Researchers say science can help find bin Laden
Applying nighttime satellite images, advanced geographical techniques, and mathematical models to history's biggest manhunt, researchers say they have a strong idea where Osama bin Laden went after escaping from Afghanistan in 2001 - and where he may be hiding still.
The researchers, using what is billed as the first attempt to apply scientific methodology to the pursuit, point to the lawless frontier town of Parachinar in northwest Pakistan as a prime place to search for the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.
"If bin Laden's alive, he could be sitting there now," said Thomas W. Gillespie, the University of California at Los Angeles geographer who led the study, published online in the MIT International Review.
The study offers crisp satellite images of three walled compounds in Parachinar ideally suited to the needs of an ailing, 6-foot, 4-inch terrorist on the lam from the world's mightiest superpower.
In lieu of street numbers, the researchers supplied precise latitude/longitude coordinates for each address - with the caution that the locations deserve closer scrutiny, not salvos of Hellfire missiles.
Parachinar, 12 miles from the Afghan border, has a population reckoned to be roughly 300,000, including refugees and Islamic fundamentalist fighters from a neighbor wracked by decades of conflict. "Scientifically speaking, this is the place where [intelligence agencies] need to prove or disprove bin Laden's presence before looking anywhere else," Gillespie said.
Why? Because it is the place that "bio-geographic" theories point to. Such theories, successfully employed to locate endangered species and more commonplace criminals, hold that a missing creature - human or beast - driven from one place will most probably seek sanctuary in the nearest safe place offering the greatest abundance of resources.
Specialists in high-tech spying say the UCLA study deserves attention.
"This is serious research that should be considered by the US military and intelligence," said Keith Masback, head of the US Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, an organization of academics, business representatives, and military officials interested in satellite surveillance.
US intelligence agencies say only that the findings by the research team are under review, declining to comment in detail.
The UCLA team settled on Parachinar by applying two biogeographic theories - "distance decay" and "island biogeography" - to bin Laden's last known location, Afghanistan's Tora Bora mountains, where he is known to have holed up after the 9/11 attacks.
The United States has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in a conspicuously unsuccessful seven-year hunt for the leader of Al Qaeda. Gillespie doesn't believe the oft-made boast by American officials that bin Laden - who carries a $25 million price on his head - is cowering miserably in some cave. "A cave hideout would create thermal anomalies that would be fairly easy to find," the geographer said.
"He needs a high-walled compound, screened from aerial surveillance by trees, with room for bodyguards, and reliable electricity," Gillespie said. "Theory suggests an urban habitat, with distracting bustle, not a wilderness hideout where any human activity would stick out - and where the US wouldn't think twice about dropping bunker-busting bombs."
Bin Laden is thought to suffer from kidney disease requiring dialysis, and, thus, electricity. He needs an anonymous but secure facility in a place where neither high walls nor assault rifle-toting guards would attract notice. In Parachinar, AK-47s are as unremarkable as iPods in Harvard Square.
Using satellite images, the researchers traced concentric circles at 10 kilometer intervals around Tora Bora. The scientists then charted possible urban hideaways within a 20-kilometer radius of his former Afghan lair. Parachinar seemed most likely. It's accessible by mountain trail from Tora Bora while offering urban anonymity, has dependable electricity (as measured by nighttime satellite images of brightness), and offers effective insulation against US troops - Pakistan's tribal districts are notoriously hostile, both in terms of terrain and local temperament.
Critics say Parachinar is an unlikely spot for bin Laden because the settlement's population is heavily Shi'ite Muslim, whose members fear and feud with the surrounding region's huge Sunni majority.
Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda acolytes are fundamentalist Sunnis, so the choice of Parachinar might seem incongruous. But the wild and wooly center is also home to substantial numbers of Afghan Sunnis, and the bloody animosity between the two groups is itself a sort of camouflage.
As in America's Old West, people know better than to ask questions of twitchy strangers.
Colin Nickerson can be reached at nickerson.colin@gmail.com. 
