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If he's dead, then why is he wanted?
By CHUCK MURPHY, Times Staff Writer At the time, there seemed little doubt that U.S. troops had registered their first decisive blow against the leadership of the al-Qaida terrorist network. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said he had received reports that "seem authoritative" that Mohammed Atef, part of al-Qaida's ruling troika, had been killed in a U.S. bombing raid on Afghanistan. But six weeks after Rumsfeld announced his demise, Atef remains on the FBI's list of the nation's 22 "Most Wanted Terrorists." The Pentagon has never released any information beyond the sketchy, qualified statements made by Rumsfeld and Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem on Nov. 16. Days after those statements, Rex Tomb, chief of the FBI's Fugitive Publicity Unit, went to his boss in Washington to ask whether, in light of the news, Atef's photo and description should remain alongside the photos of Osama bin Laden and others on the "Most Wanted" list. "I was told yes," Tomb said Wednesday. "Before someone will be removed from the list, we have to have some incontrovertible evidence that they are dead, and we have not received that in this case." Neither has the Pentagon. Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said that despite the headlines and subsequent accounts stating unequivocally that Atef was dead, the truth is that Rumsfeld, Stufflebeem and others had said all along that the intelligence reports had not been confirmed. "He (Rumsfeld) stated that he believed it to be true, not that it was true," Davis said. "That's where it stands today." Atef's death, if true, would cause significant turmoil among the ragtag paramilitary troops that make up al-Qaida. The former Egyptian police officer was said by al-Qaida defectors to be in command of the group's military wing. Along with bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri, Atef sat on al-Qaida's ruling council, making decisions on everything from payroll to terror targets. Atef's daughter married one of bin Laden's sons in January. U.S. intelligence agents also believe Atef authorized the Sept. 11 attacks on America and wrote the group's training manual, Military Studies in the Holy Struggle against Tyrants. Rumsfeld and Stufflebeem said that military intelligence had intercepted communications among suspected terrorists following a Nov. 15 bombing raid by U.S. planes near Kabul and that those conversations indicated that Atef was dead. Since that time, after conducting interviews with dozens of rank-and-file al-Qaida members, the Pentagon has been unable to offer any more definitive proof that U.S. troops killed Atef, accomplishing at least part of their primary mission to kill or capture the men behind the Sept. 11 attacks. In December, there were reports that Zawahiri was also killed by U.S. bombs, but those were quickly dismissed by the Pentagon as unconfirmed rumors. There are a couple of good reasons to question the validity of the reports of Atef's death, too. For starters, anyone who saw Atef's body and walked past may have left as much as $25-million lying in the Afghan dust -- a reward that was publicized in that country. That's the maximum amount the U.S. has offered for "information leading directly to the apprehension or conviction of Mohammed Atef." There would undoubtedly be a battle over whether the production of a dead terrorist qualifies for the reward. But Andy Laine of the Department of State's Diplomatic Security Section, which oversees the reward program, said that payment might well be made in a case like Atef's. "Say someone came in and said, 'I have information on the location of Atef's body and he is in fact dead.' And that information proved credible. That would be submitted before an interagency commission," Laine said. "A determination would be made as to whether a reward should be paid and, if so, how much." Additionally, there are plenty of reasons to believe that al-Qaida members have at least considered staging their own deaths as a means of disappearing. Testimony in the trial of four men in the bombing of U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya revealed that bin Laden sent at least two top operatives to Lake Victoria after reports that Atef's predecessor as al-Qaida's military commander had been killed in a 1996 ferry accident. Those al-Qaida members, including bin Laden's secretary, Wadeh el Hage, weren't sent to help with funeral arrangements. They were sent to find evidence that Abu Ubaidah al Banshiri had truly been killed and bring that evidence back to bin Laden, who refused to believe the reports. They were unable to find al Banshiri's body, among hundreds lost in the Tanzanian ferry sinking. But five years later, it seems likely that al Banshiri really is dead. Is Atef dead, too? "Based on our experience with the "Top Ten" list, it is certainly a possibility (that Atef is faking his death)," said Tomb of the FBI. "But I wouldn't say that has happened here. I don't know."
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