The majestic snow-capped peaks soared to 6000 metres and beyond. Today the temperature had dropped to 15 degrees below zero and visibility was down to a few metres. Dr Hussein Tretyakov placed the heavy metal suitcase in the centre of the cave and rubbed his hands vigorously. It was one of several for which his new employer had paid ten million dollars each. Most of the others were already with the sleeper cells in the United States, Britain and Australia.The small group of Arabs gathered around the bomb. They were led by a man in his mid-fifties dressed in a nondescript but expensive robe and a spotless white turban. Hussein Tretyakov had come to know and like the Egyptian lawyer, Abdul Musa Basheer, and his gentle sense of humour. Both men were now on a similar path and Abdul Basheer was one of bin Laden’s most trusted lieutenants and strategists. The former member of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad was a man of extraordinary ability and the West had every reason to be worried. If anything happened to either bin Laden or himself, Basheer had recruited some of the finest engineers, soldiers, lawyers and doctors in Islam to carry on the struggle.‘The original nuclear bombs were fission bombs where atoms were split, giving off an enormous amount of energy in the form of heat, neutrons and gamma rays,’ Hussein explained, waiting for the interpreter to translate.‘Neutrons and gamma rays penetrate the body and destroy the body’s cells, resulting in hundreds of thousands more deaths than might be achieved from just the blast and heat of a nuclear explosion,’ he continued.
