Troops backed by helicopter gunships and heavy artillery have for weeks been pounding militant positions in the valley, a former tourist spot that erupted in violence last year when a pro-Taliban cleric declared jihad on Islamabad.
"Fighter jets struck the militants' hideouts in Peochar, killing 22," the security official said, naming the area where the strike hit.
A military spokesman in Swat told AFP that "a core of militants" had perished in the operation.
It's almost as if they know they have a short time frame to deal with frontier before we feel compelled to do the job.
And with supply problems, it can't be a conventional campaign relying on large numbers of our troops. But that does not mean we don't have another option to wage war inside Pakistan.