US Predators carried out another airstrike in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan, killing four “militants.”
The Predators or the more deadly Reapers struck a vehicle and a compound in the village of Khadar Khel in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan today, according to reports from the region. The four terrorists were killed in the strike on the vehicle.
No senior al Qaeda or Taliban leaders have been reported killed in the strike.
Background on the Datta Khel region and North Waziristan
The Datta Khel area of North Waziristan is under the influence of Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadar. Datta Khel serves as a command and control center for al Qaeda’s top leaders. Several of al Qaeda’s top commanders, including Mustafa Abu Yazid, the chief financial official and commander in Afghanistan, and Abdullah Said al Libi, the commander of al Qaeda’s military, have been killed in Predator strikes in Datta Khel in the last year. [For more information on al Qaeda’s presence in Datta Khel, see LWJ report, Latest US Predator strike kills 5 in al Qaeda hub in North Waziristan.]
This year, the US has been pounding targets in the Datta Khel, Miramshah, and Mir Ali areas of North Waziristan in an effort to kill al Qaeda members involved in a plot to carry out Mumbai-styled terror assaults on European soil. Al Qaeda and allied terror groups such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the Islamic Jihad Group, the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Party, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, and a number of other Pakistani and Central and South Asian terror groups host or share camps in the region.
Despite the known presence of al Qaeda and other foreign groups in North Waziristan, and requests by the US that action be taken against these groups, the Pakistani military has indicated that it has no plans to take on Bahadar or the Haqqani Network. Bahadar and the Haqqanis are considered “good Taliban” by the Pakistani military establishment as they do not carry out attacks inside Pakistan.
The Predator strikes, by the numbers
Today’s strike is the second US attack in Pakistan this month. The last strike took place on Dec. 6 in the village of Khysore, also in the Datta Khel area. Five terrorists were reported killed in the strike, which hit a vehicle and a compound.
The pace of the strikes since the beginning of September is unprecedented since the US began the air campaign in Pakistan in 2004. September’s record number of 21 strikes was followed by 16 strikes in October and 14 more in November. The previous monthly high was 11 strikes 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.
The US has carried out 107 attacks inside Pakistan this year, more than doubling last year’s number of strikes. In late August, the US exceeded last year’s strike total of 53 with a strike in Kurram. In 2008, the US carried out a total of 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.]
This year the strikes have been confined almost exclusively to North Waziristan. All but nine of this year’s 107 strikes have taken place in that tribal agency. Of the nine strikes that have occurred outside of North Waziristan, seven took place in South Waziristan, one occurred in Khyber, and one took place in Kurram.
Since Sept. 1, the US has ramped up airstrikes against the terror groups in North Waziristan, with 51 strikes in the tribal agency. Many of the strikes targeted cells run by the Islamic Jihad Group, which have been plotting to conduct the Mumbai-styled terror assaults in Europe. A Sept. 8 strike killed an IJU commander known as Qureshi, who specialized in training Germans to conduct attacks in their home country.
The US campaign in northwestern Pakistan has targeted top al Qaeda leaders, al Qaeda’s external operations network, and Taliban leaders and fighters who threaten both the Afghan and Pakistani states as well as support al Qaeda’s external operations. [For a list of al Qaeda and Taliban leaders killed in the US air campaign in Pakistan, see LWJ Special Report, Senior al Qaeda and Taliban leaders killed in US airstrikes in Pakistan, 2004 – 2010.]
5 Comments
Is there anything different about this strike as compared with all of the others? I ask this because at least one MSM site (Fox News) has this on their site this morning and many other strikes have not even been mentioned. I didn’t see this one on cnn.com, however.
The Drones are the greatest weapon so far in the WOT. Pardon my ignorance I have some questions.
Does an agent on the ground have to mark the target?
What is the range of the missiles fired? I ask this because all the pictures of the drones I see are set against clear blue skies which would make it easy to spot?
The campaign in both the wazirs have been devastating so why do the Taliban still use these places why don’t they use balochistan (Quetta) instead because IIRC the US wanted to extend the drone campaign there but the Paks would not allow it.
Not as far as I know, JT. I usually see a brief news bulletin about these strikes on Fox News, though.
i guess that’s what happens when the only “news” is the verdict in the death of another pretty blond. we deserve better news outlets.
thats why i come to this site.
if you want to get some good info you come here. I am wondering how long it will take to push the taliban/aq deeper into Pakistan. That’s their R&R spot. I wish we could bomb the snot out of them, but our Pak “friends” may not approve.