Would We Really Want to Hold Bin Laden?

The Taliban contends it won’t turn over Osama bin Laden without “evidence” of his guilt (“Taliban Says Bin Laden Is in Its Control,” Oct. 1). Our government implies that definitive evidence can’t be produced without compromising intelligence assets. But if Bin Laden were to be turned over to our government, then what? What would we do with him? “Secret evidence” obviously couldn’t be used against him in a trial. And would we really want to hold him in custody for any period of time, inciting his followers to endlessly repeated acts of terrorism on his behalf?

Possibly the worst thing the Taliban could do to us would be to give Bin Laden into our custody. Luckily for us, the Taliban’s leaders are stupid. Let’s all pray together instead that God quickly grants Bin Laden the martyrdom he says he desires.

George Franco

Pacific Palisades

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If martyrdom is so glorious, why is Bin Laden in hiding?

Tom Hamman

Huntington Beach

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Why isn’t there a fatwa against Bin Laden for blasphemy against Islam?

Rodney Hoffman

Los Angeles

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Alexander Cockburn (Commentary, Sept. 30) is trying to make us believe that Bin Laden was so upset about half a million children who died because of economic sanctions against Iraq (if this figure is indeed correct) that he sent his gang of terrorists over here to kill as many Americans as possible. I suppose you can rationalize anything.

Bin Laden has a fortune of $280 million. Imagine how much good he could do with his money if he really cared about children. I assume that he never earned that money on his own but received it from his family, who probably earned it by exploiting their own people. Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, Saddam Hussein, Bin Laden. Take your pick! It’s all about power and suppressing diversity.

Gunilla Eckert

Los Angeles

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Chalmers Johnson (“The Lessons of Blowback,” Opinion, Sept. 30) states that “the terrorism of Sept. 11 was not directed against America but against American foreign policy.” Would he have also agreed that Hitler’s terrorism was not directed against Great Britain, France, Poland, etc., but against their foreign policies? He then implies that if our response is directed toward a country that harbors terrorists it may result in our becoming a “rogue state.”

Bin Laden, as quoted in the same issue of Opinion, wants his “Muslim brethren in Pakistan to prevent the American crusader forces from invading Pakistan and Afghanistan.” Is his concern the same as Johnson’s--that America might become a “rogue state”? Or is it that such action is the only action that will contain terrorism?

Elwood A. Crandall

Arroyo Grande