From the WSJ Opinion Archives
THE WESTERN FRONT

Wanted: A Better List
On the FBI's Web site, a glaring symbol of unseriousness.

by BRENDAN MINITER
Monday, June 17, 2002 12:01 A.M. EDT

Ramzi Binalshibh gives every indication of wanting to kill Americans. In the late 1990s he shared an apartment with Sept. 11 ringleader Mohamed Atta. It's during this time together in Hamburg, Germany, that they were likely recruited into al Qaeda by Muhammad Haydar Zammar. Atta went on to take flight lessons and lead the Sept. 11 attacks. But Binalshibh found mostly frustration. He couldn't get a visa and therefore couldn't join the plot. In his place, Atta's crew allegedly tapped Zacarias Moussaoui, who's now on trial as the "20th hijacker."

But Binalshibh's story doesn't end there. In August, only weeks before the attacks, he allegedly wired Moussaoui $14,000. It appears the Yemen-born would-be hijacker then went to Afghanistan, where he met with top level al Qaeda leaders and made a "martyr video" detailing how he'd like to die killing "infidels."

That video placed Binalshibh at the center of multiple al Qaeda plots. Newsweek reports he appeared in a surveillance video of a 2000 meeting in Indonesia. At that meeting were two terrorists who'd later go on to become Sept. 11 hijackers and Riduan Isamuddin--who allegedly funded 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef. Binalshibh has also been tied to the USS Cole bombing in Yemen.

Attorney General John Ashcroft immediately recognized the urgent need to catch this guy last fall, when he went to the media, handed out pictures and asked for the public's help in capturing Binalshibh and four other "martyrs" from video tapes found in Afghanistan.

Seems like all of this would be enough to earn a terrorist a spot on the FBI's most-wanted list. But Binalshibh is one of many faces conspicuously absent from the FBI's list. None of his martyr video friends make the list either.

Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi and Abu Zubaydah hadn't made the list when they were captured after Afghanistan fell. Al-Libi trained Moussaoui and likely knows the names, tactics and skill level of hundreds of al Qaeda members. Zubaydah, the most senior al Qaeda member to fall into U.S. hands, most recently provided information that led to the capture of enemy combatant Abdullah al Muhajir, né Jose Padilla, who they picked up last month in connection with an alleged "dirty bomb" plot.

Despite the president's talk of wanting the terrorists "dead or alive," the FBI's most-wanted list is an embarrassment. Shaikh Saiid, Osama's brother-in-law, hasn't made the list, even though he was included in a list of nine al Qaeda members handed out to soldiers searching bombed-out caves in Afghanistan, nor has Mustafa Ahmed al-Hisawi, bin Laden's financial officer. The day after Christmas, Kenton Keith, a coalition spokesman in Pakistan, reportedly gave journalists a chart of al Qaeda's brain trust. It had 42 names, six of which were crossed out, having been killed in combat in Afghanistan. Four more have been captured. That leaves 32 high-ranking al Qaeda leaders. The FBI lists only 22 men. Shouldn't we be looking for all of the al Qaeda leadership?

Shouldn't we also consider top Talib Mullah Mohammed Omar a "most wanted" terrorist? The president promised to make no distinction between terrorists and those who harbor them. Omar was last seen a few weeks ago crossing into Afghanistan from Pakistan, shaking his fist and promising to disrupt the process of choosing Afghanistan's new government before heading south again.

Then there are the problems with the names on the list. The FBI still lists Mohammad Atef, even though a smart bomb caught him at home in November. He didn't survive the blast, but enough of his house did for U.S. forces to find the martyr videos. The bureau lists Osama bin Laden as a Saudi citizen, but the House of Saud revoked his citizenship years ago. Kuwait also disputes the FBI's claim that Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, now considered the top planner of the Sept. 11 attacks, is a Kuwaiti.

Meanwhile not one of the 22 wanted posters mentions the Sept. 11 attacks. Bin Laden, according to the FBI, is wanted in the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa and also "is a suspect in other terrorist attacks throughout the world."

The State Department doesn't do much better. Although its wanted terrorist list does mention that bin Laden attacked America in September, it contains only 13 names--all of which appear on the FBI's list--and it needs to be updated. The State Department erroneously lists the reward for many of the other men at $5 million. As of October, the reward was upped to $25 million for each man on the list.

It may seem trivial to focus on the shortcomings of the most-wanted lists. It's not. Before the Taliban fell, Northern Alliance factions were competing to see who could round up al Qaeda members the fastest. They were spurred on by the thought of outdoing their rivals and earning the reward money and the prestige associated with capturing someone on the most wanted list. This is the type of behavior we ought to encourage as we chase terrorists to far-flung regions of the world.

Fixing this list goes beyond rewarding bounty hunters. The most-wanted list is a yardstick to measure the war's progress. It's also a powerful symbol, telling the world that we are marshaling our resources against a few individuals because we have specific and credible information tying them to acts of terrorism. Leaving outdated and, in some cases, flat out wrong information on the list is itself symbolic. It tells the world we're not serious.

Mr. Miniter is assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com. His column appears Mondays.

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