Early this morning, US special forces carried out a ground raid against the Maarib Province in Yemen, which officials described as an "intelligence-gathering" operation, and in which they claimed to have killed at least seven "al-Qaeda militants."

Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis reported that multiple of the US troops involved in the raid were wounded in the course  of the operation. He declined to say how many were wounded, but insisted none of them were considered particularly serious.

Davis said this was the first time the US had carried out a ground raid inside Maarib Province, and the deepest that US ground forces had yet gone into Yemen. Local tribesmen offered a different account of the US attack, saying five were killed in the raid and six wounded, and that all the casualties were from a single family.

Pentagon officials, however, say that they were trying to find "laptops and cellphones" in the offensive, saying they hoped that might help them learn more about al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). It is unclear if they came out of the raid with much of anything.