What would constitute the valid proof in a situation involving _covert and deniable_ acts of terror? What kind of proof would have been acceptable to Taliban? Based on Islamic jurisprudence, perhaps?
. . . .
Verifiable proof would not have been impossible to obtain – the method is straightforward.
The hijackers did not act alone, nor were there actions the culmination of the plans of a self-contained (and, through fruition of their scheme, self-destructing) organization that ended with their fiery destruction.
In other words, each and every man formed one node of a network – networks are traceable (‘pingable’, a computer network engineer might say).
By tracing the history and entanglements of each man, you form your backwards-moving flowchart of culpability. Flows of money, patterns of travel, associations of supporters – all of these things could be uncovered through intelligent police work. If bin Laden’s organization (as we all believe) was a part of this chain, perhaps even being the source, then that would be sufficient evidence for anyone acting on good faith.
The key is the part about acting in good faith. No dependence upon Islamic jurisprudence would have prevented the Taliban from accepting evidence based upon people’s associations with one another and traceable lines of financial, material, logistical and spiritual support – these are universally understood, human realities. The speed at which a decision might have been reached would, perhaps, have been affected by their legal customs but irrefutable evidence of support for criminality would have been nearly impossible to deny.
The United States did not have the patience (and perhaps, now lacks the expertise) to do this hard work. Also, as C. G. Estabrook points out, doing so, especially if Mullah Omar was as good as his word and willing to surrender bin Laden, would have destroyed the philosophical underpinning (such as it is) for the Bush ‘War on Terror’ which is that a “new kind of war” is being waged against an implacable and unreasoning foe who can only be dealt with – unilaterally - through maximum overkill.
.d.