[wordup] who is osama bin laden?

[Adam Shand]

the bit on bin laden has probably been found by most of you, but if not
it's interesting reading.  also the immediately below snip is pretty
entertaining.

Via: rebecca <rebecca at wetadigital.com>
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From: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/binladen/etc/synopsis.html

Osama bin Laden is charged with masterminding the 1998 bombings of two
U.S. embassies in East Africa, is believed to have had a role in the
October 2000 attack on the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden, and now is
a chief suspect in the September 11, 2001, attacks on the Pentagon and
World Trade Center. In FRONTLINE's "Hunting bin Laden," a Pulitzer
Prize-nominated team of New York Times reporters and FRONTLINE
correspondent Lowell Bergman investigates the man who has declared holy
war on the U.S. -- a wealthy Saudi Arabian exile believed to be hiding in
the mountains of Afghanistan with a $5 million bounty on his head.

Who is bin Laden? This newly updated report and companion Web site offer
background and insight into his life and motives, from his formative
experience in the Afghan jihad against the Soviets, to his scathing
criticism of the Saudi royal family and his campaign to drive American
"infidel" troops out of Saudi Arabia, to his statements and fatwahs
calling for the murder of Americans.

In tracing the trail of evidence linking bin Laden to terrorist attacks,
this report includes interviews with New York Times reporters Judith
Miller and James Risen, and a new interview with former CIA official Larry
Johnson. They discuss the attacks which are suspected to be tied to bin
Laden's complex terrorism network, outline the elements of his
international organization (with new details of its alliances and its
tactics), and explain the challenges confronting U.S. intelligence and
counterterrorism efforts.

This report also raises tough questions about the evidence used to justify
Washington's retaliatory missile strikes in Sudan against bin Laden
following the U.S. embassy bombings in 1998. Drawing on interviews and
official documents, "Hunting bin Laden" shows how U.S. officials have
backed away from their original statements that the targeted Sudanese
factory was linked to chemical weapons production.

Is the U.S. fixation on bin Laden justified? While U.S. investigators have
targeted him as the leader and financier of a terrorism network with
active cells all around the world, some informed observers believe the
U.S. has exaggerated his role and, in doing so, turned Osama bin Laden
into a folk hero.

"There is nobody who would even consider that bin Laden isn't the new
North Star, the new motivating factor that will bring us together,
replacing almost the Soviet Union," says Milton Bearden, a former CIA
agent in Afghanistan and Sudan.

While we don't know where the investigations into the September 11, 2001,
attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon will lead, the
activities of Osama bin Laden and his organization pose profoundly
unsettling questions for the U.S. and its allies. Even if the U.S. finds
sufficient evidence to target him, and succeeds in retaliation, what price
might we pay for his martyrdom? What would be the consequences of our
relationships with the peoples and governments of the Islamic world? And
how will our declaration of war against global terrorism affect U.S.
society, politics, and our understanding of ourselves?