Usama bin Ladin’s “Father Sheikh”:

combination of relative peace, active support from friendly regional leaders like
Engineer Mahmud and Haji Saz Nur, and a local governing body in the Eastern Shura
that was more focused on maintaining security and trade in the province than harassing
extremist groups like al‐Qa`ida.
If that combination of a limited but loyal local support network and lack of interference
from nearby governing bodies is any indication of what it takes for a major terrorist
organization to find a safe haven in Afghanistan, then it may be wise to take
pronouncements of the imminent destruction of al‐Qa`ida or affiliated organizations
with a grain of salt. Leaving aside the question of the current operational capacity of al‐
Qa`ida, the findings in this report serve as a warning to any who suppose that a
moderate level of security and government presence is sufficient to prevent al‐Qa`ida or
a similar organization from maintaining safe havens in Afghanistan.
Although elements of the Taliban are now more openly hostile to al‐Qa`ida, the Afghan
central government is unable to project a strong security and governance presence in all
of the districts in eastern Afghanistan. In places like Giro District of Ghazni Province,
the current local government has essentially no capacity to influence what happens
outside the walls of the district compound. In that kind of permissive environment, all
al‐Qa`ida might need to survive in the area is a reliable local partner.
It may not be possible for al‐Qa`ida to thrive in Afghanistan as it did in the days before
9/11, but the threshold required for the organization’s continued existence may be lower
than is commonly suspected. Clearly, the international community must continue to
focus on eroding the diminishing military and operational capabilities of al‐Qa`ida and
similar movements. However, the primary sources about Yunus Khalis’s life remind us
that even when al‐Qa`ida’s leadership was managing a period of significant transition,
Usama bin Ladin’s organization was able to survive locally with little more than help
from a few friends in Nangarhar and Loya Paktia, and a distracted or disinterested local
governing body in Jalalabad.
vi