How long might it really take to find al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden? U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggests the FBI’s 17-year hunt for convicted Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski as a reasonable guide.

Or worse still, Gates said on Wednesday, consider the fate of Americans taken hostage decades ago in Lebanon who died before the United States could find and rescue them.

Speaking to reporters at the Pentagon, Gates dismissed the notion that something might be amiss because bin Laden and his top lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahri, remain free more than seven years after the September 11 attacks.

“To a certain extent, I think too many people go to too many movies. Finding these guys is really hard, and especially if they have some kind of a support network,” he said.
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But Gates drew a historical parallel between bin Laden’s hide-out and the mountain cabin in Montana where federal agents found Kaczynski in 1995, after he had killed three people and injured 23 others in a bombing campaign that began in 1978.

“Look at how long it took … years and years — in the United States,” the U.S. defense chief said.