Why Can't We Find Bin Laden?

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Not everyone, however, believes the Pakistani government is helpless. U.S. Army officers in Afghanistan, along with U.N. and Afghan intelligence officials, are worried that al-Qaeda enclaves have been set up on the Pakistani side of the border under protection from the country's Frontier Corps militia, which Islamabad used during the Taliban era to patrol the tribal regions. "It's our assessment they're assisting al-Qaeda," says Major Mike Richardson, an operations officer with the U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne, which patrols the Afghan side. Some intelligence analysts in the region and in Washington also suspect that dissident elements within Pakistan's ISI are still sympathetic to the Taliban. "I wouldn't rule it out," says a senior U.S. intelligence official. "There are some rogue types in those organizations." An Afghan intelligence officer says he's sure "ISI has made safe passage into the tribal areas for these criminals."

American investigators are trying to persuade Musharraf to let them expand their bin Laden search into the tribal belt, but the Pakistanis have "a different agenda," says a Western diplomat in Islamabad. "The Americans' aim, obviously, is to get the bad guys." The Pakistani strategy is to extend the government's influence in these lawless areas by winning over the local chieftains, a kind of mini--nation building. That's why Musharraf is wary of mishaps like the one in which two U.S. missiles recently strayed inside the Pakistani border and landed a few hundred yards from a tribal militia garrison. The Bush Administration, for its part, maintains that it's "still pleased" with Musharraf's help.

But Musharraf said he believed bin Laden had died of a kidney ailment. And when he's not declaring bin Laden dead, he has joined a long list of U.S. officials who have been insisting that the terrorist leader was not the ultimate prize. "We've always said that al-Qaeda did not depend on Osama bin Laden," Rumsfeld said last week. Yet the Defense chief also acknowledged "that tape was intended to be a very clear threat." In time, we will learn how crucial bin Laden's existence is to al-Qaeda's. But in symbolic terms, the value of getting him--dead or alive--remains incalculable. --With reporting by Massimo Calabresi, John F. Dickerson, Michael Duffy, Elaine Shannon, Mark Thompson and Michael Weisskopf/Washington; Tim McGirk/Islamabad; and Michael Ware/Kabul