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Ever since the United States went to war with the Taliban, the
world has had their eyes on one man, Osama bin Laden. The objectives
of the war were clear as said by White House spokesperson, Ari
Fleischer on November 14th, 2001, “The president will not
rest until the objectives are accomplished. And those objectives
are the destruction of al Qaeda and the elimination of the Taliban
and their ability to harbor terrorists.” In fact Bush himself,
on September 16th, 2001, said he wanted Osama bin Laden “dead
or alive”. However, the war is Afghanistan has long been
over and none of America’s objectives have been complete:
Al-Qaeda has not been destroyed, the Taliban has not been eliminated
completely and Osama bin Laden is nowhere to be seen. How can
the world most powerful nation fail to capture one man? The answer
lies in Pakistan.
Bin
Laden in the Tora Bora region
Past
History
In the past, Pakistan has helped to shelter bin Laden. Bin Laden
would have been killed by a missile strike ordered by American
president Bill Clinton in 1998. Clinton later admitted, "The
best shot we had at him (bin Laden) was when I bombed his training
camps in 1998. We just missed him by a matter of hours, maybe
even less than an hour." However the real reason that bin
Laden escaped was that the U.S. informed Pakistan that it would
be striking that terrorist training camp to make sure that the
Pakistani's would not mistake it as an Indian nuclear strike.
This early warning quickly leaked through to the Pakistani spy
agency, the ISI, who informed bin Laden, allowing him to escape
from danger safely.
Diagram
of Bin laden's complex fortress in Tora Bora.
The
Escape
One of the last definitive evidence of his location was lost at
the Afghan border with Pakistan in December 2001, when a voice
believed to be his was last overheard in Tora Bora. After an intensive
bombing campaign in Tora Bora, American soldiers failed to find
bin Laden after scouring through the vast tunnel network in the
region. They could only assume bin Laden had been killed without
or a trace or he had sneaked over the nearby Pakistan border.
In
late 2001 they got their answer: combined U.S. military and intelligence
operatives in Afghanistan searched the mountainous regions of
western Pakistan, where they had picked up a pattern of phone
communication between bin Laden and friends. Most intelligence
analysts think bin Laden is still holed up in Pakistan’s
treacherous border zone. Personal couriers riding on motorcycles
and buses apparently pass messages from bin Laden in the tribal
areas to al-Qaida’s hideouts in Pakistani cities like Peshawar
and Karachi.
In
fact local tribals have testified that they had seen bin Laden
in the area recently: One such tribal, Abu Jaffar had stayed in
Tora Bora, for one night, after his foot was blown off by a stray
cluster bomb. He had stepped on the bomb after exiting his family's
cave amid heavy bombing to look for injured persons. Jaffar said
that after Osama left 10 days ago, he contacted us inside Tora
Bora to tell us that he was sending his own son to be with us
there. Osama’s son, Salah Uddin, traveled through Paktia
province with 30 Arabs and 50 Afghan fighters. Jaffar also says
that for two weeks, scores, if not hundreds, of Arabs have been
safely spirited out of the Tora Bora camp. He says that some senior
members in the current Jalalabad government are aware of the Al
Qaeda members' movements, and that the journeys have been paved
with hard cash. Most of the Arabs escaping to safety are women
children and old people. Wounded soldiers and some young men have
also been permitted by bin Laden's son to leave the embattled
base.
Map
detailing bin Laden's suspected whereabouts in Pakistan
In addition, Citing Pakistani intelligence sources, on January
29th, 2002, CBS reported that the suspected mastermind of the
terrorist attacks was secretly spirited into a military hospital
in Rawalpindi, Pakistan for treatment with the help of the Pakistani
military. On that night they moved out all the regular staff in
the urology department and sent in a secret team to replace them,"
the report quoted an unidentified Pakistani medical worker as
saying. Another hospital employee said that at the time of the
procedure, he did not know who the patient was. "Since that
time, I have seen many pictures of the man. He is the man we know
as Osama bin Laden," the second employee was quoted as saying.
"I also heard two army officers talking to each other. They
were saying that Osama bin Laden had to be watched carefully and
looked after."
Dead End
Even if bin Laden is in Pakistan, why can’t the United States
catch him? Other than small insufficient Special Forces teams,
the Pakistani government has not allowed US troops to enter the
country. The Northwest Frontier Provinces in Pakistan are an autonomous
region that is loosely governed by the federal government. In
addition, the locals are fiercely loyal to the Taliban and bin
Laden. Therefore, Pakistan fears that the region may secede if
they allow U.S. troops to capture bin Laden. In addition, because
the United States cannot scour for him, they instead provide military
aid to Pakistani military to find bin Laden. And instead of using
the money for to search for bin Laden, Pakistan gladly uses the
money to arm Pakistani militants to send into Kashmir.
Links
News
Center: Bin Laden in Pakistan
Christian
Science Monitor: Bin Laden in Pakistan
CNN.com:
Bin Laden in Pakistan
Tribal
Leader: Bin Laden in Pakistan
Washington
Times: Bin Laden in Pakistan
The
Week: Osama in Kashmir
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