Al-Qaida is Bleeding Us to Bankruptcy, Bin Laden Claims

Al-Qaida is "bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy", Osama bin Laden claims, in a section of his latest videotape which has just come to light.

Delivering a financial report on the "war on terror", he says that every dollar spent by al-Qaida in attacking the US has cost Washington $1m (£545,000) in economic fallout and military spending.

The remarks appear in a full transcript of the 18-minute tape posted on the website of al-Jazeera. They were omitted last Friday when the TV station broadcast extracts.

Referring to Afghanistan, Bin Laden says: "We, alongside the mujahideen, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat ... So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy."

He says that diplomats and others have given lectures at Chatham House in London estimating that al-Qaida spent $500,000 on "the event" (the September 11 attacks), "while America, in the incident and its aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than $500bn. Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated $1m by the permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs.

"As for the size of the [US] economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars."

In reality, spending in the war on terror and other factors have resulted in an expected $377bn shortfall for 2003 - the highest deficit since the second world war when inflation is factored out. The total US national debt is near the $7,400bn statutory limit.

Bin Laden continues: "When one scrutinises the results, one cannot say that al-Qaida is the sole factor in achieving those spectacular gains. Rather, the policy of the White House that demands the opening of war fronts to keep busy their various corporations - whether they be working in the field of arms or oil or reconstruction - has helped al-Qaida to achieve these enormous results."

He added that some on the US side had gained while the losers were "the American people and their economy".

Evan Kohlmann, a US-based counter-terrorism researcher, said it was as if Bin Laden were following the news from America, perhaps on satellite TV, and drawing shrewd assumptions about what concerns Americans.

"He is trying to create doubts in America's mind that this war is worth the cost," he told the Associated Press.