Major setback in Iraq: U.S. again fails to capture terror head al-Zarqawi.

An increasingly desperate U.S. military has once again failed to achieve one of its major objectives of capturing Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the supposed leader of al Qaeda resistance efforts in Iraq.

Floundering helplessly in its failure to

1. counter insurgent IED tactics,
2. institute a functioning representative democratic government after more than three years in Iraq, and
3. reconcile historic Kurdish, Shia and Sunni ethnic, religious, and economic differences,

the U.S. military command made the morally questionable decision to attack an occupied residence. The residence is within easy driving distance of nearby residences occupied by innocent Iraqi babies, school children, nursing mothers, day care centers, bomb making factories, senior citizens, household pets, and UNESCO-designated cultural sites.

U.S. pilots launched at least one bomb into the residence without knowing for sure that Mr. al-Zarqawi was even present or even if he was in fact guilty of "terrorism" as alleged by U.S. officials. Some knowledgeable sources in the U.S. question if this action violates the well known proscription of assassination and the United Nations Convention on Human Rights. Church leaders also raised questions whether all alternatives for conciliation and cross cultural understanding were adequately explored by U.S. commanders.

The bomb was launched by sleep-deprived U.S. pilots who, it should be noted, had not recently been checked for illegal drug use. Moreover, they took this action based on information provided by only 35 informants that Mr. al-Zarqawi was supposedly present in the residence. Sources say this is indicative of a pattern of desperate U.S. reliance on questionable intelligence to give them credibility in a fight whose justification is increasingly questioned by college professors both in the U.S. and such nations in Europe as Monaco, Andorra, and Lichtenstein.

The U.S. action underscores the failure of President Bush to locate and capture Osama bin Laden. The continued inability of the President to locate Mr. bin Laden raises additional questions about whether Mr. bin Laden is dead it basically suits the President's partisan domestic political purposes not to locate him.