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Playing Offense: How U.S. Terrorist Hunters are Going After Al Qaeda

(U.S. News) - David E. Kaplan America's frontline agents in the war on terror have hacked into foreign banks, used secret prisons overseas, and spent over $20 million bankrolling friendly Muslim intelligence services. They have assassinated al Qaeda leaders, spirited prisoners to nations with brutal human-rights records, and amassed files equal to a thousand encyclopedias. The CIA's interrogations of al Qaeda's top man in Southeast Asia revealed how the group used funds from the Saudi-based al Haramain Islamic Foundation. The Afghan offices of another Saudi outfit, al Wafa Humanitarian Organization, allegedly functioned as an al Qaeda subsidiary. Al Qaeda's founding documents: scanned letters, records of meetings, photographs, and more - some of it in bin Laden's own handwriting - were found on a computer at the offices of the Benevolence International Foundation in Sarajevo, Bosnia, a multimillion-dollar Islamic fund with offices in nine countries. Of special note was a handwritten list of names: 20 wealthy donors to the al Qaeda network, dating apparently from the late '80s. The roster included some of Saudi Arabia's wealthiest men: three billionaire bankers, top industrialists, and a former government minister. The CIA uses a special center at the remote al Jafr Prison in Jordan where it has shipped up to 100 al Qaeda suspects for initial interrogations. Jordanian interrogators are used not only at al Jafr but also at other U.S. detention centers. Bin Laden declared war on the United States back in 1991. America waited too long to join the fray, and the battle is yet to be won.
2003-05-26 00:00:00
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