The Path to 9/11 (2006) - 1x01 - Part 1

September 11, 2001. Teams of terrorist hijackers board four American airliners and take control of the cockpits. Passengers and flight controllers quickly learn something is terribly wrong

February 1993. On a similarly ordinary day, New York is stunned by a deadly bombing at the World Trade Center. The discovery of a traceable van part at the site leads to the arrest of one of the conspirators, and he is linked to a mosque led by the Blind Sheikh, a radical cleric. A valuable FBI informant helps bring down the cleric and his cell. A manhunt for elusive WTC bomber Ramzi Yousef ensues, and he narrowly escapes capture in Pakistan, where he is linked to the attempted assassination of Benazir Bhutto. Yousef travels to the Philippines, where he tests an innovative small bomb that kills a flight passenger and comes close to bringing down the plane as well. Hes almost captured again when a fire at his bomb-making lab exposes to Manila police his plot involving the simultaneous bombings of a dozen airliners.

Yousef is finally brought down when an informant in Pakistan tips off a team of agents working in coordination with FBI counterterrorism expert John ONeill. Yousefs trail leads them to a rebel named Usama bin Laden.

In 1998 journalist John Millers interview with bin Laden is broadcast, and ONeill and others in Washington are alarmed by the al Qaeda leaders fatwa against the U.S. CIA field agent Kirk contacts bin Ladens primary opposition, General Massoud of Afghanistans Northern Alliance, and they concoct a plan to capture bin Laden and bring him to the U.S. to face justice. The plan is never approved for action, but the simultaneous bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa push the Administration to respond with an ineffective missile strike that some think merely elevates bin Ladens stature in the Muslim world. Arrests of al Qaeda operatives at the Canadian-U.S. border and in New York on the eve of the millennium provide further evidence that Muslim extremists are bringing their holy war to America.