| Sources had earlier told CNN an unmanned
CIA Predator drone launched a "Hellfire" missile early Monday and struck
a car carrying the men, including the al Qaeda chief in that country who
was wanted for the bombing of the USS Cole.
It was the first direct U.S. strike against
Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network outside Afghanistan since the U.S.-led
war on terrorism was launched in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist
attacks against the United States.
"Sometimes when people are changing," Wolfowitz
said, "they expose themselves in new ways. So we just got to keep the pressure
on everywhere we are able to, and we've got to deny the sanctuaries everywhere
we are able to, and we've got to put pressure on every government that
is giving these people support to get out of that business."
Video from the scene showed the car blown
completely apart, with most of it reduced to black ash in the desert.
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Sources identified one of the dead as
Abu Ali, also known as Qaed Senyan al-Harthi, a former bin Laden security
guard who was believed to have played a major role in the October 2000
attack on the destroyer Cole that killed 17 sailors.
The attack took place in the oil rich Marib
province in Yemen.
Walid Al-Saqqaf, managing editor of the
Yemen Times, told CNN that Ali was identified as the one in the vehicle
by a mark on his leg, which was blown off in the blast and found near the
scene. |
He said Ali, who has been on the run and was
believed to be harbored by tribesmen, has been the source of a massive
hunt by security forces in Yemen. An attempt to capture him late last year
failed. That botched attempt left more than a dozen security forces dead.
About 50 U.S. Special Forces troops have
been in the country training Yemeni security forces. There was no immediate
indication they took part in this strike.
President Bush did not comment directly
on the incident in Yemen during a campaign rally in Arkansas, but he did
say the United States is pursuing "international killers."
"The only way to find them is to be patient
and steadfast and hunt them down. And the United States of America is doing
just that," Bush said.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld spoke
of Ali at the Pentagon briefing Monday when questioned about the attack.
"It would be a very good thing if he were
out of business," Rumsfeld said.
Rumsfeld said the U.S.-Yemen relationship
"has been a good one and it's ongoing." He noted that Yemen's President
Ali Abdullah Saleh visited the Pentagon and agreed to cooperate in the
war on terrorism.
"As a result, we have some folks in that
country that have been working with the government and helping them think
through ways of doing things," Rumsfeld said.
"And it's been a good cooperation, and
we've shared some information, and we think that over time it ought to
be beneficial."
Rumsfeld said a number of al Qaeda members
are known to be hiding in Yemen, slipping into the country by sea and through
its sparsely populated border areas -- what he said are used "advantageously
by terrorists."
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