CDI Terrorism Report:
Bin Laden Alive as al Qaeda Threatens New Operations

U.S. President George W. Bush's National Security Adviser, Condeleezza Rice, reportedly informed him on Nov. 12 that analysts were 80 percent certain the voice on a recently aired tape purporting to be from al Qaeda was that of Osama bin Laden. Six days later, a White House spokesman confirmed that U.S. intelligence experts have indeed concluded that the latest tape recording of Osama bin Laden is genuine.

The development represents the first hard proof in over a year that the al Qaeda leader is alive, and comes just days after American officials announced they have arrested a top al Qaeda personality — who they declined to name for operational security reasons. Meanwhile, reports in the British press claim that bin Laden himself is thought to be hiding in his ancestral homeland of Yemen and that British Special Forces have joined in the hunt for him there.

Previously, the latest evidence that bin Laden was alive was a videotape that was recorded on Nov. 9, 2001, and later discovered by U.S. Special Forces in Afghanistan. Another videotape was aired towards the end of December 2001, references in which suggested that it was recorded earlier that month or in November — although analysts could not be certain of this. Bin Laden was gaunt and perhaps wounded in this tape, a possibility that has also been raised by the fact that audio rather than video was the preferred medium for his latest missive — something that may indicate that he is in poor physical condition and may be trying to conceal this.

The latest tape first aired on the Qatar-based al-Jazeera satellite network on Nov. 12 — and since then American officials have become increasingly confident as to it authenticity. If, as appears, it is indeed really bin Laden (and no analysis can be 100 percent certain of this) the tape would indicate that he was alive as of Oct. 28 — the date that a U.S. diplomat was murdered in Amman, Jordan — a killing the al Qaeda leader refers to in his message. Bin Laden also mentioned other recent attacks including the Oct. 12 bombing in Bali that killed almost 200 people and the Chechen rebel hostage crisis that ended in Moscow two weeks later. The timing of the tape's release is a cause for some concern, coming as it does amid warnings that al Qaeda may be planning an escalation in its attacks. Last month's testimony to that effect by CIA Director George J. Tenet, together with recent attacks in Pakistan, Yemen, Kuwait and Bali, all raise the possibility of a further intensification in al Qaeda operations. Moreover, missives from bin Laden are always carefully timed and stage-managed and have often augured an attack or significant activity by al Qaeda. Also, since before tape was aired, intelligence "chatter" among suspected al Qaeda operatives had reportedly spiked to levels approaching that in the run-up to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. As such, the new tape heightens fears that new al Qaeda attacks are imminent.

The tape also attempts to justify recent attacks in Yemen, Kuwait, Bail, and Moscow as being carried out in defense of Islam, and link the current Iraq crisis to the Palestinian-Israeli situation. It also threatens Western countries as well as those Islamic countries that ally themselves with the United States. Aside from the United States, the countries threatened by Bin Laden included: Australia; Canada; Italy; France; Germany; Indonesia; Jordan; Kuwait; Pakistan; Russia; Tunisia and the United Kingdom.

In addition, the possibility that the tape may feature coded instructions to al Qaeda associates and operatives cannot be discounted. An earlier message attributed to top bin Laden aide, Ayman al-Zawahiri, may have inspired or authorized the recent Kuwait and Bali attacks. In addition, what makes the latest bin Laden tape so worrying is that it seeks to justify further attacks against civilians to the Muslim world. According to Abu Zabaydah — a top al Qaeda operative being held by the United States — such a move would presage any major al Qaeda onslaught, and follow-up on the earlier tape by Al-Zawahiri. Bin Laden's latest message will also serve to consolidate his position as the head of al Qaeda, and ensure that, with the world's attention increasingly fixated on the possibility of a future U.S. war with Iraq, that the threat of future terrorist attacks remains to the fore.

That the latest bin Laden tape comes amid warnings that al Qaeda may be planning another big 'spectacular' attack (and coincides with a statement from al Qaeda claiming just that) could be seen as contradicting estimates made by some U.S. intelligence officials last September that the group had been seriously disrupted by the U.S. campaign against it and lacked to ability to carry out such operations. However, this is not necessarily the case. Any increased threat level reflects not so much that al Qaeda has been totally unaffected by the campaign against it as much as the fact that it is learning to adapt to the highly hostile environment in which it is has had to operate since Sept. 11, 2001. Spectacular attacks like that against the Twin Towers and the Pentagon may well have been beyond al Qaeda's capabilities two months ago, but that does not mean they will always remain so.

U.S. officials give differing estimates of the effectiveness of the U.S. campaign against al Qaeda, and while some claim that a third of the organizations top players have been killed or captured, other put this figure as around 10 percent. Meanwhile, intelligence sources have confirmed that al Qaeda experimentation with and production of small quantities of biological and chemical agents predated the U.S. assault on Afghanistan, and that the terrorists had acquired small amounts of radiological materials such as might be used in a 'dirty bomb' — an idea they got from a newspaper article according to Zabaydah. Meanwhile, Tom Ridge, director of the U.S. Office of Homeland Security, has been doing the rounds with TV news shows, reassuring the American public that the threat posed by al Qaeda, while high, is nothing new. Such assertions underlie the fact that while disrupted, al Qaeda are not yet defeated and will represent a significant threat to U.S. and international security for the foreseeable future.

Mark Burgess CDI Research Analyst mburgess@cdi.org

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