I think this speaks for itself. Even the harshest critics of George Bush have to give him credit where it is due, and it is definitely due here…
One of the advantages of the Iraq war is that it drew many jihadis into that combat theater, a situation which led to their deaths. NPR
CIA-directed airstrikes against al-Qaida leaders and facilities in Pakistan over the past six to nine months have been so successful, according to senior U.S. officials, that it is now possible to foresee a “complete al-Qaida defeat” in the mountainous region along the border with Afghanistan.
The officials say the terrorist network’s leadership cadre has been “decimated,” with up to a dozen senior and midlevel operatives killed as a result of the strikes and the remaining leaders reeling from the repeated attacks.
“The enemy is really, really struggling,” says one senior U.S. counterterrorism official. “These attacks have produced the broadest, deepest and most rapid reduction in al-Qaida senior leadership that we’ve seen in several years.”
The threat of another al-Qaida terrorist attack against the United States has not gone away, they warn, noting that about 100 fighters have already “graduated” from the al-Qaida training camps and are prepared for possible terrorist operations in the West.
“Where those people are and what they’re doing, we don’t know,” says one senior official.
The officials are also careful to say that the weakening of al-Qaida in Pakistan doesn’t necessarily extend to the network’s operations in other areas, such as in east or north Africa.
“In the past, you could take out the No. 3 al-Qaida leader, and No. 4 just moved up to take his place,” says one official. “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.”
Such claims could not be independently verified, although Pakistani sources have identified by name a number of foreign militants killed in the border region in recent months.
U.S. intelligence agencies regularly monitor telephone and Internet communications involving suspected al-Qaida operatives.
“We know that they know how bad this is for them,” one official says. “We see al-Qaida guessing, trying to figure out how this is happening, and they haven’t figured it out yet.”
