Sunday,  April 29, 2012 • Vol. 12--No. 290 • 24 of 34 •  Other Editions

(Continued from page 23)

AP News in Brief
Weaker al-Qaida still dreams of payback a year after US military raid killed Osama bin Laden

• WASHINGTON (AP) -- A year after the U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida is hobbled and hunted, too busy surviving for the moment to carry out another Sept. 11-style attack on U.S. soil.
• But the terrorist network dreams still of payback, and U.S. counterterrorist officials warn that, in time, its offshoots may deliver.

• A decade of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that has cost the U.S. about $1.28 trillion and 6,300 U.S. troops* lives has forced al-Qaida's affiliates to regroup, from Yemen to Iraq. Bin Laden's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri, is thought to be hiding, out of U.S. reach, in Pakistan's mountains, just as bin Laden was for so many years.
• "It's wishful thinking to say al-Qaida is on the brink of defeat," says Seth Jones, a Rand analyst and adviser to U.S. special operations

© 2012 Groton Daily Independent • To send correspondence, click here.