Through the Valleys They Go: How We Failed To Catch bin Laden in the Months After 9/11

On the 10th of December, 2001, a radio transmission permeated the airwaves. Its composed, calm, and measured tone was instantly recognized by Charles Allen, a former CIA officer and expert in counterterrorism. Without hesitation, he identified the voice as none other than Osama bin Laden's – a sentiment echoed by ALEC Station, the CIA unit devoted to tracking bin Laden and his associates.

While pinpointing the voice was pivotal, the transmission's source was even more critical. The signals originated from Tora Bora, cradled within the White Mountains of eastern Afghanistan, adjacent to the Pakistani frontier. Forged during the Soviet incursion, Tora Bora’s web of caves, tunnels, and bomb-proof bunkers offered unparalleled sanctuary for bin Laden and his confederates - a haven unattainable in the desolate, arid expanses bordering Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Iran, and China.

With a meager two CIA surveillance drones at their disposal, the prime strategy for tracking and impeding bin Laden's escape was to deploy troops, having them guard the Pakistani border and Tora Bora's vicinity. However, Major General Dell Dailey, chief of the State Department's counterterrorism bureau, opposed such deployment. Not wanting to repeat the same mistake as the Soviets, he believed that a heavy troop presence would incite a backlash from Afghan allies and tribes. But history misguided him, as there were heavily armed NATO forces already operating within the region, and even in antagonistic areas, locals lacked the capacity to launch a substantial insurrection.

US Army General Tommy Franks was similarly opposed, deeming it impracticable to send troops on such short notice. Senate investigators subsequently uncovered that 2,000-3,000 troops would have thwarted any escape endeavors. A thousand soldiers from the Tenth Mountain Division lingered in nearby Uzbekistan, bereft of any crucial mission, while an additional thousand Marines idled at Camp Rhino, just southeast of Kandahar. Given Pakistan's inability, as a US ally, to airlift troops into the Hindu Kush Mountains within the required timeframe, the most viable option would have been deploying the forces from Uzbekistan and the Marines at Camp Rhino – a glaring oversight.

Amidst these concerns was a daily "Hunt for Bin Laden" memorandum intended for CIA Director George Tenet, President George W. Bush, and key national security cabinet members. It stressed that without a military presence along the Pakistani border, "the back door was open," as Charles Allen recounted. With the stern opposition of both Franks and Dailey, though, Bush would ultimately resort to aerial bombardment instead - a decision that would yield calamitous, irreversible repercussions. 

Thousands of tons of explosives were dropped on the Tora Bora region. The bombardment, giving Al Qaeda no other option, merely compelled them to navigate the countless, porous, open valleys that funneled directly into Pakistan. Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf lamented to General Franks, "What are you doing? You are flushing these guys out, and there are one hundred and fifty valleys for them to move through. They are pouring into my country." Bin Laden evaded capture by venturing northward, then traversing into Pakistan to the east. Hundreds of Uzbeks, Chechens, Arabs, and other foreign Al Qaeda affiliates followed, infiltrating Pakistan via the southern valleys. The arrival of these militants would go on to significantly destabilize Pakistan, and as Senate investigators observed, would "forever alter the course of the conflict in Afghanistan and the future of international terrorism."

Yet, the United States was not the sole bearer of miscalculation. On the eve of the bombing, bin Laden, convinced of his impending demise, beseeched his widows to abstain from remarriage and he also wrote a heartfelt apology to his children for the tribulations he had brought upon their lives. Penning his final will and testament on the 14th of December, 2001, he wrote, "Allah bears witness that the love of jihad and death in the cause of Allah has consumed my being, the verses of the sword coursing through every fiber of my heart, 'and fight the pagans all together as they fight you all together.'" Unbeknownst to him, and thanks to a significant error made by the United States, fate would grant him an additional decade to reconsider and amend his will.