Bin Laden’s War Log

AfPak Channel reports US counter-terrorism officials have revealed some of what they’ve found in OBL’s diary:

U.S. counterterrorism officials said yesterday that the Navy SEALs who killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden seized his “meticulous” handwritten diary along with other documents and electronic information, showing that bin Laden was in operational control of al-Qaeda, communicating with his lieutenants, offering suggestions to diversify targets, and calculating the number of Americans that would need to die before America would depart the Middle East (AP, Independent, CNN, AFP). Bin Laden also reportedly retained a singular focus on the West, a position that caused tension with other members of al-Qaeda (Post).

While authorities say the diary and other documents contain no “imminent” threat information, they do reportedly show that bin Laden was in direct communication with Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and even offered criticism of an article published in the affiliate’s English-language magazine “Inspire” (ProPublica, AP).

I’m not trained as a trial lawyer, but it strikes me that this evidence – along with the dossier from New York – probably refutes one of the arguments I’ve heard against the feasibility of trying OBL rather than killing him: the claim that in a court of law it may have been impossible to persuasively link him to the events of 9/11. Thoughts?