On Mr. bin Laden

If there’s one man people in the West associate with Islam, it’s Osama bin Laden.  A 52-year-old son of the 10^th wife of a wealthy Saudi businessman, bin Laden could have turned into one of the world’s richest men, or perhaps one of the foremost clerics of his religion.  But 22-year-old Osama, unfortunately, took the road less traveled, and joined Afghan militants in their fight against the Soviet Union, eventually staying there and becoming the face of Al Qaeda.

WHAT’S GOING ON?

There’s news out today that Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari has announced that the U.S. and Pakistan have been unable to locate Osama bin Laden, that “[The CIA] obviously feel that he does not exist anymore but that’s not confirmed, we can’t confirm that.”  Doesn’t exist anymore?  Does that mean that Osama bin Laden might be dead???

WHY DO WE CARE?

If it’s true, if bin Laden truly “does not exist anymore,” then what?  I mean, bin Laden attacked us, and we attacked back, all over the world.  But didn’t WWII end (basically) when Hitler killed himself?  Doesn’t that mean this “war on terrorism” should be over now?

Sadly, not at all, no matter how we’re measuring success in this fight.  If we entered this war as a way to show our strength and get back at our September 11 attackers, then we haven’t yet done that – leaving bin Laden to die of (presumed) natural causes doesn’t exactly show our enemies that we have the power and the ability to get to anyone, anytime.  WE didn’t get him, Father time did.

On the other hand, if we entered the war on terrorism to eradicate terrorism from the face of the planet, we’ve basically gotten absolutely nowhere.  Our fight in Iraq has made terrorist networks bigger and harder to trace.  Our fight in Afghanistan has somehow enabled a resurgent Taliban (the bad guys in the very beginning, the “enablers” of bin Laden) to regain their footing and start making plays for big parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR THE FUTURE?

I expect Zardari’s announcement was not one of actual futility – Pakistan’s President admitting ignorance to international media doesn’t ring true to me.  Instead, I suspect it was a simple play of showing Al Qaeda exactly what they want to hear, because there’s nothing they’d like more now than to prove us wrong.  I definitely foresee them filming a new video either of bin Laden himself, or of bin Laden’s successor and his call to arms.  Either way, Al Qaeda gets to feel like they have the upper hand, when they’re actually simply giving us more data, more chatter over the terrorist networks we listen in on.  Besides, cocky adversaries are the most likely to make mistakes.

Let’s see what happens here...