9/11 and 12 and 13...

William Arkin at the Washington Post has analyzed the Moussaoui trial transcripts to learn more about al-Qaeda's plans for 9/11 and thereafter:

Contrary to the notion that bin Laden's al Qaeda is a command center for an enemy army, the hijackers had an enormous amount of autonomy. Though KSM conceptualized the use of commercial planes to attack high profile targets, the specific targets and the actual date of the attack were selected by ring leader Mohamed Atta.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed ["KSM," the "mastermind" of the 9/11 attacks] also clarifies a couple of urban legends still out there about the events of 9/11: There was no 20th hijacker or a fifth airliner. Although KSM would have liked to have had more "muscle" men, some of the selected Jihadists proved unable to gain entry into the United States. Also, the hijackers received no help from U.S. based al Qaeda operatives. There were no U.S. based operatives.

Bin Laden also thought that the second wave should concentrate on the western United States because he anticipated greater security in Washington and New York post-9/11. Second wave target possibilities included a bridge in San Francisco bay, though there was also discussion of hitting the Sears Tower in Chicago.

But KSM had not selected targets for the second wave, and Washington or New York targets not hit in the 9/11 attack were also to be carried forward for a second attack, and possibly even a third. These additional targets included the White House, the Empire State building, a foreign embassy in Washington and a nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania.

And Arkin finds this "delicious parallel between al Qaeda and the Bush administration"

al Qaeda plotters "had no idea that the damage … would be as catastrophic as it was, and he did not plan on the U.S. responding to the attacks as fiercely as they did…"

In the category of historic misjudgments, thus al Qaeda and the Bush administration have something in common. The Bush administration similarly had no idea that defeat of Saddam Hussein's army would be as catastrophically successful as it ended up being, and they did not plan on Iraqis responding to the war and the American occupation as fiercely as they have.