Bin Laden Warned of 'Disaster after Disaster' for al-Qaida

Osama bin Laden bemoaned "disaster after disaster" inflicted by U.S. drone strikes on al-Qaida before he was killed and even mulled changing his terror group's name, a top U.S. official said Monday.

President Barack Obama's top counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan said al-Qaida was losing "badly" under a huge U.S. assault, was a "shadow" of its former self and that its core leadership would soon be "no longer relevant."

Brennan said in a speech in Washington that the al-Qaida leader's frustration poured out in documents seized from his compound by U.S. Navy SEAL special forces who killed him a year ago.

"He confessed to 'disaster after disaster,'" Brennan said, saying that some of the captured material would be published online this week by the Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

On the eve of the anniversary of bin Laden's death, Brennan argued that a relentless U.S. drone campaign and other pressure had left al-Qaida seriously weakened, and unable to replace wiped-out leaders.

"Under intense pressure in the tribal regions of Pakistan, they have fewer places to train and groom the next generation of operatives, they're struggling to attract new recruits.

"Morale is low," Brennan said in a speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, which was briefly interrupted by a Code Pink anti-war demonstrator who was hauled out of the room by a burly policeman.

Brennan said that the documents gathered at bin Laden's lair in Abbottabad, outside Islamabad, show that the late al-Qaida leader urged his subordinates to flee Pakistani tribal regions for places "away from aircraft photography and bombardment."

Things got so bad for the group which plotted the September 11 attacks in 2001, the deadliest terror strike in U.S. history, that bin Laden considered changing the group's name, he said.

"In short, al-Qaida is losing, badly. And bin Laden knew it," he said, adding that bin Laden had complained at the Obama administration's decision to stop using the phrase "war on terror."

Brennan's speech will likely prompt new claims by Republicans that the Obama campaign is exploiting the anniversary of the bin Laden raid to boost the president's prospects of reelection in November.

Senior Obama aides are clearly using the president's decision to launch the high risk raid as an implicit comparison to the character of his presumptive Republican rival Mitt Romney.

Brennan also claimed that the administration's tactics against al-Qaida had made it harder than ever for "core" al-Qaida to plan and execute large-scale, potentially catastrophic attacks.

"Today, it is increasingly clear that-compared to 9/11, the core al-Qaida leadership is a shadow of its former self," Brennan said.

"Al-Qaida has been left with just a handful of capable leaders and operatives, and with continued pressure is on the path to its destruction.

"And for the first time since this fight began, we can look ahead and envision a world in which the al-Qaida core is simply no longer relevant."

Brennan's speech amounted to the administration's most comprehensive public survey about the state of the struggle against al-Qaida.

He spent considerable time defending strikes by unmanned U.S. drones in nations like Pakistan, crediting them with dismantling al-Qaida's top leadership and causing bin Laden's distress.

Brennan said the strikes were legal, ethical and proportional, and added that Obama had instructed his officials to share more details about the secret war.

Despite lauding the administration's achievements in hammering top al-Qaida leaders and the group's capacity, Brennan also warned that global terror threats were still potent, particularly those emanating from Africa.

"As the al-Qaida core falters, it continues to look to its affiliates and adherents to carry on its murderous cause," Brennan said, warning that the group's merger with the Shebab group in Somalia was "worrying."

He said that al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) remained a threat, despite the strike that took out radical U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who directed its external operations.