Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud is dead

Are the Pakistan Taliban already at each other's throats?

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Who knows what's really going on in that part of the world? It's a ball of confusion. It's good for the coalition side that they appear to be battling each other. The Taliban sect with the most firepower will emerge as the leaders/victors. Let's just wait until the dust clears on this one.

Meshud's biggest asset was that he could hold the various tribes and factions that make up the movement together. Without that the movement will start fracturing until there is a new leader. The US and Pakistan have to take advantage of the momentary disorder and split the Taliban. Hopefully some leaders will be more willing to switch sides than lose the struggle for leadership (especially likely given the tendency of people in that part of the world to switch sides in war, and the fact that that the losers in this struggle will probably die). This situation might pan out like that in Iraq, where the death of Abu Musab Zarqawi and other leaders caused disarray and in Al Qaeda in Iraq, giving the Sunni tribes motivation and room to switch sides.

Whether Mehsud is dead is not really relevant since in Taliban ideology a martyr is more highly valued than a living commander.

"Eventually the ones who do not fear death will prevail!"

Of course this kind of dictum has no base in rationality but as long as ever new generations of Taliban recruits believe in this tenet it will become an incontrovertible reality for them. So their passionate love for the ultimate sacrifice creates an intangible form of transcendency leaving a ´secular´ observer really disturbed and deeply perplexed.

Violet Oboe said:

Whether Mehsud is dead is not really relevant since in Taliban ideology a martyr is more highly valued than a living commander.

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You don't understand the situation there. Only a relatively small hard core of fighters would re-double their efforts because he's dead. Far more are motivated by money or personal respect.

Leadership is important in any war, so this is a blow to the Pakistani Taliban and no mistake.

Local people of fata that i have talked to have said that inteligence agencies first prop up people like these and then use them as Kosher meat in order to get blood dollars. In Pakistan no organization can establish it self and carry out any activity without the support and prior approval. As far as Afgan Taliban are concerned they will out endure the NATO even if it stays in Afganistan for the next decade.