A rchive Date
[ 23-05-2005 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Afghanistan ]
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[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7937013/site/newsweek/
A Troubled Hunt
Many Qaeda bigwigs have been caught, so how does bin Laden manage to survive?
By Michael Hirsh
Newsweek
Updated: 2:49 a.m. ET May 22, 2005
May 30 issue - He was a legendary jihadi leader who preached holy war, took on the greatest power of his day and caused thousands of deaths in terror strikes. But as British imperial forces hunted for him year after year in the 1930s and '40s, Mirza Ali Khan simply disappeared into the folds of what are now the Pakistani tribal regions. The search for Khan, who was better known to his British pursuers as the Fakir of Ipi, petered out as the decades passed and people lost interest. "The fakir was never captured," says Pakistani scholar Husain Haqqani. "People say he died of natural causes in 1960."
Is this to be Osama bin Laden's fate as well - an enduring case of justice denied? As the fourth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks draws closer, some critics fear that bin Laden too could slip into the mists of history unless U.S. policy - and luck - changes. "Our teams are getting nowhere," says Gary Schroen, a highly decorated former CIA officer who oversaw CIA operations in the region until August 2001 and still works on contract for the agency (he was in Pakistan in March). As the British found out, the steep, cave - pocked mountains of Waziristan, where many believe bin Laden to be, make up the most difficult military terrain imaginable. "That is an area where, if the people don't want you to be caught, you can stay for a very long time," says Haqqani, a former diplomat now at the Carnegie Endowment in Washington. "Even with modern surveillance technology, bin Laden could end up being like the Fakir of Ipi."
Pakistani Foreign Minister Khursheed Kasuri told reporters last week that he believed bin Laden has been on the run since the capture earlier this month of Abu Faraj al - Libbi, the latest culprit to be identified as Al Qaeda's "No. 3." But Schroen says that both the Pakistanis and the Bush administration have expressed too much confidence that al - Libbi's arrest could lead the hundreds of Special Forces, CIA, FBI and other counterterror officials in Pakistan and Afghanistan to the Qaeda chieftain.
There is no evidence that bin Laden's entourage reacted in panic to the al - Libbi news. According to two Taliban operatives interviewed by NEWSWEEK, whose accounts could not be independently verified, bin Laden has been safely ensconced in a secret, well - protected base along the northern Afghanistan - Pakistan border for more than a year. One source cites bin Laden's security guards, and another cites people in contact with them, as saying that most of the leader's meetings with even trusted aides take place outside the base. "The point is to keep everyone, even his most trusted people, confused as to his real whereabouts," says one of these Taliban officials, whose nom de guerre is Ali Khail. And al - Libbi's proximity to bin Laden was hyped, he says. (Khail, a mujahedin commander during the Soviet war who is now a Taliban propaganda and intel operative, claims to have contacts in bin Laden's camp.) A former senior Taliban intelligence officer who today remains part of the ousted fundamentalist regime's intelligence network concurs: "Libbi doesn't know that much to endanger the sheik [bin Laden]," he says.
Bin Laden's greatest protection now may be his growing legend, Schroen says. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf fears a horrific Islamist backlash if he publicly arrests the man seen in parts of South and Central Asia and the Middle East as an Islamic Robin Hood. By contrast, the Pakistani leader is willing to hand over lesser figures like al - Libbi, who was allegedly involved in two attempts on Musharraf's life but arouses no strong feelings among the Pakistani public. As evidence, Schroen says that it took the Pakistanis five months to act against al - Libbi after the Americans delivered intel on the whereabouts of a Qaeda suspect who could not, at the time, be specifically identified; Schroen believes the Pakistanis acted only after determining that the suspect was not bin Laden but a smaller fish. "We gave them the information on Libbi back in December," says Schroen, who has written a new book on his work with the CIA in Afghanistan. "They didn't want to do it." Pakistani officials deny this. "I reject that Pakistan stayed back on the intelligence for five months," says Pakistani military spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan. "The moment Pakistan got confirmed intelligence, Pakistan immediately acted."
Schroen says he believes it was only after "a lot of behind - the - scenes pot - sweetening" - including a promise of F - 16s - that al - Libbi was captured in a frontier town. Then it was a "win - win for the Pakistanis," Schroen says. "They get a bad guy off the playing field and nobody in Pakistan knows who the hell he is." CIA spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise said the agency had no comment on any of Schroen's views.
More evidence that the hunt for bin Laden may be grinding into slow gear emerged last month. Lt. Gen. David Barno, the outgoing commander of the 18,000 U.S. forces in Afghanistan, was quoted as telling reporters that a new "spring offensive" was planned. But Gen. Safdar Hussain, who commands the 70,000 Pakistani troops in the tribal regions, later said Barno's expectation of an offensive was a "figment of his imagination."
Schroen says that, based on what he knows, there is no serious Pakistani hunt for bin Laden right now. U.S. forces are honoring their pledge not to cross the border into Pakistan. Meanwhile, the Pakistani military, having been bloodied a year ago during an incursion into South Waziristan, has stopped offensive operations in return for tribesmen's promise not to support Al Qaeda or attacks on Afghanistan and inside Pakistan. Retired Pakistani Army Lt. Gen. Talat Masood believes it is inaccurate to say that bin Laden is not being hunted. But Masood and other knowledgeable Pakistanis say that to protect himself, Musharraf would probably deny any Pakistani involvement in bin Laden's capture or death if it were to happen, given the Qaeda leader's popularity.
Schroen and other intelligence officials believe that to do bin Laden in, Washington must first replenish the CIA and other forces drained by Iraq. Then, a strong U.S. diplomatic effort is needed with the Pakistani government and military "to convince them to get busy this summer," Schroen said. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, asked last week whether any progress had been made against bin Laden, responded: "When you're hunting for someone and you haven't found them, you haven't found them." It was, obviously, an accurate statement. But it's also what the British might have said once - and might still say - about the Fakir of Ipi.
With Sami Yousafzai in Peshawar, and Ron Moreau and Zahid Hussain in Islamabad
© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.
© 2005 MSNBC.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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