in reality, there is nothing regarding baradar's arrest. he is safe and he is in afghanistan." in the meantime, nato commanders were already looking past the immediate fight. u.s. marines today secured the area in marjah where they plan to establish a new government center, and pave the way for tribal leaders and others to meet and discuss the city's future. >> woodruff: for more on all of this, we get three views. seth jones is a senior political scientist at the research organization rand. he was an advisor to the u.s. military in afghanistan last year. thomas johnson is a research professor at the naval postgraduate school in monterey, california. he focuses on afghanistan and central asia. and steve coll is president of the new america foundation and a writer for "the new yorker." he's the author of "ghost wars: the secret history of the cia, afghanistan and bin laden." thank you, all three, for being with us. seth jones, to you first. let's focus on this important capture. first of all, we do believe that baradar has been captured even though the administration isn't confi

in reality, there is nothing regarding baradar's arrest. he is safe and he is in afghanistan." in the meantime, nato commanders were already looking past the immediate fight. u.s. marinetoday secured the area in marjah where they plan to establish a new government center, and pave the way for tribal leaders and others to meet and discuss the city's future. >> woodruff: for more on all of this, we get three views. seth jones is a senior political scientist at the research organization rand. he was an advisor to the u.s. military in afghanistan last year. thomas johnson is a research professor at the naval postgraduate school in monterey, california. he focuses on afghanistan and central asia. and steve coll is president of the new america foundation and a writer for "the new yorker." he's the author of "ghost wars: the secret history of the cia, afghanistan and bin laden." thank you, all three, for being with us. seth jones, to you first. let's focus on this important capture. first of all, we do believe that baradar has been captured even though the administration isn't confirm

he very well might emerge as the replacement for mullah baradar. there are a number of contenders, but he is pretty high up. think about this political implications of that. clearly, this counter is a coup for the obama administration, but the idea that a guantanamo detainee returns to the battlefield and will not be the operational leader of the afghan taliban create quite a few problems for the obama white house and its efforts to close guantanamo. it will remind people of the risks that can take place when you left some of the detainees free. on the other hand, republican critics are going to want to make too much of this because they are going to have to answer the question, why did the bush administration let him go? it was not the obama administration. it was the bush administration who let him go. host: when you talk about guantanamo, where will baradar go? guest: good question. in the past, he may have gone to guantanamo. clearly, the obama administration does not want to do that. since we have closed -- president obama has closed all of th

guest:s the: have baradar -- the pakistanis have baradar. we, too, have to ask for permission. it is useful at times like this -- these guys, the taliban, al qaeda are pretty resourceful, an intelligent on their own. they know how to take operational steps to protect themselves. they are enormously innovative and adoptive and they have managed to survive despite a rather determined to american allied campaign against them for many years. as an enemy, they are more formidable than you might imagine. these are not -- i will just leave it at that. they have proven themselves to be a formidable enemy. host: richard in new york, good morning. caller: i saw the tower's fault 45 minutes after their reports that they were hit. i watch these reports, too. this things to high heaven like an inside job, but i appreciate it. host: moving on to marvin in detroit. caller: i have been watching between vice president biden and vice president cheney talking about people who were prosecuted in federal courtç do you have a rough tally of those who were prosecuted by the government? guest: i thin

"the new york times" says now that mullah abdul ghani baradar is one of the most approachable members of the taliban. people are wondering that pakistan has a motive to gain political favor. >> i will not speak to specific motives, specific operations or captures. what i will say is that we are enormously heartened byç the ft the pakistani government and their military and intelligence services increasingly recognize the threat within their midst and are doing something about it. iraq, he said, is that right? >> there is reports of another bomb in romani. you described these attacks as few and far between, high profile. is there going to be any change of the u.s. preparations for the elections because of these? are more troops going to be sent down? >> not that i know of. i normally would not speak to this. but secretary gates got an update yesterday. the general will brief you on monday morning here. no, in fact, he met with the secretary shirley after the publication of that front page "the washington post" story, the sky is falling, sectarian violence is about to break out again,