Osama bin Laden begins helping Abdullah Azzam, his mentor, to run the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK), the “Office of Services,” which becomes a key node in the private funding network for the Afghanistan war and is the “precursor organization to al Qaeda.” (9/11 Commission Report, p. 89)
While living full-time in Pakistan, bin Laden also supports the building of six Arab-only training camps in Afghanistan, as well as create Arab combat units to fight the Soviets. The units would have non-Afghan Muslims (such as John Walker Lindh) and would also form the al Qaeda cadre.
Day: March 27, 2021