Captured Al-Qaeda kingpin is case of ‘mistaken identity’

Sunday Times - Times Online talks about the recent capture of Al Quaeda's "third in command." Just maybe he is not as important as we were led to believe.

"THE capture of a supposed Al-Qaeda kingpin by Pakistani agents last week was hailed by President George W Bush as “a critical victory in the war on terror”. According to European intelligence experts, however, Abu Faraj al-Libbi was not the terrorists’ third in command, as claimed, but a middle-ranker derided by one source as “among the flotsam and jetsam” of the organisation.
Al-Libbi’s arrest in Pakistan, announced last Wednesday, was described in the United States as “a major breakthrough” in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden.
Bush called him a “top general” and “a major facilitator and chief planner for the Al- Qaeda network”. Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state, said he was “a very important figure”. Yet the backslapping in Washington and Islamabad has astonished European terrorism experts, who point out that the Libyan was neither on the FBI’s most wanted list, nor on that of the State Department “rewards for justice” programme. "

So what the big deal? A little white lie - a little exaggeration. We have exaggerated before - remember? WMD's, "Mission Accomplished". Hell those exaggerations didn't get us into trouble and didn't mislead the public - right?