Osama bin Laden: The Biggest Fish of Them All

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However the command structure of al-Qaeda may evolve, the pattern of international Islamic terrorism has been set for some time. Since the destruction of the training camps in Afghanistan in 2001, terrorists have dispersed either to their home nations--like Indonesia, Yemen or Somalia--or gathered in new locations such as Chechnya and the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia. Robbed of the advantages that came from having a state-within-a-state in Afghanistan, terrorists have fallen back on local networks for logistical and financial support. None of this implies that the threat is over. Information gathered after the recent rash of arrests of Algerians in France, Britain and Spain testifies to a continued ability to plan attacks, and there are plenty of experienced analysts who are convinced that a war in Iraq will fuel the supply of recruits to Islamic extremism.

All the same, since last summer there has been a steady drumbeat of arrests of significant al-Qaeda figures. Finding them is dangerous work. In the past four months, according to a Pakistani source, six suspected informers have been killed by al-Qaeda sympathizers in the tribal area of South Waziristan. Still, the worldwide hunt is having an effect. Describing conversations among suspected terrorists in the past few months, a top investigator in Milan remarks, "They aren't discussing attacks anymore. They talk about their brothers arrested here or killed there." Somewhere in the shadowy landscape of international terrorism, there are surely discussions this week on the fate of Mohammed, a man who, as much as anyone, deserves the credit for turning an idea for global jihad into an awful reality. In the mind of at least one official close to President Bush, that fate is sealed. "He killed over 3,000 of our citizens in one attack," said this official. "We will try, and execute, him." And dream, no doubt, of finding the man whose trail went cold 15 long months ago. --With reporting by Timothy J. Burger, Elaine Shannon and Michael Weisskopf/Washington, Simon Elegant/Kuala Lumpur, Tim McGirk and Syed Talat Hussain/Islamabad and Ghulam Hasnain/Quetta