(CNN) -- Officials call the attack "massive and unprecedented." At least 65 suspected terrorists killed. Assaults from both the ground and the sky. And elite, clandestine U.S. forces joining Yemeni commandos in targeting al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula -- considered the global terror group's most dangerous affiliate. But what would make the raid in southern Yemen most significant is if it yielded a target who Americans and Yemenis have been looking for: Ibrahim al-Asiri, the group's chief bomb maker. While U.S. officials said the operation didn't directly target him, al-Asiri is among those suspected to have been killed in the Sunday firefight, a high-level Yemeni government official told CNN.
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At least 65 suspected al Qaeda members were killed in a Yemeni-U.S. joint operation
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Officials: DNA tests are being done to see if Ibrahim al-Asiri is among the dead
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He's the suspected mastermind behind the 2009 underwear bomb plot
A U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said no @placeholder took part in combat on the ground, but U.S. forces did wear night vision gear and flew Yemeni forces to a remote, mountainous spot in southern Yemen.