Good News: Another dead terrorist leader

The BBC is reporting that the No. 2 man in the terrorist organization in Iraq, believed to be the financier and director of suicide bombers, has been killed

Al-Qaeda's second in command in Iraq has been shot dead, reports say.

Iraqi and US officials said Abu Azzam, described as an aide to leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, had been shot dead in a joint operation on Sunday morning.

As I've said before, every time they get one of these big wheels, it's good news. Yes, there's another whacko ready to step up to the plate, but evry one of these guys who is either captured or killed disrupts the organization and inevitably leads to more information and more terrorists.

It's an unavoidable part of the job: these guys don't exactly have large staffs in constant personal contact with one another. They are secretive and limit their contacts. So while its easy to downplay the significance of individual events like this, the fact is the removal of these "high-ranking" individuals does have an impact.

A US military spokesman said Abu Azzam had been tracked for some time, and his death was a "significant development".

Lt-Col Steve Boylan said troops located him in a high-rise block in the Iraqi capital after a tip-off from an Iraqi citizen.

It is not known whether he was alone when he was found.

There are a few interesting points contained in these few sparse details provided. First, the guy was fingered by an Iraqi citizen, and if you are paying attention we are seeing more and more of that: local Iraqis turning in the terrorists, especially the foreigners. This guy is supposed to be palestinian. Second, it's obvious they knew who this guy was and they were specifically looking for him. We see more and more indications that coalition and Iraqi officials have a pretty darn good picture of the organizational structure of the terrorists in Iraq. Probably at least partly a result of earlier captures of terrorists and their computers and papers and ongoing interrogations.