Something’s up: Four major Al Qaeda commanders killed in Pakistani tribal areas — in 10 days

[Valin]

Hot Air:

Allahpundit

December 9, 2012

 

At least one of them was a very big fish.

 

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Unless I’ve missed something, with Hussainan, Rahman, Abu Yahya al-Libi, and Ilyas Kashmiri all dead, AQ’s hierarchy now basically consists of Zawahiri on top and then a swarm of younger inexperienced no-names far beneath him who are trying to hold the group together by filling emerging leadership voids. But never mind that; the interesting bit here is the timing. Hussainan was killed on Friday and today we get this:

 

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According to Bill Roggio, two other AQ capos were killed in drone strikes in South Waziristan on November 29 and December 1. Not only that, but those strikes were the first U.S. attacks in 36 days, the second-longest operational pause in drone warfare in Pakistan since 2008. What gives? Did the U.S. have a bead on these guys all along but decided to hold off while trying to rebuild relations with Pakistan, or did we stumble into some kind of intelligence windfall? Maybe it’s a bit of both: Coincidentally, Pakistan’s foreign minister declared on November 28 — a day before the first new drone strike — that relations with the U.S. have now been fully repaired. Could be that ISI, as a token of goodwill, decided to drop a dime on a bunch of Al Qaeda bigwigs, with the U.S. given a green light by Pakistani military leaders to go ahead and take them out.

 

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