Top General says 'getting' bin Laden and Zarqawi won't eliminate terror threat

WBOC16
Jan. 06, 2006

AT AN AIRBASE IN THE PERSIAN GULF While the hunt for Osama bin Laden goes on, one of the top American generals involved in the search says getting bin Laden probably won't eliminate the terrorist threat.

General Allen Peck, the number two officer in charge of the coalition air forces command in Iraq and Afghanistan, says "there's no single face to the enemy that we're fighting" and he doubts whether bin Laden poses the greatest threat to stability in the region.

Peck says Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been striking with far more frequency and lethal force. But even if both "high value targets" were eliminated tomorrow, there are scores of loosely organized groups of people in the region bent on terrorist acts.

Peck believes that standing up an effective Iraqi security force that has the "competence and the confidence" to go after insurgents will be the single most important thing in stabilizing the region.