Should Republicans go ahead and add Supreme Court Justices to head off Democrats

Al Qaeda's shrinking ability

AP:

Senior Bush administration officials have warned in recent weeks that al-Qaida is regrouping for another massive attack, its agents bent on acquiring nuclear, chemical or biological weapons in a nightmare scenario that could dwarf the horror of Sept. 11.

But in Pakistan and Afghanistan - where Osama bin Laden and his chief deputy are believed to be hiding - intelligence agents, politicians and a top U.S. general paint a different picture.

They say a relentless military crackdown, the arrests last summer of several men allegedly involved in plans to launch attacks on U.S. financial institutions, and the killing in September of a top Pakistani al-Qaida suspect wanted in a number of attacks - including the 2002 killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and two failed assassination attempts against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf - have effectively decapitated al-Qaida.

Because of the secretive and underground nature of cells that operate throughout the world, it cannot be known for certain what effect the damage done to al-Qaida in its home territory has had on operations elsewhere.

Pakistani intelligence agents told The Associated Press that it has been months since they picked up any "chatter" from suspected al-Qaida men, and longer still since they received any specific intelligence on the whereabouts of bin Laden or any plans to launch a specific attack.

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"We have broken the back of al-Qaida," Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao said last month in a speech in Peshawar, the capital of the frontier province on the border with Afghanistan. Musharraf added last week that his government had "eliminated the terrorist centers" in the Waziristan tribal region and elsewhere.

"We have broken their communication system. We have destroyed their sanctuaries," the president told reporters. "They are not in a position to move in vehicles. They are unable to contact their people. They are on the run."

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Maj. Gen. Eric Olson, the No. 2 American commander in Afghanistan, said he had seen nothing to indicate that al-Qaida was attempting to get its hands on nuclear or biological weapons.

There is "no evidence that they're trying to acquire a terrorist weapon of that type and, frankly, I don't believe that they are regrouping," he told AP in a Feb. 25 interview.

"I think the pressure on them here, the pressure on them in Pakistan, the pressure on them in Iraq, is pretty great and it makes very difficult for them to operate," Olson added.

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Maj. Gen. Olson, who leaves Afghanistan next month to return to the 25th Infantry Division back in Hawaii, said al-Qaida leaders were unable to use modern communications for fear of detection and were reduced to "16th century" techniques such as couriers. He said he wasn't discouraged by the success bin Laden and his deputy have had in releasing audio and videotapes filled with threats during the past few months.

"They can deliver all the videotapes they want, as long as they're not delivering weapons that can kill large numbers of people and I am convinced that their ability to coordinate large attacks like that is severely disrupted right now because of the pressure we have on them," he said.

I think al Qaeda has been significantly wounded. One of the interesting piece of information that came out of the charges against the valdictorian who is accused of plotting to assinate President Bush, is the conversations witht he al Qaeda leaders in Saudi Arabia who, corectly told bin Laden that they were not in a position to win if they launched attacks in Saudia Arabia. That bin Laden, et.al. insisted that they do it anyway suggest desperation rather than the patience usually associated with their attacks. The recent communications with Zarqawi suggesting he attack in the US is another piece of evidence that bin Laden does not have the resouces to make such an attack directly.

However, it does not take that many suicidal people to launch an attack, and that probably accounts for the administrations caution. Hitler was also running out of assets when he launched the battle of the bulge. Similarly the Tet offensive was launched because the communist felt they were losing. Bin Laden has much fewer assets than Hitler or Giap, but if he gets the opportunity he will use what ever he has. He is still losing and even a spectacular attack will not change that.