Elusive Osama bin Laden becomes global commercial trademark
A correspondent of Arguments and Facts newspaper goes to Afghanistan in an attempt to find out why Osama bin Laden is so hard to catch.
Some of those who used to meet Osama bin Laden in person are confident that the hunt for the leader of al-Qaeda has recently become all show and no substance.
“Please tell the truth. You don’t like the Sheikh, do you?
“By no means I like him. I’ve got no reasons whatsoever to like him. However, it would be unfair to speak badly of him. Back in our training camp, Osama has always been polite to the people, he treated everybody equally, even those of a lower rank,” says Takhir Habibullah, a resident of Jelalabad, as he lays several yellowed black-and-white photos on a table. The pictures feature a bearded man crouching near a mortar. “The only thing the Sheikh didn’t like was when he saw somebody having a nap in the afternoon. He’d wake up that man straightaway by telling the following: ‘Why on earth are you sleeping? You’ll sleep when you go to heaven. Now go and fight the infidel,” says Habibullah.
Habibullah was a sergeant in the Afghan government forces. One day he was taken prisoner by the mojahedins. He was held in a hole in the ground for the next six months. Later he was sent to a camp of Arab mercenaries, the place was dubbed The Black Storks. Habibullah was used for building defenses around the camp. The bearded man on his photographs was in command. Though Habibullah has not seen bin Laden since 1991, the Afghan authorities put him into prison for some time. He was repeatedly questioned by prosecutors who wanted to know just one thing: Where is He?
“I don’t know where he is now,” says Habibullah as he pours me a cup of yellowish Afghan tea. I might as well say that Osama bin Laden lives right across the street these days. It may take a lifetime to capture this sort of people in Afghanistan. The shuravi (the Soviets – ed. note) made a lot of effort trying to catch him. They failed. The Americans will fail too,” says he.
“Osama became a trademark”
Osama bin Laden was officially posted on the list of the world’s most wanted terrorists on August 7, 1998, shortly after al-Qaeda bombed two American embassies in East Africa. The reward for information leading to the arrest of Bin Laden went up to $25 million after al-Qaeda suicide bombers hijacked U.S. passenger planes and attacked New York on September 11th. Two months later the American tanks rolled into Kabul. But the “terrorist #1” (who had hidden in Afghanistan for five years) vanished without a trace. At the beginning, the media would spread the breaking news about his capture every other week. These days the reports of this kind are few and far between. The CIA says periodically that Osama is, in all probability, more dead than alive. The CIA statements are normally followed by Osama’s messages posted on the Internet as an audio or video file. By means of his messages, Osama apparently makes a mockery of his enemies. He sends a clear signal to those in doubt: The news about my death is nothing but rubbish.
It is high noon. I seem to have lost the sense of time completely. We are walking on a dusty road that snakes among the mountains. The merciless Afghan sun is scorching the rock and earth. I feel parboiled and somewhat dizzy, sweeping sweat from my forehead almost every minute. Habibullah hands me a pair binoculars, the Soviet army standard issue, and points out to the east:
“Take a look over there… Can you see the flag on a mountain? For you information, we’re in Pakistan. You just didn’t notice how we crossed the border, did you? We kept walking along the path, and we saw no border guards or roadblocks whatsoever. Now, have a think. You just took a walk across the border in broad daylight, and it was a cakewalk, even for you. So what problems are we talking about with regard to the Sheikh?”
Even the Pakistani army commandos do not dare make a raid on the villages located in a narrow mountain range (“the tribal zone”) along the Pakistan-Afghan border. The Pakistani authorities have no control over the territory. The local tribal leaders rule the area. Hundreds of makeshift workshops are busy manufacturing AK-47s and explosives, which are used against NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan All that talk about bin Laden hiding away somewhere – give me a break. Adolf Hitler could have hidden himself in one of those villages. The Osama posters are omnipresent in the area. They grace the walls of every house or business. According to opinion polls, Osama bin Laden is the most popular politician among the Pakistanis.
“Osama doesn’t have to do anything these days. His name became a sort of trademark, just like McDonald’s restaurants. Those young British Islamists who attempted to blow up the passenger planes over the Atlantic – they were actually trying to copycat Osama’s ways. Now it simply makes no difference whether the Americans will ever catch him or not. Osama bin Laden has become a virtual symbol of struggle, and thus he already won his war against America. What’s he doing now? I bet he’s watching TV to enjoy his huge popularity. Once he cares
