Al-Qaeda 'Decimated' in Pakistan: US Officials

By Kevin Spak, Newser Staff

Posted Feb 3, 2009 8:09 AM CST

(Newser) – CIA-directed air raids into Pakistan have “decimated” al-Qaeda’s senior leadership, killing up to a dozen high-level targets, senior US military officials tell NPR. They say a “complete al-Qaeda defeat” there is now entirely possible. “The enemy is really, really struggling,” says one official. “These attacks have produced the broadest, deepest, and most rapid reduction in al-Qaeda senior leadership that we’ve seen in several years.”

Officials caution that it is too early to declare victory, with some 100 al-Qaeda training “graduates” loose and unaccounted for. But “we know how bad this is for them,” says one official. “We see al-Qaeda guessing, trying to figure out how this is happening, and they haven’t figured it out yet.” The officials credit improved intelligence, particularly “human penetration” into al-Qaeda, with the strikes’ success.

[Images (3)]

[Quotes (1)]

A Pakistani soldier identifies target coordinates as artillery fires toward militant positions in the Bajur tribal region on the border with Afghanistan, Pakistan, on Friday, Nov. 28, 2008. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Pakistani soldiers are seen outside an abandoned cave used by militants at the Sabagai village in the Bajur tribal region in Pakistan, on the border with Afghanistan, Friday, Nov. 28, 2008. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

In this Thursday, June 21, 2007 file photo, an MQ-4 Predator controlled by the 46th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron stands on the tarmac at Balad Air Base, 50 miles north of Baghdad, Iraq. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo, File)

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In the past, you could take out the No. 3 al-Qaeda leader, and No. 4 just moved up. Well, if you take out No. 3, No. 4 and then 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, it suddenly becomes a lot more difficult to revive the leadership cadre. - A senior US official

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