"We calculated in advance the number of casualties from the enemy..."

Sunday, Dec. 16, 2001 By MICHAEL ELLIOTT

Osama bin Laden on a videotape released by the Department of Defense

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For analysts of terrorism, the tape held rich pickings. Bin Laden confirmed what has been suspected by law-enforcement officials: that there was a clear hierarchy among the Sept. 11 hijackers and that they operated under a strict need-to-know code. Though all those who died knew they were engaged in a "martyrdom operation," said bin Laden, most of them were ignorant of the precise target of their mission until the morning it took place. Alani says, "The degree of secrecy they established was unbelievable. Only five or six people had a full picture of the whole operation." (They did not include bin Laden's "spokesman," the Kuwaiti Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, who— in a glimpse into the everyday life of a terrorist— turns out to be a soccer fan.) St. Andrews' Ranstorp thinks the tape suggests that the Sept. 11 attacks fit into a classic al-Qaeda pattern: an operation is conceived in the field (in this case, by Mohamed Atta, who is thought to have piloted American Airlines Flight 11, the first plane to hit the Twin Towers), then referred back to the leadership in Afghanistan for approval.

In the Islamic world, the tape's effect was muted. It may help those— such as President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and King Abdullah II of Jordan— who would like to argue that the war in Afghanistan is being waged against terrorists, not against Islam. But the tape was released on the eve of Eid ul-Fitr, a major holiday marking the end of Ramadan, when Arabs tend to family festivities rather than the news. Besides, the hot political issue in the past few weeks has been not the war in Afghanistan but the renewed violence between Israel and the Palestinians.

Some of those who bothered to watch muttered about body doubles and voice manipulation, but most newspapers and TV stations in the Middle East played the story straight, accepting that the tape was authentic. That doesn't mean it will change the minds of those who oppose the war. "I don't believe it will have a huge impact on the Muslim world," says Atwan, the editor of al-Quds. "It's too late. It's like accusing somebody of murder and executing him, and then saying 'Now we found the evidence.'" For Atwan and many other commentators, the point is not bin Laden's responsibility for attacks like those of Sept. 11; that is a given. It is, rather, the actions the U.S. took to visit justice on the terrorists. "I want the U.S. to behave as a civilized superpower," says Atwan. "To take revenge, to send these bombers to kill innocent people, isn't justified."

Victory justifies a lot, but experts on al-Qaeda warn that winning the war will not eliminate the organization. For Jacquard, a central significance of the tape was the overt support offered to al-Qaeda by a network of radical and militant Saudi clergy; bin Laden and al-Ghamdi mention four other clerics approvingly. "That kind of sympathy with Islamic militancy and rationalization of terror," says Jacquard, "has become common in Saudi Arabia and the gulf states." Ranstorp thinks the poem bin Laden recited— "Our homes are flooded with blood...we will not stop our raids/Until you free our lands"— could mean that a new wave of attacks on the U.S. will be launched after Afghanistan has been pacified. "One of the worrying things," he says, "is that we will be lulled into a false sense of security."

In the fight against terrorism, caution is a virtue. Still, a month ago, bin Laden could spend a happy hour chatting with friends in the comfort of a well-appointed house. By the time the tape of that event was shown to the world, he was— in all likelihood— hidden in a cave, being bombed by American planes. On the tape, bin Laden said, "Over weeping sounds, now/We hear the beats of drums." They beat for him.

— With reporting by James Carney and Douglas Waller/Washington, Bruce Crumley/Paris, Helen Gibson/London and Scott MacLeod/Cairo