Bin Laden trail 'stone cold'

The clandestine US commandos whose job is to capture or kill Osama bin Laden have not received a credible lead in more than two years. Nothing from the vast US intelligence world–no tips from informants, no snippets from electronic intercepts, no points on any satellite image– has led them anywhere near the al-Qaida leader, according to US and Pakistani officials. "The handful of assets we have, have given us nothing close to real-time intelligence" that could have led to his capture, said one counterterrorism official, who said the trail, despite the most extensive manhunt in US history, has gone "stone cold." Intelligence officials think that bin Laden is hiding in the northern reaches of the autonomous tribal region along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. This calculation is based largely on a lack of activity elsewhere and on other intelligence, including a videotape, obtained exclusively by the CIA and not previously reported, that shows bin Laden walking on a trail toward Pakistan at the end of the battle of Tora Bora in December 2001, when US forces came close but failed to capture him. It has been so long since there has been anything like a real close call that some operatives have given bin Laden a nickname: "Elvis," for all the wishful-thinking sightings that have substituted for anything real. After playing down bin Laden's importance and barely mentioning him for several years, Bush last week repeatedly invoked his name and quoted from his writings and speeches to underscore what Bush said is the continuing threat of terrorism.