My ex-husband and I, even though we're not together, we are 100 percent together in raising our kid. We communicate a lot and where I drop the ball and need him to pick it up or vice versa, he's there.
Osama bin Laden, the person, more likely serves the function of a stand-in. Compare the new terrorists with partisans or conventional terrorists in Israel. These people often fight in a decentralized manner in small, autonomous units, too.