Commanders Want Elite Units Freed From Qaeda Hunt

WASHINGTON, Sept. 2 — Commanders in the American military's most elite Special Operations unit are contending that their troops should be freed from the fruitless hunt in Afghanistan for Osama bin Laden, military and intelligence officials say.

Some senior officers in the Joint Special Operations Command have concluded that Mr. bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda, was probably killed in the American bombing raid at Tora Bora last December, officials said. They concluded that he died in a bombing raid on one of several caves that had been a target because American intelligence officials believed they housed Qaeda leaders.

Yet the Special Operations leaders lack hard forensic evidence that would prove Mr. bin Laden is dead, and acknowledge their conclusions are deductive, drawn partly from the lack of recent confirmed sightings or radio intercepts indicating he is still alive, officials say.

Other military and intelligence officials have sharply disagreed with their assessment, and the analysis by some commanders of the Joint Special Operations Command does not represent a consensus of all Special Operations forces leaders, military officials said.

The analysis concerning Mr. bin Laden's fate plays into a deepening debate under way among Special Operations leaders about how best to use the military's super-secret counterterrorism forces.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld is pushing for an expanded use of Special Operations forces units beyond Afghanistan to kill or capture terrorists. As a result, Special Operations leaders are trying to determine whether the hunt for the elusive Qaeda leader is still the best use of the limited resources of the most elite units.