Panetta says al-Qaeda defeat ‘within reach’

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta landed in Afghanistan today, vowing “maximum pressure” to defeat al-Qaeda, a goal he said was “within reach.”

After the killing of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden in a raid by U.S. Navy Seals in May, the U.S. is now targeting 10 to 20 other “key leaders” in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and North Africa, Panetta said. They include Ayman al-Zawahiri, who the U.S. believes is holed up in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a semi-autonomous region of Pakistan.

“If we can go after them, I think we really can strategically defeat al-Qaeda,” Panetta said on his first overseas trip since being sworn in July 1. “Is it going to take some more work? You bet it is. But I think it’s within reach.”

Panetta, 73, oversaw the bin Laden operation as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. He called the death of the al- Qaeda leader “an important start.” Missions by the CIA and other forces eroded al-Qaeda’s ability to conduct attacks on the scale of Sept. 11 and have forced the group on the run, he said.

“Now is the moment, following what happened with bin Laden, to put maximum pressure on them,” Panetta told reporters traveling with him before landing in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital. “If we continue this effort, we can really cripple al- Qaeda as a threat to this country.”

Panetta is visiting Afghanistan as the U.S. and its allies seek to ensure al-Qaeda never again gains a foothold in its mountains and deserts, as the group did before the Taliban was ousted from control after the 2001 attacks. The U.S. is negotiating a long-term agreement with Afghanistan to cement strategic ties even as it plans to withdraw 10,000 troops this year with an eye to handing over security control in 2014.

Petraeus on Al-Qaeda

Army General David Petraeus, who is stepping down as commander of the 48-nation military coalition in Afghanistan, said he shared Panetta’s assessment. He will take over Panetta’s old job as CIA director in September and will be succeeded in Afghanistan later this month by Lieutenant General John Allen.

Petraeus said estimates show 50 to 100 members of al-Qaeda group remain in Afghanistan, with some also linked to other militant groups. Most are located in the mountains of Kunar and Nuristan provinces in the east, where there are few Afghan security forces, he said.

The coalition has conducted missions recently to disrupt their operations and has longer-term plans to secure the area with local forces, Petraeus said.

‘Strategic Dismantling’

The combination of that pressure and the squeeze on al- Qaeda elsewhere creates “a real prospect” for “strategic dismantling or strategic defeat,” he said.

“There may be elements of al-Qaeda around for some time,” Petraeus said. “The question is whether they can effectively plan and execute strategic attacks.”

Panetta said he’s looking for “sufficient stability” in Afghanistan and Iraq to prevent the countries from being havens for al-Qaeda.

The drive for “maximum pressure” includes a focus on the Taliban leadership, Panetta said. The U.S. has turned more attention recently to persuading leaders of the insurgency to reach a negotiated peace with the Afghan government.

“I think it’s really key to keep the pressure on now in order for us to have half a chance of being able to achieve reconciliation,” Panetta said.

His predecessor, Robert Gates, said keeping up military pressure on the Taliban may force its leadership to the negotiating table by the end of the year.

Governing Themselves

“We’re here because we want to ensure that Afghanistan is never again a sanctuary for al-Qaeda,” Petraeus said. “The only way to accomplish that is to enable our Afghan partners to secure and govern themselves.”

A successful handover of security control hinges on Afghan security forces being strong enough to take over, said Panetta, who was a member of the Iraq Study Group that conducted an independent assessment of the war in Iraq. He plans to meet with Afghanistan’s ministers of defense and interior, who oversee the army and police.

Panetta, a California Democrat who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1977 to 1993, is coming back into the spotlight after the more low-profile post at the CIA, where covert operations demand secrecy.

He’s met often with many of those he’ll hold talks with in Afghanistan, including President Hamid Karzai, albeit mostly without the public announcements and press conferences that are a feature of foreign visits by defense secretaries.

“We’ve always had a very good relationship,” Panetta said of Karzai.

‘Agile and Efficient’

Still, he said he hopes for improvement. Ties between the U.S. and Karzai have been strained amid allegations of vote- rigging in the 2009 presidential election and the government’s failure to tackle corruption.

Panetta spent his first week in office meeting with staff and with Obama, as well as making calls to members of Congress and his foreign counterparts. On July 4, he called six members of the U.S. armed forces serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and Bahrain to pledge his support for the troops and their families.

He said on his way to Kabul that he’s looking to develop an “agile and efficient” military and a “vision of what the Defense Department will look like in five or 10 years.”

Panetta said he has directed staff to work with the White House Office of Management and Budget, which he once headed, to find “the approach that would make the most sense in terms of protecting our national defense and achieving savings at the same time.”

His goals also include strengthening alliances such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which leads the coalition in Afghanistan.

In Libya, where leader Muammar Qaddafi is in a standoff with rebels, the aim is to “do what we can to bring down the regime,” Panetta said. “That seems to me to be extremely important to try to get the best result we can.”