Where's Osama?

by Rick Gee

Shortly after fanatical terrorists killed thousands in the attacks of 9/11, King George Bush II vowed, “We will find those who did it, we will smoke 'em out of their holes, we will get them running, and we will bring them to justice.” Since those who did it all died in the four aircraft used as flying bombs, presumably Bush was referring to Osama bin Laden, the alleged mastermind of the attacks. Of course, we’re still waiting for that evidence, George. And I’m not talking about the “smoking gun” video, which according to US officials, was found “in a house in Jalalabad, eastern Afghanistan, and handed to US officials by a person or group the Pentagon has refused to identify.” As the Church Lady would say, “How con-veeeeen-ient!” But I digress. 

Dubya promised that the war in Afghanistan would “bring him in, dead or alive.” But now the CIA says bin Laden likely escaped Afghanistan for Pakistan and may have moved on from there. The failure to capture and/or kill bin Laden is a stain among a multitude of stains on the CIA and the rest of the US intelligence apparatus. Is this the same CIA that failed to uncover the 9/11 plot? Can we believe anything the CIA or the rest of the federal war machine tells us? 

Secretary of State Colin Powell told ABC News that he didn’t know bin Laden’s whereabouts but that US forces were in “hot pursuit” of him. “I can't say he is out of that immediate region. I have seen nothing that suggests we know where he is, whether it's in Afghanistan, Pakistan or somewhere else,” Powell said. 

Accepting this statement at face value strains credulity. If they have no idea where he is, how can they be in hot pursuit? Even if we give Powell the benefit of considerable doubt, doesn’t that exemplify the sheer ineptitude of the CIA and the military? Not only can’t they find him, they don’t even know which continent he is on right now. 

I am not inclined to believe any of this. The more likely scenario is that US officials intentionally let him escape. I posited this theory during a recent radio talk show on which I was interviewed about a recent column. The hosts were sympathetic to my overall point of view but weren’t willing to accept such a theory. Nonetheless, it’s not as far-fetched as it may at first seem. Because bin Laden, AKA “The Evil One,” has been held up as Public Enemy Number One, and if the polls can be believed (almost always a leap of faith), a majority of Americans supports the government’s efforts to bring him to justice. If he were to be apprehended in short order, support for further foreign escapades may begin to wane. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said as much without admitting it outright when he defended his decision not to send in a large ground force to find bin Laden when al-Qaeda fighters made a final stand at the Tora Bora cave complex last month. 

“The larger number of Americans on the ground might very well have hastened his departure as opposed to delayed it,” said Rumsfeld. 

So a larger number of troops would force him to flee to God knows where, but a smaller number was unable to capture him. Does that sound to you like they want to capture the modern Hitler? 

After bin Satan, Taliban leader Mullah Omar is the second-most-wanted terrorist. One report had him escaping by rickshaw. Again, either they let him go, or the Empire was unable to capture a man fleeing in a 19^th century vehicle with a seating compartment mounted between two large wheels and pulled by a runner holding two long poles. 

Now the US government seeks to have it both ways. On the one hand, bin Laden is the main target. On the other hand, military officials say the primary goal of the war in Afghanistan is to disrupt bin Laden’s al-Qaeda terror network so that it cannot function. But intelligence authorities say that “while al-Qaeda has been disrupted, and a few leaders have been captured and killed, bin Laden himself remains one step ahead of the United States, with the central nervous system of his terror network still intact.” 

So which is it? And should we be surprised that “military officials” say one thing, while “intelligence authorities” say the opposite? Who is lying and who is telling the truth? Does it matter? 

January 17, 2002