Thousands of Pakistani troops poured heavy fire into the mountain stronghold where Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader, may be hiding, but American officials fretted he may have gotten away.
| If he was there in the first place... |
American Predator drones hovered over the battlefield and about a dozen U.S. intelligence officers were helping the Pakistanis as the battle raged for the fourth day. Thousands of civilians poured out of the 20-square-mile area surrounded by about 7,000 soldiers, but little else was known about what was going on in the remote region along the Afghanistan border. "I don't know the situation today," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on CNN. "Pakistan has caused a lot of press attention, and it's not clear to me who's there, if anybody."
| Maybe Qari Tahir. He'd still be a good catch. One can always hope... |
"I know that today there have been pitched battles...and a fair amount of people being killed on both sides," said an intelligence officer. But as for Al-Zawahiri's fate, the official said, "We still don't know." Another intelligence source said American officials grew "increasingly skeptical" about the operation when Pakistani forces, awaiting reinforcements Thursday night, gave the Al Qaeda fighters a deadline to surrender. The deadline passed without any surrenders and the fighting resumed. "It seems to be reminiscent of what we saw in Afghanistan at Tora Bora," said the source. "Hesitation, negotiation, deadlines being given, exceeded, given again. It doesn't look all that hopeful," the source added. "It looks a lot softer right now."
| It looks typically Pakistani, doesn't it? |
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