I have no idea how solid a source this site is, but it is intriguing that Bin Laden’s number two may have been trained by the KGB.

Moscow: Russia’s secret agency Federal Security Service (FSB), formerly known as KGB, had imparted militant training to Ayman-al-Zawahiri, the number two in the terrorist organisation Al Qaeda after chief Osama bin Laden.

The Dawn quoted a report in a Poland newspaper “Rzeczpospolita” that before deciding to join Osama, Zawahiri received terrorist training in 1998 at a FSB camp in Dagestan.

Thereafter, he shifted his base to Afghanistan to become Osama bin Laden’s deputy, the paper quoted a former FSB agent as saying.

The agent also claimed that Zawahiri was not the only link between the FSB and Al Qaeda.

That would explain why he was so damn good as a strategist for AQ, where Bin Laden was more the visionary – figure head as explained here.