The target date was January 20, 2009 - the day of the United States’ presidential inauguration ceremony. That had been the date for the attack ever since the plan was born on a cold and windy day in 2002. Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants started organizing the attack on the United States in a cave in the dusty, barren hills of Pakistan. Bin Laden had sent secret personal notes via courier to every one of his Al Qaida leaders around the world to attend an important meeting to be held on March 13, 2002. Each of the twelve Al Qaida tribal leaders was told to attend this meeting and to permit no detection of their travels or the meeting’s purpose. Nothing that bin Laden had ever done, including planning the September 11, 2001 disasters, was as big, daring and dangerous as what he was planning for January 20, 2009.
          Bin Laden and the twelve Al Qaida lieutenants from around the world met every six months after the initial March, 2002 meeting. Never did they meet in the same place. Never did any of the United States forty separate intelligence organizations suspect or have knowledge of any of the bin Laden meetings, even though the Al Qaida representatives left their home countries two times every year and flew to either Afghanistan or Pakistan. Bin Laden’s secret plans remained only in the minds of the twelve chiefs and bin Laden. Only thirteen men shared the colossal secret plans. The result of their efforts would result in shocking the world with its scope and the resultant death toll. After each clandestine bi-annual meeting the men would return to their home countries and work on their assigned duties. They, in turn, recruited only the best and the most trustworthy jihadists to assist them carrying out their perilous, world shaking scheme.
          Never before had such a plot been planned that would require such exquisite timing and teamwork. Never before had an attack been designed that would have a deeper consequence or a higher death toll.
          One of the requirements that bin Laden had ordered was that everyone involved in the project would, commencing six months before the attack, look like an average American. All beards were to be shaved, haircuts would resemble Wall Street millionaires. Clothing would be exactly what Americans wear – casual, sporty and smart. All foreign accents would be eliminated through constant vocal practice and lessons. Wherever possible each jihadist leader would travel with an attractive blond, posing as his wife. Nothing would be left to chance. The ultimate goal of the invasion of the United States would be planned down to the last minute detail. The modern world’s most daring invasion would come off without a hitch.
          In Washington, D.C. the newly elected President of the United States and his designated Secretary of Homeland Security were meeting to discuss the state of national security. The future department head told the President, “I’ve checked with all the security and spy agencies and we look clear. There are no current threats to our nation’s security.”
          The attack would take place in six months.
          Purchases of urea nitrate and hydrogen gas cylinders, the ingredients of fertilizer based explosives, were being purchased, small quantities at a time and distributed to jihadist’ cells around America. No suspicions were aroused.
          Sections of fifteen hundred Russian surface to surface missiles were smuggled in through open Canadian and U.S. border locations to be assembled in basements across America.
          Suicide bombers were recruited and promised that by their participation, which meant blowing themselves and others up, they would be awarded with 72 virgins in heaven.
          In cellars in Chicago, Seattle, Cleveland, Houston and San Jose Middle East technicians were assembling biological, chemical and dirty nuclear devices.
          Every major military installation in the United States was put on surveillance by trained jihadists. Every movement of the military was noted.
          The components of 24,000 Kalishnikov automatic rifles were shipped to jihadist owned machine shops in cities around the U.S. from locations in Syria. Some shipments contained screws, bolts, shoulder rests. Others were labeled “parts for washing machines.” No suspicions were aroused.
          In Los Angeles, New York, Washington, D.C., Houston, Newark, San Francisco, San Diego, Seattle and Elizabeth, New Jersey groups of thirty five to ninety men met every other week to finalize their involvement in the attack which was scheduled to be launched in two months. These were the foot soldiers which would attack the major centers of communication in America.
          In the most exquisite part of the invasion plans, thirteen enormous container ships from Indonesia, Iran, France, Brazil, Myanmar, Venezuela, North Korea and Saudi Arabia would depart from their home ports and head for ports in America – Corpus Christi, Texas; Jacksonville, Florida; Oakland, California; Long Beach, California; New York Harbor and the Port of Newark, New Jersey.
          Each ship would conceal 5,500 fanatic, well-trained jihadists in addition to their arms and armament. Each jihadist soldier would be assigned a definite attack point in an American city.  Each ship, loaded with jihadists, their weapons and provisions was secretly loaded causing no suspicion in their countries of origin. Each taking advantage of the laxity of security at the world’s ports. The thirteen ships set sail for their goal ports in the United States. The timing of their arrivals was coordinated. They were each programmed to arrive at their American ports within minutes of each other.
          On January 18, 2009, two days before “attack day,” bin Laden sent coded e-mail messages to his thirteen lieutenants who were now based in major American cities, the cities that would be the focus of the attacks. Bin Laden told them there would be no further communication until the hours after the attack.
          The newly elected President of the United States practiced his inauguration speech in a guest office room at the White House. Members of Congress and hundreds of guests began to gather on the steps of the Capital building. The Vice President elect peered into a mirror and straightened his tie.
          The head of the Central Intelligence Agency walked towards the open door of his waiting limousine, guiding his wife with his left hand. In his right hand he held a brief case containing the latest intelligence report indicating no overt threats to the United States.
          All thirteen ships had berthed at their American ports and on each vessel 5,500 restless jihadists prepared to overthrow the small contingent of guards at each port and head for their target sights – police headquarters, radio and television stations, National Guard depots, military bases.
          The fertilizer based explosives were prepared for ignition. Nuclear, biological and chemical explosive devices were readied for detonation at their targets.
          Kalishnikov rifles were assembled and loaded. Within hours an army of over 200,000 Al Qaida organized and trained jihadists were standing on American soil, prepared to launch a massive attack. Americans, from border to border, were excited about the inauguration of a new and popular President. Millions of Americans sat before their television sets, waiting for the inaugural festivities.
          Two focal points loomed large in the sights of the terrorists – New York City and Washington, D.C. Rising from basements, one thousand surface to surface missile launchers and their missiles were quietly loaded onto pick up trucks, vans and innocent looking family station wagons. The vehicles were stationed at well-chosen locations in New York and Washington, D.C. Five hundred in each city – waiting for their electronic message to fire.
          Bin Laden sat anxiously by a bank of electronic communication equipment in a large cave in the mountains of northern Afghanistan. He sipped strong tea from a porcelain cup decorated with a pastoral mountain scene. His aides could feel his anxiety as the hour of attack approached.
          At the same time that the elected President of the United States walked to the podium on the steps of the Capital Building and placed his left hand on the Bible, the newly named head of the Homeland Security Agency heard a sharp report to his left. He saw the blur of an object headed for the podium. He heard a barrage of reports, these coming from his right. He looked towards the country’s new President and saw him, his wife, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and a score of others suddenly disappear in a ball of flame.
          Instantaneously a hundred missiles struck and blew out the top of the Capitol Building. Other missiles exploded in the midst of the assembled thousands, killing most. The U.S. government was under attack. Four hundred jihadist terrorists emerged from cellars and attics around the nation’s capitol, loaded their Kalishnikovs and attacked the White House and the remnants of what was once the Capitol building, killing everyone in their way.
          In New York City five hundred missile launchers were loaded, armed and aimed. Wall Street was destroyed in five minutes. Three hundred and fifty dedicated and well armed terrorists searched offices and streets, shooting everyone in sight.
          Communications centers were overwhelmed and destroyed.
          Major cities and military installations across America were attacked. Dirty nuclear bombs were exploded in the largest intersections of a dozen American cities.
          Biological weapons were exploded in Detroit, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, St. Louis, Baton Rouge and Newark.
          All Major television networks were off the air and thousands of reporters, on air talent and technicians were slaughtered.
          U.S. Military posts were surprised and overwhelmed. Dirty nuclear devices and chemical weapons were incorporated in the attacks on the military bases by the terrorists.
          Terrorists, clandestinely trained to fly America’s fighter planes and bombers in their home countries, captured dozens of American military airports and were in the air within the first six hours of the attack, bombing and strafing American cities with American planes.
          American deaths climbed to nearly a million in two weeks.
          The terrorists began operating two nationwide television stations, broadcasting that America was “Now operating under jihadist law.”
          Six months after the attack, in a small town north of San Diego, a young woman, holding her four year old daughter in her arms, turned towards her husband and asked, “What does all this mean? What’s going to happen to us? How did this happen to the United States?”
          Her husband, a former computer programmer, sat on their couch, holding his head in his hands, and said, “Honey, I don’t know. I just don’t know. I guess we didn’t take this whole terrorist thing seriously enough.” 
               

                                            “Victory at all costs, victory 
                                    In spite of all terror, victory
                                    However long and hard the 
                                Road may be; for without victory
                                        There is no survival” 
   

                                …Winston Spencer Churchill