Hellfire Househunting

And no, I'm not talking about my current house hunting search that progresses into its second full year of futility in the North Jersey area.

I'm talking about the raid on the compound in Damadola, Pakistan, which killed at least four or five high ranking al Qaeda terrorists with a series of Predator drone raids using Hellfire missiles. There's a good reason that the surviving al Qaeda terrorists took the remains of their dead compatriots with them.

They didn't want their bodies and identities to be plastered all over the airwaves showing just how damaging the raid was on al Qaeda's top leadership.

Is it possible that the raid, in fact, did kill Zawahiri? It's a longshot, but we'll have to wait for the inevitable videos to surface. If none are forthcoming, it might suggest that we've fully driven Zawahiri underground.

It doesn't mean that the fight is over by a long shot, but it does highlight a major intelligence operation success in a very public way. We had operational details on a high level terrorist meeting and disrupted it quite thorougly. And that's a very good thing.

UPDATE:
Confederate Yankee has additional thoughts on the raid, and measuring success.

UPDATE:
The raid has apparently been much more successful than anyone realized - we may not have nailed Zawahiri, but we got someone nearly as good:

According to ABC News, Midhat Mursi al-Sayid 'Umar--also known as Abu Khabab al-Masri--was killed in last week's bombing of al Qaeda targets in Pakistan. The U.S. had issued a $5 million dollar reward for the terrorist bombmaker.

UPDATE:
So, what initial reports said was a failed attack on Zawahiri and a PR nightmare for the US turns out to be something quite different. If the reports out of Pakistan are indeed accurate, the US put a serious hurting on the al Qaeda leadership - taking out their top bombmaker, top deputies, and shows that the US had excellent intel on the whereabouts of these particular terrorists. For a change, the world saw that the CIA can get it right.

Others following the story: The Strata-Sphere, Sensible Mom, In the Bullpen, bRight and Early, Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, Jeff Goldstein, and Free Thoughts. Sweetness and Light picks up the trials and travails of the mysterious missile/artillery shell/ordnance caption shift.

UPDATE:
Michelle Malkin is also covering the story as is LinkMecca who notes that no one will get to collect the $5 million bounty on Mursi's head.