who felt “betrayed by bin Laden” when he learned about terrorist attacks.

The sentence is expected to be announced as soon as Thursday. Its severity could provide an insight into the military panel’s view of the case, which has been criticized because Mr. Hamdan was a minor figure in Al Qaeda.

On Wednesday, the judge granted a defense request that Mr. Hamdan be credited for more than five years of pretrial confinement since he was first charged in 2003. If the panel imposes a short sentence, lawyers said, the administration would be under increased pressure to justify continuing to hold a detainee who might already have completed his term after a conviction.

The Bush administration has long asserted that it could continue to hold detainees even if they were acquitted or given short sentences because they are designated enemy combatants who, according to the administration, can be held until the end of the war on terror.

As the verdict was read just after 10 a.m. on Wednesday in an old airport building at the isolated naval station here, Mr. Hamdan, a Yemeni who has been in custody since he was detained in Afghanistan in November 2001, stood passively at the defense table. He wore a traditional white headscarf. His head was bent slightly to one side.

The conviction of Mr. Hamdan, who was part of a select group of drivers and bodyguards for Mr. bin Laden until 2001, was a long-sought, if qualified, victory for the Bush administration, which has been working to begin military commission trials here for nearly seven years.

The six senior military officers on the panel deliberated for eight hours over three days. Four votes in a secret ballot were required for conviction.

Critics have long contended that the military commission system does not meet American standards, partly because it allows hearsay evidence and evidence derived through coercive interrogation methods.

The verdict did not mute the critics. Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA, said the trial “revealed what is common knowledge — the military commissions are fatally flawed and do not adhere to major aspects of the rule of law.”

But the military prosecutors said the verdict supported their contentions that Mr. Hamdan was a “career Al Qaeda warrior” who was pledged to protect Mr. bin Laden from the mid-1990s until after the Sept. 11 attacks. The chief military prosecutor, Col. Lawrence J. Morris of the Army, added that the verdict validated the system “as an extraordinarily fair, open and just process that produces a reliable result.”

Michael J. Berrigan, the deputy chief defense counsel for Guantánamo, said the defense was encouraged by the verdict. “For a team that was expected to strike out at every pitch,” Mr. Berrigan said, “we at least hit a triple.”

He described the conspiracy charge that was rejected by the panel as the government’s main charge, and noted that when Mr. Hamdan was originally charged in 2003 the only charge he faced was conspiracy.

Charles D. Swift, a former Navy lawyer who has represented Mr. Hamdan for years, said the case would eventually reach the American court system, which he predicted would correct legal errors here. Mr. Swift called the military commission “a made-up tribunal to try anybody we don’t like.”

Defense lawyers have long argued that the charge on which Mr. Hamdan was convicted, material support for terrorism, has not historically been part of the international law of war, which is the law applied by the military commissions. Prosecutors say that, although the term “material support” may not have existed historically, the laws of war have long prohibited stealthy attacks on civilians, the mainstay of terrorism groups.

After an appeal to a military appeals court, convicted detainees can take their cases to a civilian federal appeals court and, potentially, to the Supreme Court.

The panel rejected two specifications that would have supported a conviction for conspiracy. One asserted that Mr. Hamdan was part of the larger conspiracy with senior Qaeda leaders and shared responsibility for terror attacks including the 2001 terror attack.

The second conspiracy specification rejected by the panel asserted that Mr. Hamdan was part of a conspiracy to kill Americans in Afghanistan in 2001 with shoulder-fired missiles.

But the panel voted to convict Mr. Hamdan of five of eight specifications that made up the charge of providing material support for terrorism. The specifications included accusations that he drove Mr. bin Laden, served as his bodyguard, was a member of Al Qaeda and knew its goals.

During the sentencing hearing the judge, Keith J. Allred, a Navy captain, told the panel members that the specifications were duplicative and that they should sentence Mr. Hamdan as if he had been convicted of only one specification.

For the Bush administration, a conviction on any charge represented a singular victory, partly because a case brought on Mr. Hamdan’s behalf reached the Supreme Court in 2006. That case, Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, ended with a ruling that derailed the Bush administration’s first plan for military commission trials here.

Tony Fratto, the deputy White House press secretary, said the administration was pleased that Mr. Hamdan received a fair trial, with an opportunity to present a defense against serious charges.

“The military commission convicted Hamdan of material support for terrorism,” Mr. Fratto said in a statement. “The military commission system is a fair and appropriate legal process for prosecuting detainees alleged to have committed crimes against the United States or our interests. We look forward to other cases moving forward to trial.”

The two-week trial included references by both sides to the Nuremberg trials.

Prosecutors, eager to shore up the image of the commissions here, presented a video that included graphic images of Qaeda terror attacks and their victims that they titled “The Al Qaeda Plan,” in reference to “The Nazi Plan,” a film shown at Nuremberg to document the Holocaust.

The defense noted that Hitler’s driver, Erich Kempka, was not prosecuted as a war criminal at Nuremberg.

Much of the case against Mr. Hamdan was based on his own descriptions of his role as a driver collected by federal agents in more than 40 interrogations, including some that lasted many days.

In the sentencing hearing on Wednesday afternoon, a psychiatrist called by the defense described Mr. Hamdan’s feeling of having been betrayed by Mr. bin Laden, although she did not fully explain why.

The psychiatrist, Dr. Emily A. Keram, also described what she said was Mr. Hamdan’s emotional reaction to seeing “The Al Qaeda Plan” at his trial, with its images of attacks and screaming victims.

Dr. Keram said that Mr. Hamdan had described being shocked by the images. “He told me that it was hard on his soul,” she said, adding that “he felt that his head was going to explode.”

Prosecutors argued that Mr. Hamdan had protected and ferried Mr. bin Laden to elude detection, including after the Sept. 11 attacks. However small his role in Al Qaeda, they said, people like Mr. Hamdan make Al Qaeda possible.

Defense lawyers argued that there was no evidence that Mr. Hamdan was involved in planning any Qaeda operations or had advance knowledge of them. They contended that his role as a driver was just a job for a father of two who “had to earn a living,” as one of his lawyers, Harry H. Schneider Jr., said.

WaPo : Hamdan Seen as 'Not Fit' for Terror

Hamdan Seen as 'Not Fit' for Terror

Alleged 9/11 Architect Says bin Laden's Driver Was 'Not a Soldier'

By Jerry Markon | Washington Post Staff Writer | August 2, 2008

GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba, Aug. 1 -- Osama bin Laden's former driver was a "primitive" chauffeur and mechanic who "was not fit to plan or execute" terrorist attacks, the self-described mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks told jurors in writing Friday at the driver's military trial.

Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the alleged Sept. 11 architect, wrote that Salim Ahmed Hamdan was a low-level support staffer who never joined al-Qaeda and did not share bin Laden's ideology. Hamdan is on trial in the first U.S. military commission since World War II. His lawyers rested their case Friday, and closing arguments are scheduled for Monday.

"He did not play any role. He was not a soldier, he was a driver," Mohammed said in answers to written questions from Hamdan's lawyers that were relayed to the six military jurors. "His nature was more primitive (Bedouin) person and far from civilization. He was not fit to plan or execute."

The testimony provided another tantalizing glimpse inside the mind of Mohammed, who has been charged in the most devastating terrorist attack in U.S. history and has been a figure of intrigue since his arrest in 2003. He sketched out a vision of al-Qaeda as a group whose members also have "wives and children and schools" and said that anyone who thinks a mere driver would be involved in attacks "is a fool."

Attorneys for Hamdan, who is charged with ferrying weapons for al-Qaeda as part of a terrorism conspiracy, had wanted Mohammed to testify live in court at the U.S. detention facility here. They had told jurors there was "a significant chance" they would hear from the perpetrators of the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

But Mohammed, after answering written questions, refused to meet with Hamdan's lawyers and declined to appear in court. His written remarks back up the defense's argument that Hamdan was a mere chauffeur uninvolved in terrorism. But it is uncertain if a military jury will take the word of an accused al-Qaeda leader.

The statements of Mohammed, who first appeared in court in June and railed at the military commission system that is expected to try him as well, revealed no lack of self-confidence. He called himself the "executive director of 9/11" and said he oversaw all al-Qaeda cells operating outside Afghanistan. He dismissed drivers such as Hamdan, a Yemeni father of two with a fourth-grade education, as mostly "illiterate."

His statement said Americans do not understand that al-Qaeda is a multifaceted terrorist organization that also employs a support network of professionals, such as teachers and computer engineers. "We are not gangs," he wrote.

"As the American Army (we) have drivers, cooks, crewmen and legal personal," Mohammed wrote, according to a translation from his original Arabic that was provided to the jurors. "We also, are human beings . . . we have interests in life. Our people have wives and children and schools. . . . You can not understand terrorism and Al-Qaeda from 9/11 operation."

He said al-Qaeda has been able to carry out its attacks successfully because of the group's diffuse structure and penchant for secrecy.

"One of the reasons for the success of the outside operations is the secrecy of the operations," Mohammed wrote. "So many of (bin Laden's) inner circles have no knowledge of what he was planning and so many of Al-Qaeda's members and even the trainers at the military camps do not have any knowledge of the works of the outside cells. That includes the civilian employees."

Hamdan, whom prosecution witnesses have described as personally close to bin Laden, was a mere cog in the al-Qaeda structure, the self-proclaimed terrorist leader wrote. "He was a driver and auto mechanic . . . he was not at all a military man," Mohammed said. "He is fit to change trucks' tires, change oil filters, wash and clean cars, and fasten cargo in pick up trucks."

Mohammed also attempted to shed light on what Hamdan was doing when he was captured in Afghanistan in November 2001. Prosecution witnesses testified that Hamdan had two shoulder-fired missiles in his car when he was arrested and that he told interrogators he transported weapons for al-Qaeda.

After the United States attacked Afghanistan following Sept. 11, Hamdan's job was to transport "Al-Qaeda's families" out of harm's way, Mohammed said. He would know, Mohammed added, because "I was personally responsible for transporting and getting out all families from Afghanistan to Pakistan."

A statement by another detainee also said Hamdan was not involved.