Osama Bin Laden Biography: The World's Most Wanted Man
Osama bin Laden
Osama bin Laden
He was the world’s most wanted international
terrorist – the Svengali-like a leader at
the helm of a violent political movement that
brought havoc and destruction the world over.
His name became instantly familiar – Osama
bin Laden.
We all recognized his image; the long, drawn
face, the scraggly beard, the turban.
Yet, discovering the man behind the image
has never been easy, causing him to be referred
to as a ‘fact-checkers nightmare.’
Only now, 6 years after his death, are we
able to piece together a complete profile
of the life and death of the man at the forefront
of a violent political movement that significantly
impacted our world.
In this week’s Biographie, we discover the
the truth about Osama bin Laden.
* * *
Formative Years
Osama bin Laden was born into a wealthy industrialist
family in the city of Riyadh in 1957.
His father, Mohammed bin Laden, was a builder
and contractor, who, during his lifetime had
eleven wives and at least fifty-two children.
His mother was a petite Syria woman.
Mohammed was an ambitious businessman who
had brought his family from Yemen to Saudi
Arabia in the hopes of both advancing his
own professional opportunities and providing
opportunities for his sons.
Things went well, and the elder bin Laden
built important social relationships and
forged enduring bonds with notable members
of Saudi society, including members of the
House of Saud – Saudi Arabia’s ruling
family.
Mohammed built the bin Laden Construction
Corporation into one of the largest and most
profitable construction businesses in the
The Middle East.
As he became more successful, Mohammad further
strengthened his bond with the Saudi Royal
family.
He used his money and influence to bolster
the image of the House of Saud.
In return, King Faisal decreed that all the
nation’s construction contracts would be
awarded to the bin Laden Corporation.
Mohammad bin Laden died in a plane crash in
1967.
The ten-year-old Osama was told at the funeral
by King Faisal that ‘today I have lost my
right hand.’
The Construction Corporation was taken over
by Osama’s older brothers.
By the mid-1990’s it was worth around $36
billion.
Osama was groomed to enter the family business.
After successfully completing high school,
he furthered his education at King Abdul Aziz
University.
There he studied economics and management
with an eye to a future in business.
He also learned the behind-the-scenes dynamics
of the family enterprise.
Unlike Osama, most of his brothers chose to
attend Western Universities where they were
not constricted by Islamic tradition.
This was particularly true of Osama’s half-brother
Salim.
Known for his good looks and charm, Salim
was educated in London and flew his own private
plane.
In the early 1970s, Osama, now in his mid-teens,
began to enjoy the excesses of wealth.
He would regularly make the trip to Beirut,
Lebanon to take in the excitement of the city’s
fast-paced nightlife.
He spent hours frequenting bars, nightclubs
and casinos and often drank more than he should
have.
He also began enjoying the company of beautiful
young women.
Spiritual Awakening
Around 1975, however, Osama bin Laden had
a spiritual rebirth, causing him to return
to Islam with a fervent devotion that altered
his goals and lifestyle dramatically.
It began when he decided to help with restoration
work on two mosques.
At the same time, he began meeting with Islamic
fundamentalists and reading more about the
teachings of Islam.
Within weeks he had disowned his former loose
way of life and become a devout Muslim.
At the age of twenty, Osama entered an arranged
marriage with a devout Syrian woman who was
a distant cousin.
Together they immersed themselves in Islamic
Fundamentalism, rejecting Western values and
priorities and condemning its greatest proponent,
the United States.
When Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal was killed
by his deranged nephew, bin Laden’s anti-American
sentiments were reinforced.
The king’s nephew had been educated in the
The United States and had become completely westernized.
Bin Laden was thrilled when, in 1979, a fundamentalist
the religious leader is known as Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini overthrew the Shah of Iran, who was
seen as a puppet of the United States.
For the first time, Islamic fundamentalists
had seized a Muslim country and established
an Islamic state.
It gave undeniable proof that radical Islamic
forces could prevail over Western decadency.
Then, towards the end of 1979, the Soviet
Union invaded the largely Muslim nation of
Afghanistan.
Soviet forces were ruthless, pouring overwhelming
firepower on the Afghanistan resistance.
They killed the Afghanistan president, and
put their own government in place.
Middle Eastern Arab nations were alarmed.
They were all sympathetic to the Afghani cause,
but knew that none of them had the ability
to take on the Soviet war machine.
Yet, Islamic fundamentalist militants were
determined to do something.
Ousting the Soviets and restoring Islam in
its purest sense fit their definition of jihad,
or Holy War.
Thousands of young men, united by Islam rather
than national boundaries, traveled to Afghanistan
to risk their lives for their beliefs.
Among them was Osama bin Laden.
Afghanistan
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was the
the impetus that took Osama bin Laden out of his
comfortable life of privilege and into his
reincarnation as a freedom fighter.
Yet, unlike many others, he did not unthinkingly
grab an AK-47 and rush off to the desert to
join the guerrilla army.
His first stop was Pakistan, where he set
up recruitment, station to bring Muslims
from surrounding Arab nations to the cause
of jihad.
It soon became clear that his business background
and money was going to be a huge asset.
He organized training camps where the recruits
learned the art of strategic warfare.
Bin Laden knew that the thousands of eager
young men he was gathering together needed
a support network.
So, he also began recruiting doctors, bomb
experts, military strategists, and engineers
from all over the Arab world.
His family’s building background impelled
him to build the infrastructure that would
be needed to defeat the Soviets.
Men who had come to fight soon found themselves
digging trenches, paving roads and building
hospitals and depots.
During the 1980s, bin Laden was instrumental
in bringing together in Afghanistan and nearby
areas of Pakistan more than twenty-five thousand
Muslim fighters from at least thirty-five
countries across the Muslim world.
Yet, support also came from the most unlikely
of places – the United States.
The U.S. was fixated on stopping Soviet expansion
and so we're willing to support Islamic efforts
to remove the Communist invaders from Afghanistan.
Despite their hatred of the United States,
the jihadists gladly accepted their backing
– after all, it meant money, weapons and
supplies.
Still, they made sure that the Americans stayed
well clear of their operations.
One Islamic intelligence officer noted that
‘no American instructor was ever involved
in giving training on any kind of weapon or
equipment to the mujahideen,’ or holy fighters.
Bin Laden was instrumental in securing from
the United States ‘stingers’, which were
heat-seeking ground-to-air missiles with the
ability to bring down a Soviet fighter plane.
With the aid of American stingers, bin Laden’s
men could bring down at least 270 Soviet aircraft.
Through their fixation on defeating the Soviets
by whatever means necessary, the U.S was
creating a monster.
As well as bringing money, resources and organizational
skill to the jihadist cause, bin Laden fought
alongside his fellow jihadists.
One of his troops recalled . . .
He was a hero to us because he was on the
front line, always moving ahead of everybody
else.
He not only gave us money, but he also gave
himself.
He came down from his palace to live with
the Afghan peasants and the Arab fighters.
He cooked with them, ate with them, dug trenches
with them.
That was bin Laden’s way.
Bin Laden was not afraid of death, convinced
that there was a special place in the hereafter
for those who participated in jihad.
He often stated that one day of fighting in
Afghanistan was like a thousand days of praying
in an ordinary mosque.
As a result, he was more than willing to become
a martyr for the cause.
Conquering Hero
In 1989, after a painful decade, the Soviets
finally withdrew from Afghanistan.
Osama bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia with
the reputation of a jihadist hero.
He was hugely popular amongst the common people,
and the ruling family saw friendship with
him as a way to quell criticism from Islamic
fundamentalists, who saw them as too western.
Bin Laden milked his hero status for all it
was worth.
He spoke at mosques and other places, often
drawing large crowds of young men who were
inspired to help create an Islamic fundamentalist
world.
His speeches, filled with venom against the
The United States were often taped, with over
a million copies circulating around the Mulsim
world.
Despite returning to the rich embrace of his
family, Osama did not avail himself of the
a lavish lifestyle that was available to him.
He moved into a modest apartment with his
wife and children and did his best to live
according to strict Islamic teachings.
Yet, a fire was smoldering inside him.
That fire was inflamed in August 1990 when
Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein invaded the neighboring
the nation of Kuwait, with Saudi Arabia looking
to be his next target.
Panic rose in the House of Saudi.
Bin Laden stepped up to offer his assistance,
his experience in Afghanistan allowed him
to map out a battle strategy to save his country.
He was determined that any Iraqi aggression
would be met my Muslim forces alone.
To call on the West for help would be, he
argued, contrary to Islamic teachings and
demoralizing to the nation.
Bin Laden warned the Saudi government that
assistance from the U.S. would mean that Islamic
fundamentalists would withdraw their support.
But Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Défense,
Prince Sultan knew that even bin Laden’s
forces could not defend his country from the
air, naval or chemical and biological weapons
attacks that Saddam Hussein had at his disposal.
On one occasion, bin Laden burst in the Prince’s
office and yelled,
There is no need for American troops!
Yet, when the prince asked him how he would
save the people from an Iraqi chemical weapon
the attack, he could only reply . . .
We will defeat them with our faith.
The Saudi Government did turn to the United
States for help.
The result was the Gulf War – a U.S. led
Western assault on Iraq.
Saddam was pushed back and his threat negated.
However, to the outrage of bin Laden and his
fundamentalist followers, U.S. military forces
remained in the region in case Saddam made
any further aggressive moves.
The House of Saudi, who had not long before
seen association with bin Laden as an asset,
now got nervous at Osama’s hero status and
huge popularity.
They warned him to restrain from making negative
public comment about their reliance on the
West, threatening to remove the lucrative
public contracts that had been given to the
family business.
Exile
The relationship between bin Laden and the
House of Saud quickly deteriorated to the
the point that, in 1991, he was expelled from
the country.
Three years later his citizenship was revoked.
He fled to Sudan with his immediate family,
which now included three wives and fifteen
children.
They moved into a brick and stucco home in
Khartoum where he lived a simple and deeply
religious life.
In Sudan, bin Laden quickly found support
for his ideology, which was fiercely opposed
to any collaboration with the West.
His goal was to overthrow regimes that were
friendly to the U.S. and establish in their
place true Islamic states.
The first step towards that end would be to
strike at U.S. targets throughout the world.
By doing so, it was believed that the United
States would be forced to withdraw from the
The Middle East.
Then, the governments that been propped up
by America could easily be toppled.
The nucleus of the terrorist organization
that would bring about these changes was a
the group that bin Laden helped develop.
It was called al-Qaeda.
From their base in Sudan, experienced al-Qaeda
leaders were sent to various parts of the
a world where there were large Muslim populations.
Their mission was to incite an Islamic revolution
and carry out acts of terrorism.
In his first year in Sudan, bin Laden became
a disciple of Hassan Abdallah al-Turabi, the
Islamic spiritual leader of Sudan.
While Turabi helped Osama to deepen his spiritual
development, bin Laden, in turn, built up
Turabi’s jihadist group, the Popular International
Organization or PIO.
He also built connections with various international
financial institutions to channel money towards
his growing terror networks.
At the same time, he could smuggle terrorists
into the United States by arranging for them
to be employees of companies owned by wealthy
pro-Islamic Middle eastern businessmen.
Meanwhile, within Sudan, bin Laden established
a building company is known as the al-Hijrah
for Construction and Development Ltd.
Its sole purpose was to build an infrastructure
in Sudan to move the equipment, vehicles,
and weaponry needed to expedite terrorist
acts.
International Terrorist
By the mid-1990’s bin Laden had established
a worldwide reputation as a revolutionary,
with thousands of young jihadists idolizing
him and dreaming of being just like him.
The first bombing attack that was credited
to bin Laden was the December 29, 1992 attack
on two hotels in Aden, Yemen.
Both hotels were frequently used by U.S. military
personnel in the area.
Three people were killed and five more were
wounded in the attack.
This was part of a concerted effort to oust
the Americans from the Horn of Africa and
assert fundamentalist Islamic power in the
region.
The focus of the action was Somalia, where
bin Laden organized fierce fighting against
U.S. forces who were there for humanitarian
purposes.
Bin Laden counted the withdrawal of U.S, troops
from Mogadishu as among his most significant
victories against the U.S.
Following his actions in Somalia, bin Laden
turned his attention to Europe.
His first step was to bolster the Islamic
fundamentalist movement in the Balkans, before
setting his sights on Western Europe and the
The United States.
Muslim communities in these places were saturated
with pro-Islamic, anti-Western propaganda.
Bin Laden also relied heavily on e-mail and
the internet to get the word out.
In 1995, al-Qaeda turned its attention back
to the Middle Eastern nations that it believed
were roadblocks to the establishment of Islamic
fundamentalist regimes throughout the Muslim
world.
Bin Laden saw Egypt and Saudi Arabia as the
two biggest local obstacles to his cause.
In Saudi Arabia, he became obsessed with overthrowing
the House of Saud.
In November 1995, he orchestrated the bombing
of a U.S. Military training center in Riyadh,
killing seven people.
The House of Saud was outraged at the attack,
convinced that bin Laden was behind it.
A few days after the attack, four mercenaries
from Yemen opened fire with AK-47’s outside
of his residence in Sudan.
Bin Laden’s bodyguards returned fire and,
within minutes, three of the assailants and
two bodyguards were dead.
From that day on, Osama bin Laden’s house
and the street was transformed into an armed
camp.
It wasn’t just the House of Saud that were
after him.
In 1996, a U.S. Special Forces operation was
launched to capture bin Laden, with the aid
of America friendly Mulsim nations.
From now on, he refused to venture out of
Sudan. But then both Saudi Arabia and the U.S.
turned up the screws, threatening economic
sanctions on Sudan unless they handed bin
Laden over.
He was quietly asked to leave and he and his
wife and children headed for Afghanistan in
May 1996.
Safely ensconced in Afghanistan, bin Laden
now fully embraced the role of international
leader of the Islamic extremist movement.
To stay alive, though, he had to surround
himself with many bodyguards.
He established a three-room operations base
in a cave that had been carved out of the
mountainside, that was equipped with basic
furnishings.
His only connections to the outside world
were his satellite phone and two laptops.
In 1998, bin Laden turned his destructive
attention back to Africa.
His plan was to bomb two U.S. Embassies in
different African countries.
On August 7th, simultaneous attacks in Kenya
and Tanzania killed hundreds of people.
Although he denied responsibility, the international
the community were unanimous that bin Laden was
behind the attacks.
As a result, the U.S. stepped up its attempts
to take him out, with an airstrike on October
20th known as Operation Infinite Reach.
It destroyed three terrorist training camps
in the Afghani mountains, but bin Laden remained
at large.
Target: USA
A year later, he was connected to an attack
on the U.S. Navy destroyer USS Cole.
The ship had stopped to refuel in the port
of Aden, Yemen, when terrorists blasted it,
killing seventeen sailors.
Less than a month after that, two planes smashed
into the twin towers of the World Trade Center
in New York City, striking a devastating blow
at the very symbol of American business and
achievement.
Within moments it had been transformed into
a full-blown war zone.
About 45 minutes later, the terror struck
again.
A hijacked airliner that had departed from
Virginia was spearheaded into the Pentagon
– the nation's military headquarters.
The horrific, shocking attack, the deadliest
since Peral Harbor, was a major wake up call
for the United States.
A $25 million reward was offered for bin Laden
and antiterrorist task forces were set up.
Despite a full-on effort to bring him to justice,
bin Laden was able to remain at large, plotting
further attacks for another decade.
Sometime in the mid-2000s, he slipped into
Pakistan.
For a while, he stayed in rural mountain villages
protected by local tribal leaders.
Then he moved to the Abbottabad compound with
three of his wives (he now had five) and thirteen
of his children.
It was there that the Americans finally got
their man.
The End
In the early morning hours of May 2nd,2011,
about twenty-five Navy SEAL commandos descended
on the Abbottabad compound.
They quickly breached the 18-foot walls and
then stormed the house, using explosives to
gain entry.
Two men encountered on the first floor were
killed, and then the commandos rushed upstairs
where they identified and killed bin Laden.
He was shot in the chest and the forehead.
One of his wives was also shot in the leg
when she lunged at a SEAL.
To make sure that they had gotten their man,
one of the SEAL’s took a photo and then
quickly put it through facial recognition
software.
The result showed a 95 percent likelihood
that this was Osama bin Laden.
Later DNA testing put it beyond a shadow of
doubt – the world’s number one terrorist
was dead.
Osama bin Laden was buried at sea shortly
after the raid.
Unfortunately, the terror organization that
he created remains.
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