Wednesday, March 31, 2010

U.S. Drones Hit Taliban Safe House In North Waziristan...It's Not So Safe Anymore, 6 Killed


Yesssss! A nice midweek predator drone strike by the U.S. in North Waziristan in NW Pakistan has hit a Taliban safe house and the end result is six fewer Taliban walking the Earth.

From the report at The Long War Journal:



The US struck a Taliban safe house in the lawless tribal agency of North Waziristan as the Pakistani military continues to target the Taliban in nearby Arakzai.

At least three missiles were reported to have been fired from an unmanned Predator or Reaper on a compound known to house Taliban fighters in the village of Tapi, near Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

"A US drone attack targeted a compound owned by Zamir Khan, a local tribesman, and used by militants," a Pakistani security official said, according to The News. "Two missiles were fired." A second unmanned strike aircraft fired a third missile into the compound shortly after the first attack, a Pakistani official said.

Six terrorists were reported killed in the two missile strikes, but no senior Taliban or al Qaeda fighters have been identified as being among those killed.

Tapi is a known haven for the Haqqani Network, the Taliban group that operates in eastern Afghanistan. The Haqqani Network has close ties to al Qaeda; Siraj Haqqani, the group's military commander, sits on al Qaeda's top shura, and the network trains and utilizes suicide bombers for attacks in Afghanistan.

The U.S. has been keeping up fairly consistently with an average of 3 predator drone attacks per week in NW Pakistan with North Waziristan being hit by far the most in the past two months. And as this article states, the Pakistani military continues to apply more pressure to the Taliban in Orakzai agency - I'm still waiting for the Pakistani military to announce a full operation for North Waziristan, much like they did in South Waziristan. A North Waziristan operation would be laid with pitfalls for government troops but at the same time, it still leads the pack for the landing area for Taliban.



US strikes kill 6 in North Waziristan



The US struck a Taliban safe house in the lawless tribal agency of North Waziristan as the Pakistani military continues to target the Taliban in nearby Arakzai.

At least three missiles were reported to have been fired from an unmanned Predator or Reaper on a compound known to house Taliban fighters in the village of Tapi, near Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

"A US drone attack targeted a compound owned by Zamir Khan, a local tribesman, and used by militants," a Pakistani security official said, according to The News. "Two missiles were fired." A second unmanned strike aircraft fired a third missile into the compound shortly after the first attack, a Pakistani official said.

Six terrorists were reported killed in the two missile strikes, but no senior Taliban or al Qaeda fighters have been identified as being among those killed.

Tapi is a known haven for the Haqqani Network, the Taliban group that operates in eastern Afghanistan. The Haqqani Network has close ties to al Qaeda; Siraj Haqqani, the group's military commander, sits on al Qaeda's top shura, and the network trains and utilizes suicide bombers for attacks in Afghanistan.

The US last struck in Tapi on Feb. 17. That attack killed Sheikh Mansoor, a commander in al Qaeda's Lashkar al Zil, or Shadow Army. Mansoor was based in North Waziristan but carried out attacks against US and Afghan forces across the border in Afghanistan.

The latest US strike in Pakistan puts the March total at nine. Since the air campaign heated up in August of 2008, the US has averaged between five and seven strikes a month.

So far this year, the US has carried out 26 strikes in Pakistan; all of the strikes have taken place in North Waziristan. In 2009, the US carried out 53 strikes in Pakistan; and in 2008, the US carried out 36 strikes in the country. [For up-to-date charts on the US air campaign in Pakistan, see: Charting the data for US airstrikes in Pakistan, 2004 - 2010.]

Unmanned US Predator and Reaper strike aircraft have been pounding Taliban and al Qaeda hideouts in North Waziristan over the past several months in an effort to kill senior terror leaders and disrupt the networks that threaten Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the West. [For more information, see LWJ report, "Senior al Qaeda and Taliban leaders killed in US airstrikes in Pakistan, 2004 - 2010."]

Most recently, on March 8, a US strike in a bazaar in Miramshah killed a top al Qaeda operative known as Sadam Hussein Al Hussami. Hussami was a protégé of Abu Khabab al Masri, al Qaeda's top bomb maker and WMD chief, who was killed in a US airstrike in July 2008. Hussami was a senior member of al Qaeda's external operations network, and was on a council that advised the suicide bomber who carried out the attack at Combat Outpost Chapman in Khost, Afghanistan. That attack killed seven CIA officials and a Jordanian intelligence officer. The slain intelligence operatives had been involved in gathering intelligence for the hunt for al Qaeda and Taliban leaders along the Afghan-Pakistani border.

In the neighboring tribal agency of Arakzai, the Pakistani military continues its air offensive against Taliban groups operating there. The military claimed that 35 Taliban fighters were killed in the latest round of helicopter strikes against Taliban bunkers and safe houses in the tribal agency.

Since the fighting began on March 21, the military has claimed that more than 150 Taliban fighters have been killed. Nonetheless, the Taliban have still massed for several attacks against the paramilitary Frontier Corps units operating in Arakzai.

Over the weekend, more than 100 Taliban fighters launched an assault on a Frontier Corps outpost and overran it, killing a lieutenant colonel and four troops. The military retook the outpost after a several-hour-long battle. A day later, the Taliban massed to attack another outpost, but the attack was repelled.

On several occasions over the past year, the Pakistani military has claimed to have restored order in regions in Arakzai, but the Taliban have retaken control after security forces have withdrawn.

The military has also launched limited operations in neighboring Khyber and Kurram. The Taliban still control large regions in these two tribal areas, and remain in full control of North Waziristan.

1 comment:

PatriotUSA said...

Six more Taliban turned into
'medicated goo', what a shame,
what shame! Heh heh.