The president also added more than one billion dollars to the agency's war on terrorism, most of it for the new covert action, the report said.

The operation will include what officials said is "unprecedented" coordination between the Central Intelligence Agency and commando and other military units, according to the Post.

Bush has instructed the CIA to attack bin Laden's communications, security apparatus and infrastructure, the paper quoted senior government officials as saying.

A demostraion image of the Predator's aerial reconnaissance capabilities. Source: FAS UAV Images

According to the report, US intelligence agencies have identified new and important specific weaknesses in bin Laden' al-Qaeda network, and these vulnerabilities will be the focus of the lethal covert action.

"The gloves are off," a senior official told the Post. "Lethal operations that were unthinkable pre-September 11 are now underway."

Last spring, US intelligence officials obtained high-quality video of bin Laden but were unable to act on it, the report said.

The video showed the al-Qaeda chief and his entourage at one of his known locations in Afghanistan. But neither the CIA nor the US military had the means to shoot a missile or another weapon at him while he was being photographed.

Since then, the CIA-operated unmanned drone Predator, which normally carries only high-resolution cameras, has been equipped with Hellfire antitank missiles that can be fired at targets of opportunity, according to The Post.

The technology was not operational at the time bin Laden was caught on video, the report said.