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In Hunt for Bin Laden, a New Approach
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"If you find him now, the problem still won't be resolved," he said of bin Laden. "Maybe you'll get the fish, but you'll poison the pond around him."
Since 2002, the United States has given more than $10.5 billion in aid to Pakistan, not including funds for covert operations. Much of the money, however, has gone to Pakistan's military or has been spent with little oversight, according to U.S. government audits. Only a tiny fraction has gone for building schools and hospitals in western Pakistan.
"The Americans didn't believe in that," said the senior Pakistani security official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "They just said, 'Bang, bang, bang.' A man who has a sledgehammer in his hand, all problems look like nails."
J. Cofer Black, director of the CIA's counterterrorism center from 1999 to 2002, was a key player in the hunt for al-Qaeda and well known in Washington for his give-no-quarter approach. "When we're through with them, they will have flies walking across their eyeballs," he told Bush shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks.
In an interview last month, however, Black echoed concerns expressed by other officials that the U.S. government had paid too little attention to the "hearts and minds" of people living along the Afghan-Pakistani border, many of whom have reinforced their allegiance to the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
"This may sound strange coming from a flies-on-the-eyeballs guy, but the most important thing is support and aid to local leaders and the population," Black said. "If you don't have that, you can put in all the divisions you want, and it won't matter."
A Double Game
For seven years, the hunt for bin Laden hinged on the proposition that the U.S. government had a reliable partner in Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, who resigned under pressure last month.
But even some Pakistanis said the U.S. government was naive to think that Musharraf or his generals would do much to find bin Laden. They noted that Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency had cultivated ties with the al-Qaeda leader for two decades and that many officers remained sympathetic to his cause.
Afrasiab Khattak, a Pashtun politician based here in the northwestern city of Peshawar, said Pakistani forces would occasionally help the CIA capture second-string al-Qaeda figures, but only to keep the aid money flowing from Washington.
"The Bush administration deceived itself," he said. "From the very beginning, the Pakistani generals were playing a double game. It was an open secret."
Khattak said he has warned U.S. officials since 2000 of bin Laden's close relations with Pakistan's spymasters, adding that he tried to alert Washington after 2002 that al-Qaeda was rebuilding in the tribal areas.
"We kept telling the Americans, 'They are here.' They said: 'No, no. This cannot be true. General Musharraf is very committed, he's with us,' " recalled Khattak, president of the Awami National Party in North-West Frontier Province.
