Al-Qaida commander dead, Pakistan minister says

There was a time in this country when stories like this mattered and reporters were trying to be the first to tell them on the nightly news but those days were long ago. Now reports like Palin's lack of knowledge regarding history, John Edwards cheating on his wife and hiding a child he didn't want anyone to know about topped off with Weiner's tweets, these stories were buried. It's almost as if no producer really cares about any of this.

Al-Qaida commander dead, Pakistan minister says
By Asif Shahzad - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Jun 6, 2011 11:47:47 EDT
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan's interior minister said Monday he was "100 percent" certain that wanted al-Qaida commander Ilyas Kashmiri was killed in a U.S. drone strike.

Rehman Malik's claim came as suspected American missiles targeted hideouts in the militant sanctuaries near Afghan border, killing at least 16 people.

Malik did not say how his government knew that Kashmiri was killed Friday by a missile, or if it had evidence of his death.

Kashmiri, wanted for attacks in Pakistan and India as well European plots, was wrongly reported to have been killed in a similar strike in Sept 2009. U.S. officials have described Kashmiri as al-Qaida's military operations chief in Pakistan. He was rumored to be a contender to replace Osama bin Laden as the terror network's chief.
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Al-Qaida commander dead, Pakistan minister says

Troops: What does bin Laden’s death mean to war?
By Robert Burns - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Jun 6, 2011 14:52:12 EDT
COMBAT OUTPOST ANDAR, Afghanistan — In encounters with troops in Afghanistan this past week, the question Defense Secretary Robert Gates heard more than any other was this: What does Osama bin Laden’s death mean for the war?

Soldiers on the front lines of a conflict that began when many were pre-teens seemed to be wondering: Must we keep fighting and dying in this country if the terrorist who was the reason we came here is dead?

Gates said emphatically, yes, because Afghanistan could yet again revert to a haven for terrorists bent on perpetrating another 9/11 attack.

But it’s a question that hangs over an intensifying debate in Washington about charting the next steps in a war — now in its tenth year — that is growing more costly and less popular among the American public and in Congress.

The bin Laden factor arguably has put Gates and other advocates of sticking to the current war strategy on the defensive. Although he is retiring June 30, Gates clearly is not shying away from a Washington policy debate that will come to a head this month with President Obama’s decision on how many troops to withdraw in July and, perhaps, how quickly to pull out the rest of the 30,000 “surge’“ forces the commander in chief sent here last year.

There are now 100,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan — three times the total when Obama took office in January 2009.
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What does bin Laden’s death mean to war

3-star SEAL’s Osprey targeted in jailbreak
By Dan Lamothe - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Jun 6, 2011 14:28:40 EDT
Two detainees escaped from a detention facility on a Marine base in Afghanistan, then used a grenade launcher to target an MV-22 Osprey about to take off with a three-star Navy SEAL on board, Marine Corps Times has learned.

Vice Adm. Robert Hardward was in the Osprey on base Aug. 7 after visiting the headquarters of 1st Battalion, 2nd Marines, in the Musa Qala district of Helmand province. He heads Joint Task Force 435, which oversees detainee operations in Afghanistan, and has been nominated to replace Marine Lt. Gen. John Allen as the deputy commander of U.S. Central Command. Allen is expected to become the top commander in Afghanistan this fall.

The details are outlined in an investigation report obtained by Marine Corps Times through the Freedom of Information Act. Marine officials in Afghanistan said last summer that two Marines and a contractor were shot to death by a detainee who escaped from an Afghan-run detention center. However, it was not disclosed that a detainee had taken aim at the landing zone with a grenade launcher, or that Harward was on base when the detainees escaped.
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3-star SEAL’s Osprey targeted in jailbreak