December 11, 2001

8:56 PM

Where-o-where can bin Laden be?The general belief among U.S. officials appears to be that al Qaeda's leader, Osama bin Laden, probably is still somewhere in Afghanistan... But, conceded a defense official, the United States has very little solid information on the whereabouts of bin Laden. "If we had a real clue, we would have already got him," he said.
posted by Rastafari (9 comments total)

MSNBC is reporting that al Qaeda leaders and some taliban may have fled Afganistan into Iran and Pakistan.
posted by entropy at 9:10 PM on December 11, 2001

Well, we know he's not dead yet, since it's hasn't been videotaped and broadcast over al-Jazeera damn, he just missed the November sweeps... Has he crossed over to Pakistan? Or is he in Chechnya? Or maybe even Iraq? And, why isn't the $25 million bounty producing any results?
posted by Rastafari at 9:13 PM on December 11, 2001

From this month's issue of G2Mil's magazine 's Afghan War Supplement:

While rapidly conquering the Taliban was impressive, no Afghan was part of the 9-11 attacks. The large al Qaeda terrorist organization began as smaller groups in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. As they agitated their home rulers, they were expelled or fled to New York or Sudan where they began to organize terrorist attacks. They used the new technology of global cell phones and Internet e-mail to maintain close covert contact. The simplicity of international air travel and the worldwide instant money transfer system also helped. After the 1993 WTC bombing, they were scattered from New York and pressured to leave Sudan. Al Qaeda emerged in Afghanistan, but are no longer welcome there, so now they have gone elsewhere. It doesn't matter if no government welcomes them because most Third World governments have little knowledge of what is happening in their remote areas. Al Qaeda even had several members operating in the USA for years, including a US Army Special Forces sergeant
posted by y2karl at 9:28 PM on December 11, 2001

They used the new technology of global cell phones and Internet e-mail to maintain close covert contact. The simplicity of international air travel and the worldwide instant money transfer system also helped.

So is that why the US shut down the entire internet and money transfer system in Somalia? And are now setting up base there?
posted by dlewis at 4:04 AM on December 12, 2001

At this point, I'm pretty skeptical of the U.S. suspicion that Bin Laden is leading forces in Tora Bora. He would be the only leader of Al Qaeda or the Taliban who has encamped with troops instead of trying to escape on his own.
posted by rcade at 5:21 AM on December 12, 2001

Am I the only one at MeFi who, on hearing and seeing references to Tora Bora, envisions Osama lazing on a beach somewhere in the South Pacific?
posted by Carol Anne at 5:29 AM on December 12, 2001

Philip Smucker of the Christian Science Monitor is reporting today that bin Laden fled to Pakistan 10 days ago with help from local tribes.
posted by tamim at 11:47 AM on December 12, 2001

Note that it doesn't, at the moment, serve US interests to suggest that he is not at Tora Bora. Al Qaeda is, and they need to be shredded. I"m amused to find that they were ready to surrender, until they heard the US/UK special forces were coming. If that's the way they were framing things, I'd have sent our guys in there too.

dlewis: we shut down businesses that fit the definition of having connections to terrorism; that they happened to be the only way Somalia got internet was surely incidental. As for why we're "setting up base" there, use your imagination.
posted by dhartung at 12:06 PM on December 12, 2001

dhartung: Calm down. Those were just two stories I read earlier that made sense in light of that quote. No need to be so defensive.
posted by dlewis at 2:18 AM on December 13, 2001