Foreign Relations report claims bin Laden was within reach in '01

A Senate report to be released the day before President Barack Obama's Tuesday announcement on boosting troop levels in Afghanistan claims that the U.S. had cornered Osama bin Laden in December 2001.

The report prepared by majority staff for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- "Tora Bora Revisited: How We Failed to Get Bin Laden and Why It Matters Today" -- lays blame squarely at the feet of the Bush administration, and namely former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Operation Enduring Freedom commander Gen. Tommy Franks, for failing to catch bin Laden when subsequent review "removes any lingering doubts and makes it clear that Osama bin Laden was within our grasp at Tora Bora."

"Requests were also turned down for U.S. troops to block the mountain paths leading to sanctuary a few miles away in Pakistan," the report states. "The vast array of American military power, from sniper teams to the most mobile divisions of the Marine Corps and the Army, was kept on the sidelines. Instead, the U.S. command chose to rely on airstrikes and untrained Afghan militias to attack bin Laden and on Pakistan’s loosely organized Frontier Corps to seal his escape routes.

"On or around December 16, two days after writing his will, bin Laden and an entourage of bodyguards walked unmolested out of Tora Bora and disappeared into Pakistan’s unregulated tribal area," the report continues. "Most analysts say he is still there today."

In a letter of transmittal attached to the report, Committee Chairman Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said it was vital to understand mistakes made in the past to go forward in the eight-year conflict.

"Our inability to finish the job in late 2001 has contributed to a conflict today that endangers not just our troops and those of our allies, but the stability of a volatile and vital region," Kerry wrote.

Asked about the report Sunday morning on CBS' "Face the Nation," Senate Armed Services Committee Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) said killing the terrorist leader might have meant the U.S. military wouldn't be in Afghanistan at all aynmore.

"I would say there'd be a good chance we would not have forces or need to have forces there," he said.

Eric Zimmermann contributed to this report

This post was updated at 11:00 a.m.

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