Killing Zarqawi is like hitting a grand slam in the third inning.  It's a great feeling, and there are well-earned cheers from the crowd.  But the game is far from over.

How did we get Zarqawi?  Aggressive SIGINT?  The Jordanians?  An Al Qaeda mole?  All of the above?

The answers are important.  If we've cracked the code on a new terrorist-finding process, that bodes well for us finding AMZ's successor.  But if the secular Sunnis -- and/or, Al Qaeda Actual -- decided AMZ had outlived his usefulness, that isn't a good sign for our future, because his successor likely enjoys more popular support.

The counterinsurgency strategy, including it's flaws, remains unchanged.  We still need more men in Al Anbar, particularly in Ramadi.  The Army still needs to extract itself from the firm bases, replicating the (very effective) USMC tactics of 7th Marines in Al Qaim.  And we, as an American populace, must still decide whether or not we intend to stomach this fight with our resources, including those that might need to be rationed or drafted to win it.

The aspect that I find to be interesting is that if the intel that let to his death came from an insider or insiders, and it was not a strategic decision made by Al-Qaeda to get rid of Zarqawi, then the distrust, confusion and suspicion may be exploited and used in our favour to make further inroads into the insurgency.

GreyMatter

The aspect that I find to be interesting is that if the intel that let to his death came from an insider or insiders, and it was not a strategic decision made by Al-Qaeda to get rid of Zarqawi, then the distrust, confusion and suspicion this would have caused may be exploited and used in our favour to make further inroads into the insurgency.

GreyMatter