The US continues to hammer terrorist bases in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan, striking for the fourth time in the past two days.
The latest airstrike, carried out by the unmanned Predator and Reaper attack aircraft, killed three “rebels” in the village of Payekhel in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan, according to Dawn. The Datta Khel area is administered by Hafiz Gul Bahadar, the Taliban commander for North Waziristan.
No senior Taliban or al Qaeda commanders have been reported killed in the strike.
The US has carried out three other strikes in North Waziristan over the past two days; 32 terrorists have been reported killed in the strikes, including a military commander in the Haqqani Network. Earlier today, a swarm of Predators launched 12 missiles at two compounds in the village of Darga Mandi on the outskirts of Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan. Fourteen terrorists, including members of the so-called Punajbi Taliban, were reported killed.
On Sept. 14, US Predators fired three missiles at a compound in the village of of Bushnarai in the Shawal area of North Waziristan. In that attack, 11 terrorists, including several “foreigners,” a term reserved for al Qaeda operatives, were killed. In the second strike on Sept. 14, four “militants” were killed when Predators hit their vehicle in the village of Qutabkhel.
Today Pakistani intelligence officials claimed that Saifullah, a Haqqani Network military commander in Afghanistan and a cousin of Siraj, was killed in the Sept. 14 strike in Qutabkhel.
This latest strike today is the 13th this month, making September the most active month since the US began hitting targets in Pakistan in 2004. Eleven strikes were carried out in January 2010, after the Taliban and al Qaeda executed a successful suicide attack at Combat Outpost Chapman that targeted CIA personnel who were active in gathering intelligence for the Predator campaign in Pakistan. In the bombing at COP Chapman, seven CIA officials and a Jordanian intelligence officer were killed.
With today’s strikes, the US has carried out 67 attacks inside Pakistan this year. The US exceeded last year’s strike total of 53 with a strike in Kurram late last month. In 2008, the US carried out 36 strikes inside Pakistan. [For up-to-date charts on the US air campaign in Pakistan, see LWJ Special Report, Charting the data for US airstrikes in Pakistan, 2004 – 2010.]
Background on the Datta Khel area
The Datta Khel region has been hit hard by the US, especially in the past several weeks. Six out of the last 12 strikes have taken place in Datta Khel. The US has conducted 17 airstrikes in the Datta Khel region this year, or 25 percent of its current total of 67 airstrikes in Pakistan in 2010. Of the 161 strikes in Pakistan since 2004, 22 strikes have taken place in Datta Khel.
The Datta Khel region is a known hub of Taliban, Haqqani Network, and al Qaeda activity. While Bahadar administers the region, the Haqqani Network, al Qaeda, and allied Central Asian jihadi groups are also based in the area. The Lashkar al Zil, or al Qaeda’s Shadow Army, is known to have a command center in Datta Khel.
Some top al Qaeda leaders have been targeted and killed in Datta Khel. A strike on Dec. 17, 2009, targeted Sheikh Saeed al Saudi, Osama bin Laden’s brother-in-law and a member of al Qaeda’s Shura Majlis, or executive council. Al Saudi is thought to have survived the strike, but Abdullah Said al Libi, the commander of the Shadow Army or Lashkar al Zil, and Zuhaib al Zahibi, a general in the Shadow Army, were both killed in the attack.
But the most significant attack in Datta Khel took place on May 21 this year and resulted in the death of Mustafa Abu Yazid, a longtime al Qaeda leader and close confidant of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahiri.
Yazid served as the leader of al Qaeda in Afghanistan and the wider Khorasan, a region that encompasses portions of Pakistan, Iran, and several Central Asian states. More importantly, Yazid was as al Qaeda’s top financier, which put him in charge of the terror group’s purse strings. He served on al Qaeda’s Shura Majlis, or top decision-making council. Yazid also was closely allied with the Taliban and advocated the program of embedding small al Qaeda teams with Taliban forces in Afghanistan.
21 Comments
This month of constant strikes reminds me of the end of the movie ‘The Godfather’. Lets just hope we are getting some HVTs just like Michael Corleone did.
Love this uptick in pace. Hopefully we’re taking out HVTs, but even if we don’t hear “name” kills, these strikes have value in the psychological stress it puts on the enemy, plus we may be taking out future name HVTs that will now never gain the experience and expertise to cause havoc in the future.
Any ides if this uptick is due to some new intel / source /methods?
Good job to our men and women who are making this happen!
I agree that foot soldiers make future HVTs. With the last couple of weeks, my money is on the drones’ taking out at least one HVT along with foot soldiers.
Could just be optimism on my part, but the step change in pace and strength of strikes (“swarms” and more than two or three missiles per strike) indicates some high value targets were likely involved.
It looks like the increased drone strikes were in part to have the enemy on their heels as the offensive in Kandahar (Zhari district) kicks off.
Could be very good news indeed for the big picture.
About a month ago the administration announced that is was no longer going to pressure Pak to move on the northwest territories. I wonder if this is what we are doing in lieu of pressuring pakistan to take action. Good stuff.
I believe UBL (has been) and Zawahiri within the past 2 years have moved into a large city inside Pak – They know they will not be hit there from the air – It would have to come from a raid and any type raid would have to involve Pak forces and because of that they will always stay outside our OODA loop…
Coalition troops, maybe including some Indian Special Forces, should prepare to take N. Waz. and, perhaps to return it to Paks. As one component of a hammer and anvil or pincer to cut of escape routes and Taliban traffic re Kandahar.
US special forces are “probably”operating in NW and if right, must be the ones targetting for the drones.
To infiniblue: Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…….. 🙂
Though I don’t know what “OODA Loop” is, I do agree with TMP that all AQ’s HVTs have been moved into an urban area well within Pakistan proper and are under the “personal” protection of the Pakistani Security Service. I am resigned to the belief that no AQ HVT will ever be caught or killed. They will all die peacefully over the natural span of their lives after committing, orchestrating, sponsoring, etc. etc. innumerable further atrocities of magnitudes great and small.
I agree with JRP that it seems like most or all of the HVT’s left (OBL, Zawahiri, Shukrijumah, al-Libi) are probably in or near cities where drones cannot currently strike. However, al Yazid was killed in N. Waz not that long ago so maybe some of them did find need to go N. Waz/other FATA areas some of the time. I’d be surprised if OBL and Zawahiri spent much time in FATA though since drones can get them there. My guess is OBL does not move around much and is near enough to a city like Chitral or somewhere else in Khyber Pukhtunkwa where drones don’t go but not close enough to major population centers that he would arouse suspicion. I know Pakistan’s ISI has been and continues to be a problem, but personally I don’t think they’re protecting the most notorious AQ HVTs, maybe some low level AQ guys and lots of Taliban factions to be sure.
how much for one predator strike?
this one got three…
how much tax money goes to this at time seemingly meaningless expense…
“The OODA loop (for observe, orient, decide, and act) is a concept originally applied to the combat operations process, often at the strategic level in both the military operations.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop
Rule of thumb: if you see something you don’t understand stick it in Google (or look it up in Wikipedia).
Crusader: “how much tax money goes to this at time seemingly meaningless expense…”
About $10K per Hellfire. But more for running the whole delivery and intelligence system. Just think if we’d spent $170K on 17 properly targeted Hellfires in 2000 how many billions would have been saved in lower Manhattan. It’s not a waste of money when it saves lives and capitol in the long term. OWrrying about a Hellfire strike makes their ability to operate effectively that much more difficult.
Regarding the AQSL (look it up …) they have the usual problem of the so-called #3: their CFO and their COO (and associated VPs) who by definition have to do something to be effective. They have to go where the action is or delegate to another chain of management who is in the FATA (and therefore can be hit). AZ, UBL, MO can live at the end of a very secure chain but the “#3” has to put his neck on the line and that’s why so many “#3” AQ have been killed.
From video AZ shot in 2004 AZ was in NW in the Sawhal (forensic botany FTW). But notice how AQSL do not do videos any more: changed appearance and location issues, I think. I think they’re very low profile, perhaps in cities or towns (but perhaps in the FATA or Balochistan — remember KSM and baS both though Karachi was safe though they were careless with their GSM SIM cards). They move only at night with a very, very small entourage (perhaps one cars worth) to minimize their “cross-section”. They know that if they are found even a battalion of 055 Brigade bodyguards is not going to be able to protect them from a determined US force that wants them captured or killed. The US would be quite happy with a body bag of parts that can be DNA analyzed though a head or body would be better to “prove to the world” that we got them. So being cryptic is all they have left. They communicate with a chain of couriers (and perhaps mail and other techniques including dead drops) to make backtracing that communication difficult. The other in here is financial: they still need money to live. Where does that come from? Who brings it? Where does it originate? That bit is less exciting than “boots on the ground” but I suspect that might lead us to him in the end.
Of course they could have help from ISI but that might be risky as I’m pretty sure the CIA is working that angle against the ISI too. I doubt they meet any ISI these days they can’t trust them.
Thanks kp. That all makes sense. Like you said they still need money and they still need food. And it seems like you are right that the HVTs have stopped doing video, but it seems like they’re still doing audio (AZ put out a message recently). Do you think that tracking the couriers who carry the audio tapes could be a way to get to them? I’m sure CIA is thinking of that, they have released so many tapes since 2001 and it seems like most of them have been dropped off at one of Al Jazeera’s offices in Pakistan. It seems like CIA should if they haven’t already try to negotiate with Pakistan and any news bureaus in western Pakistan to put hidden cameras at their news bureaus so you could see somebody dropping off the tapes. Even if you couldn’t identify them b/c of having a covered face you could maybe follow them. I’m sure the person dropping off the tapes is several degrees removed from senior leadership but this still seems like a good way to try to get at them. what do people think, or maybe we’ve been doing this all along and it hasn’t worked?
@ds: Of course the CIA (and NSA) have thought about trying to track the couriers. The problem is doing it.
If you are watching a tape get delivered to Al Jazzera then you might find that person doing the delivery but then you have to find the previous link. But that might give you much if AQ find a unknown local give him a package and ask him to take it to this address for $50 (and perhaps surveil him whilst he does it so it gets there). Or drop the package at a location and call Al Jazzera to tell them it’s there. Or if you make that delivery by mail. Then you have to find the person who posted it.
There should be no easy to find connection to the chain and then to track the chain. That’s not easy especially if it’s another paid unknown. Then you have to find where he got it from (another courier? by mail? a dead drop?) and how he knew to look for it (regular check of a dead drop? by someone giving him the package?).
There’s no guarantee that this courier line is fixed (it shouldn’t be though making it variable can add vulnerabilities but makes tracking more difficult). At the top end of line closest to AQSL the first link is clearly very trusted but as you go down the chain you can get less and less trusted or better still unknowing. I suspect at some point between the highly trusted chain and less trusted side of the chain there are set of dead drops to “air gap” the trusted end.
One other issue about the audio tapes is I think they’re originally recorded as “audio cassettes”. That’s a simple piece of hardware that the AQSL can trust is not bugged or emitting any trackable system. They also blend into the environment well if sent in the mail. The same with audio tracks on videotape (a thirty minute message buried well down the tape). Or converted to digital at some point along the chain say onto on a SD card and sewn into clothing or out into an object for transport then put back onto tape by a low level jihadi close to the media outlet. If you have the original tapes you might be able to detect this if they don’t use lossless compression.
A lot of this is “old fashioned” spy tradecraft involving people and not technical hardware. See Le Carre and similar accurate novels and factual histories from WW2 onwards. When well designed it’s difficult to trace backwards especially if you can avoid repeating the same sequence of links. And you only get a few chances per year to do the trace and nothing incriminating should be left behind. You only need a handful of links to stay pretty secure.
DS . . . I’m sure our intelligence agencies have thought of everything imaginable. Notwithstanding their excellent tradecraft (12/30/2009 FOB Chapman double-cross), it is obvious that AQ leadership is well-protected by Pakistani intelligence or Haqqani network in a location where we simply can’t get to them for political reasons. One would think that the recent Pakistani floods would shake something loose, but nothing. Face it, we’ll never get these AQ HVTs; they’ll live out their natural lives, because the U.S.A. does not have the political will to get them.
@JRP: “in a location where we simply can’t get to them for political reasons”
There is no location in Pakistan that would be protected for political reasons. Even a big city. If we know the location of any AQSL I’m quite certain that “boots on the ground” would follow with or without the cooperation of the locals. I’m sure AQSL knows that. AZ and UBL for sure we would take them any place on the planet (even Iran if we had a certain location). I’m not sure we’d do this for MO in Pakistan but we might.
We went “boots on the ground” in before expecting to capture AQSL in each case I think. I think we are willing to do it again for the top 2.
http://billroggio.com/archives/2006/09/the_black_guards.php
https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/09/pakistanis_claim_us.php
Is it possible to send some kind of signal that you cant`t hear but is recorded on tape, so that you can pin point the location where it is recorded?
Chris, I’m not a scientist so I can’t say how, but I’ve had exactly the same idea. That is, you put emitters in target areas so that all target locations have overlapping coverage from 3 emitters so that you can triangulate the location from the 3 different signals and the strength of each. This way, any recording (audio or video) would ideally carry three hidden signals which would allow us to determine where a recording was made. It could be as simple as imperceptible (to the enemy) dot/dash interference signals sent every 2 minutes (each traingulation area would have emitters timed so that they would not send their signals at the exact same time). For example, in a 2 minute repeat timeframe in a triangulated area, emitter 1 sends dot dot dot at 00:30, emitter 2 sends dot dash dot at 01:00 and emitter 3 sends dash dot dash at 1:30.
When we see a video (or get an audio) from the enemy, as long as the recording is at least 2 minutes long (to allow for all 3 emitter signals to be captured), we can identify which unique trio of emitter signals were imprecetably recorded.
How it would be done (if even possible), I leave to the scientists but if possible, it would allow us to start tracking where recordings are made.
Gee, I sure wish I could thank the people doing this stuff. It sure looks as if they’re saving a lot of lives by taking out these jihadi.
Thanks for the answers everybody. Yeah I guess I hadn’t thought about how easy it would be to create huge disconnects in the custody chain of tapes so that even if we did trace the last person or two with it, it might not even lead to any militants much less AQSL.