U.S. Awaiting Results of Airstrike

Feb. 7 -- U.S. forces are waiting for bad weather in southeastern Afghanistan to clear so they can verify the effects of a Monday strike on suspected al Qaeda leaders.

Two Hellfire missiles were launched from a CIA-operated unmanned drone aircraft at a group of men in Zawar Khili, an area that has been strongly pro-Taliban and once included a terrorist training complex that was heavily bombed in early January.

The men have not been officially identified, but since one of them was tall, there is speculation the 6-foot-4-inch Osama bin Laden or his right-hand man, Egyptian citizen Ayman al-Zawahiri, might have been among those killed.

U.S. war commander Gen. Tommy Franks told ABCNEWS today he believed the identities of the dead would be "interesting," but added he had not seen any indications that bin Laden was among the victims.

The Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press identified the three people killed in the attack as civilians. Citing tribal elders in the region, AIP identified the men as Munir Ahmad, Jehangir Khan and Daraz Khan.

But the Pentagon is confident that they were senior al Qaeda members, U.S. sources said.

The attacks were made after the Predator drone had been tracking a convoy of a half-dozen sport utility vehicles in an area where none had been spotted for weeks.

The convoy size, types of vehicles and the way they hung together on the mountain roads were also typical of al Qaeda, sources said. The decision to strike was further reinforced when the convoy stopped, and nearly 20 heavily armed security people got out, along with three men dressed in Arab-style white robes.

The three stood apart from the others in conversation, and at that moment, U.S. commanders, hundreds of miles away, decided to strike.

In eastern Afghanistan, Wazir Khan, a brother of regional warlord Bacha Khan, told The Associated Press seven people were killed in the attack, but that bin Laden "is not among those people."

Manned warplanes were not used because none were in the area, U.S. sources told ABCNEWS.