SET THE VCR DURING "C.S.I.":

This Week: "In Search of Al Qaeda" (Frontline, Thursday, Nov. 21 at 9pm on PBS)

The voice on the tape, U.S. experts now believe, is "almost certainly" that of Osama bin Laden. His exact whereabouts, however, and the strength of the Al Qaeda network, remain unknown.

Yet some things, despite all the uncertainty, do seem clear. As producer and correspondent Martin Smith suggests in this week's report -- "InSearch of Al Qaeda," airing Thursday, Nov. 21 at 9pm on PBS (check local listings) -- while Al Qaeda has been forced from Afghanistan, it is finding new sanctuaries elsewhere. Just as important, the sentiment or idea that Al Qaeda represents is, in many places, gaining strength.

Smith, who produced FRONTLINE's "Hunting bin Laden" in 1998-99, set out in August with co-producer Marcela Gaviria and cameraman Scott Anger to find out what's become of Al Qaeda since the U.S.-led campaign in Afghanistan. It's a journey -- at times a harrowing one -- that took them from London to the militant Islamic strongholds along Pakistan's northwest frontier, into Pakistan's teeming cities, and on to Saudi Arabia and Yemen, bin Laden's homeland.

Along the way Smith interviewed statesmen, generals, security officials, and tribesmen. He didn't find Al Qaeda, per se, but what he did find maybe more unsettling. "We discovered that Al Qaeda is more than an army of terrorists," Smith says. "It's an idea about how to hurt the West. And it's taking hold with more and more people in countries as disparate as the United Kingdom and Yemen."

Our local paper has a review and says the show is terrific. Here also is a profile of bin Laden from a few years ago by Mary Anne Weaver, whose book Steven Martinovich enjoyed.
Posted by Orrin Judd at November 21, 2002 10:13 AM