"Targeted attacks" a big blow to al-Qaeda

       Recent targeted attacks that killed militants in Somalia, Indonesia and Pakistan have chipped away at alQaeda's power base, sapping the terror network of key leaders and experienced operatives who train new recruits and carry out attacks.
       Intelligence officials said on Friday that the military strikes have reduced al-Qaeda's core leadership to only a handful of men and diminished its ability to train fighters. This, they said, has forced al-Qaeda to turn to its global affiliates for survival.
       The killings of Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan in Somalia, Noordin Mohammed Top in Indonesia and Baitullah Mehsud in Pakistan, all in recent weeks, have been the latest blow.
       A US counterterrorism official said the deaths deal "a major near-term blow to their respective militant groups".
       Since the start of the year, US forces have stepped up strikes against militants in terrorist hubs, including Pakistan and Somalia. US National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said this week that such strikes have been possible because of a greater understanding of al-Qaeda.
       British intelligence agents have joined the US in stepping up counterterrorism measures and adding agents, leading to fewer fully developed terrorist plots being uncovered in Britain.
       Still, al-Qaeda's top leaders - Osama bin Laden and his No.2, Ayman alZawahri - remain free, and terrorist bombers continue to strike around the world, as al-Qaeda and the Taliban establish links with satellite groups.
       This week, suicide bombers in Somalia killed 21 people, including 17 peace-keepers, in twin attacks at an African Union base in Mogadishu.
       The attacks were said to be in retaliation for a US commando raid last week in southern Somalia that killed Nabhan,the leader of the powerful Islamist group al-Shabab, which was using foreign fighters to help al-Qaeda expand deeper into the Horn of Africa.
       Nabhan was one of the founders of al-Shabab, a group that didn't exist a decade ago.
       Nabhan, a Kenyan with Yemeni roots with years of strategic and weapons training, was a key alliance-builder. He was also key in procuring weapons and funds,and training recruits, according to Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside Al Qaeda:Global Network of Terror .Mehsud's death in Pakistan last month represented a similar blow. Mehsud was the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan.
       Strikes against militant leaders in Pakistan have been particularly important for Britain. About 75% of the terrorist plots against the UK have roots in Pakistan. A plot to down at least seven transatlantic airliners in 2006 was thwarted partially because counterterrorism officials intercepted coded emails between a British terror cell and their handlers in Pakistan, prosecutors said. Mehsud, who underwent extensive training in Afghanistan before Sept 11,2001, acted as a unifying force among Taliban factions.
       Ilyas Kashmiri, an al-Qaeda operations chief in northwest Pakistan, was also believed to have been killed in North Waziristan by missiles fired by US drones.Kashmiri was accused of playing a role in the failed assassination attempts against former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf.
       A Pakistani intelligence official said it appeared many factions were starting to fight among themselves for leadership,and ranks are turning on each other because they are suspicious and finances are drying up.
       Before the Sept 11 terror attacks in 2001, al-Qaeda provided fighters with extensive four-month training sessions at camps in Afghanistan. Now, training has been driven underground and recruits lack real battle experience, counterterrorism experts said.
       In Indonesia, there is no clear successor for Noordin, who was killed last week during a gunfight with police seeking suspects in the July bombings of two Jakarta hotels.
       Noordin was identified by authorities as the leader of al-Qaeda in Southeast Asia. He had been implicated in every major attack in Indonesia since 2002.