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Osama’s Alive. Does it Matter?
Wednesday, November 20, 2002
(9:48 AM PT)
By Michael O'Hanlon
Slate.com

Bin Laden's survival has critical symbolic significance. Terrorist organizations with highly charismatic leaders tend to depend heavily on those leaders and benefit greatly from their inspiration. Groups such as the Shining Path in Peru, Kurdish Peoples Party in Turkey, Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, and the quasi-terrorist UNITA in Angola did not weaken appreciably until their leaders—Abimael Guzman, Abdullah Ocalan, Velupillai Prabhakaran, Jonas Savimbi—were arrested or killed (or decided to negotiate).

A year ago, President Bush said he wanted Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive." Alas, last week's audiotape underscores that more than 400 days after the 9/11 attacks, he continues to elude us. Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle has seized on this to question the course of the war on terror, suggesting that we have made little progress if Bin Laden and most other top al-Qaida leaders remain at large. Is Daschle right? Or is the administration right that our efforts in Afghanistan, at home, and elsewhere indicate that we are winning the war?

We should avoid the temptation to consider this struggle a vendetta against one horrible man and his close associates. The pragmatic question is whether we prevent more serious attacks by al-Qaida and related organizations against the United States, its interests, and its allies. By this standard, military and law enforcement actions have probably reduced al-Qaida's capabilities by at least half in the short term (meaning that Bush is more correct than Daschle, in a sense). But the continued survival of top al-Qaida leadership, the relatively slow recent efforts here in the United States to improve domestic security (despite this week's passage of legislation creating a new department of homeland security), and the appeal of Bin Laden's message to much of the Islamic world mean that the longer-term outlook is gloomier.

First, how strong is al-Qaida today? Bin Laden's survival does not mean the organization is thriving. Its recent operations suggest that al-Qaida still has many willing and able soldiers. But their sanctuary, training facilities, weapons labs, and communications hubs in Afghanistan have been demolished, so they are generally operating independently and resorting to simple tactics.
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