How al-Qaeda stays connected
If Osama bin Laden is directing plans for an attack on the United States - as Washington intelligence officials suspect - his instructions are likely coming out of the craggy mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan on the back of a donkey or under the shawl of an unassuming-looking villager. After the arrests of several top lieutenants, bin Laden and his right hand man, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahri, have learned their lessons well, Pakistani intelligence officials and international terrorism experts say. They don't use satellite or cellular phones, don't trust anyone outside their innermost circle and never come up for air. Messages from the men likely pass through the hands of many couriers, most of whom have no idea where they originated, before they are turned into e-mails or conveyed by phone calls to other militants.
Posted by: Dan Darling 2004-08-11 |