ISLAMABAD, May 3: A set of declassified Al Qaeda (AQ) correspondence released by a US think tank on the first anniversary of the killing of global terror icon Osama bin Laden (OBL) by American forces in Abbottabad reveals that the outfit’s chief, disgruntled with his unruly affiliates, wanted to embark on a reform process to win back the sympathies of alienated Muslims.

Besides, he wanted focus of all militant attacks to be the US which he described as “our desired goal” and plotted to down aircraft carrying President Barack Obama or Gen Petraeus (now CIA chief).

The information was gleaned from 17 Al Qaeda internal memos authored by OBL and his senior lieutenants, including Atiyya Abd-Al Rahman, Abu Yahya al-Libi and Adam Gadahn, which were recovered from Bin Laden’s Abbottabad hideout by US Navy SEALs after the raid. Most of these documents were in electronic format and had been saved on thumb drives, memory cards and OBL’s personal computer’s hard-drive, in addition to hard copies of some of the correspondence addressed to him.

It remained unclear what percentage did the revealed documents make up of the intelligence treasure trove, thought to comprise thousands of documents seized from the so-called Osama compound.

Gen John Abizaid, chair of the Combating Terrorism Centre (CTC) which published the documents, in the foreword for an attached analytical report ‘Letters from Abbottabad: Bin Ladin sidelined’ noted that documents might help reassess the known information about Al Qaeda, “but not as a definitive commentary on Al Qaeda’s evolution or the group’s current status”.

The memos, however, provide a fresh insight into the outfit’s planning to overcome the difficulties it was confronting, including distancing of ordinary Muslims from its ideology, growing isolation, depleting cadres, financial difficulties and loosening control over global affiliates.

There were obviously regrets for the mistakes made by the group.

“I plan to release a statement that we are starting a new phase to correct (the mistakes) we made… In doing so, we shall reclaim, God willing, the trust of a large segment of those who lost their trust in the jihadis,” OBL said in a 2010 letter as he worried about AQ affiliates causing unnecessary Muslim civilian casualties.

As part of the plan to rejuvenate the group, correspondence reveals that changing the name of Al Qaeda was being contemplated because the strategists thought the outfit’s ID did not evoke the feeling of affiliation among common Muslims who consequently did not feel offended by the campaign against it. The names being considered included Ta’ifat al-tawhid wa-al-jihad, Jama’at wahdat al-Muslimin, Hizb tawhid al-Umma al-Islamiyya and Jama’at Tahrir Al-Aqsa.

While the attached analytical report concludes that the AQ central leadership under OBL was not in sync on the operational level with the affiliates, Bin Laden, who has been painted as a lone sad man helplessly watching things get out of control, looked upset with the failure of affiliated groups to garner public support, poor media campaign and inefficiently executed terror plots that killed innocent fellow believers.

His advisers, including Gadahn and Libi, could be seen criticising the strategies and activities of Al Qaeda in Iraq, Al Qaeda in Arab Peninsula, Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan and Al-Shahab.

There has, however, been very little criticism of the operations carried out by the Taliban and groups like the Haqqani network. Gadahn, while questioning various terror operations, refers once to an Afghan Taliban act -- bombing of a mosque for killing Kunduz mayor that killed 30 others, who happened to be praying there.

Growing challenges, however, did not stop the isolated AQ chief from plotting rather impractical attacks, including shooting down planes bringing President Obama and Gen Petraeus to Pakistan or Afghanistan with the hope of plunging the US into crisis.

“I asked Shaykh Sa’id, Allah have mercy on his soul, to task brother Ilyas to prepare two groups -- one in Pakistan and the other in Bagram area of Afghanistan -- with the mission of anticipating and spotting the visits of Obama or Petraeus to Afghanistan or Pakistan to target the aircraft of either one of them,” the terror leader said in a letter.

“The reason for concentrating on them is that Obama is the head of infidelity and killing him automatically will make Biden take over the presidency for the remainder of the term, as it is the norm over there. Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the US into a crisis.

“As for Petraeus, he is the man of the hour in this last year of the war, and killing him would alter the war’s path.”

The accompanying analysis said that the correspondence shed light on AQ’s ties with Pakistan and Iran. About Iran, the documents suggested there was an adversarial relationship, but left it vague in the context of Pakistan.

“The discussion of Pakistan is scarce and inconclusive. Although references are made about trusted Pakistani brothers, there are no explicit references to any institutional Pakistani support for Al Qaeda or its operatives,” the attached analytical report by the CTC said.

In one of his last letters before his death, OBL looked supportive of Arab Spring as he noted: “What we are witnessing these days of consecutive revolutions is a great and glorious event, and it is most probable, according to reality and history, that it will encompass the majority of the Islamic world with the will of Allah, and thanks to Allah things are strongly heading towards the exit of Muslims from being under the control of America, and the Americans worry about that, which is great.”

It is interesting that both the western governments and OBL viewed Arab Spring positively. While the prevailing perception in the West was that the Arab uprising would serve as a blow to militant ideology of AQ, OBL looked at it differently. He was, however, worried that the countries witnessing the movements may settle for western style democracy stopping hardline extremists from coming into power. This progress, he opined, was “half solution”.