WASHINGTON, 11 December — President George W. Bush was deciding yesterday whether to release a videotape of Osama Bin Laden that officials say gives conclusive evidence of his responsibility for the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the National Security Council was deliberating over the release. The final decision will be made by Bush, who has seen a copy of the tape that was found in a house in eastern Afghanistan, officials said.
The tape was recorded at a dinner last month and shows Bin Laden saying the damage to the World Trade Center towers in New York had been much greater than he anticipated, according to media reports and officials who have seen it.
They said Bin Laden expressed amusement that some of those taking part in the hijackings of four passenger jets did not know they were on suicide missions. Bin Laden has in an interview welcomed the attacks but denied involvement.
The issue for US officials was whether making public more evidence of Bin Laden’s involvement to answer doubts over his complicity in the attacks would outweigh any disadvantage in providing the Islamic militant with publicity or a possible outlet for coded messages.
"There are many good reasons on both sides," Fleischer said.
"The reasons to release it in the president’s opinion is: One, he wants to share information with the American people. He thinks it’s important for people to know what Osama Bin Laden has said in this regard."
"On the other side ... we have not sought opportunities to provide Osama Bin Laden with TV time, with air time," Fleischer said. Officials have also been concerned about revealing any intelligence sources and methods through a release.
The 40-minute homemade tape was found at a private home in the eastern Afghanistan city of Jalalabad.
Vice President Dick Cheney said on Sunday that the tape showed that Bin Laden had significant knowledge of what happened in the hijacked plane attacks and "left no doubt about his responsibility."
"He does, in fact, display significant knowledge of what’s happened, and there’s no doubt about his responsibility for the attack on Sept. 11," Cheney said Sunday on NBC’s "Meet the Press."
"This is one more piece of evidence confirming his responsibility," the vice president said.
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was also on television Sunday talking about the tape. Asked on ABC’s "This Week" whether the tape clearly shows that Bin Laden planned the attacks, he relied: "I think it’s very clear. Yes."
Wolfowitz added: "It’s disgusting. I mean, this is a man who takes pride and pleasure for having killed thousands of innocent human beings. It confirms everything we’ve known about him already. Hopefully, we’ll stop hearing anymore of these insane conspiracy theories that somehow the United States has made this up or somebody else did."
Fleischer said this tape, unlike tapes released by Bin Laden following the Sept. 11 attacks, was not made as propaganda.
"It is different from the prepackaged propaganda tapes ... this appears to be a conversation that was taped, as he was talking with other people," Fleischer said.
The United States has been seeking to counter doubts, especially in the Arab world, about Bin Laden’s involvement in the attacks. But this has conflicted with desires to carefully shield intelligence information.
Britain earlier released the first extensive documents aimed at establishing a case against Bin Laden.
