Seals Reveal Truth About
Bin Laden Raid
Osama Bin Laden was killed
within 90 seconds of the US Navy Seals landing in his compound and not after a
protracted gun battle, according to the first account by the men who carried
out the raid. The operation was so clinical that only 12 bullets were
fired.
The Seals have spoken out
because they were angered at the version given by politicians, which they see
as portraying them as cold-blooded murderers on a kill mission. They were also
shocked that President Barack 0bama announced Bin Laden’s death on television
the same evening, rendering useless much of the intelligence they had seized.
Chuck Pfarrer, commander of
Seal Team 6, which conducted the operation, has interviewed many of those who
took part for a book, Seal Target Geronimo, to be published in the US this
week.
The Seals own accounts
differ from the White House version, which gave the impression that Bin Laden
was killed at the end of the operation rather than in its opening seconds.
Pfarrer insists Bin Laden would have been captured had he surrendered.
There isn’t a politician in
the world who could resist trying to take credit for getting Bin Laden but it
devalued the intelligence and gave time for every other Al-Qaeda leader to
scurry to another bolthole, said Pfarrer. The men who did this and their
valorous act deserve better.
It’s a pretty shabby way to
treat these guys. The first hint of the mission came in January last year when
the team’s commanding officer was called to a meeting at the headquarters of
joint special operations command. The meeting was held in a soundproof bunker
three stories below ground with his boss, Admiral William McRaven, and a CIA
officer.
They told him a walled
compound in Pakistan had been under surveillance for a couple of weeks. They
were certain a high-value individual was inside and needed a plan to present to
the president. It had to be someone important. So is this Bert or Ernie? he
asked.
The Seals nicknames for Bin
Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri are a reference to two Muppets in Sesame
Street, one tall and thin and the other short and fat. We have a voice print, said
the CIA officer, and were 60% or 70% certain it’s our guy. McRaven added that a
reconnaissance satellite had measured the targets shadow. Over 6ft tall.
When McRaven added they would use Ghost Hawk helicopters, the team leader had
no doubt. These are the most classified, sophisticated stealth helicopters ever
developed, said Pfarrer. They are kept in locked hangars and fly so quiet we
call it whisper mode.
Over the next couple of
months a plan was hatched. A mock-up of the compound was built at Tall Pines,
an army facility in a national forest somewhere in the eastern US.
Four reconnaissance
satellites were placed in orbit over the compound, sending back video and
communications intercepts. A tall figure seen walking up and down was named the
Pacer.
Obama gave finally gave the
go-ahead after Valerie Jarret had vetoed it 3 times and Seal Team 6, known as
the Jedi, was deployed to Afghanistan. The White House cancelled plans to
provide air cover using jet fighters, fearing this might endanger relations
with Pakistan.
Sending in the Ghost Hawks
without air cover was considered too risky so the Seals had to use older
Stealth Hawks. A Prowler electronic warfare aircraft from the carrier USS Carl
Vinson was used to jam Pakistan’s radar and create decoy targets.
Operation Neptune’s Spear
was initially planned for April 30 but bad weather delayed it until May 1, a
moonless night. The commandos flew on two Stealth Hawks, codenamed Razor 1 and
2, followed by two Chinooks five minutes behind, known as Command Bird and the
gun platform. On board, each Seal was clad in body amour and night vision
goggles and equipped with laser targets, radios and sawn-off M4 rifles. They
were expecting up to 30 people in the main house, including Bin Laden and three
of his wives, two sons, Khalid and Hamza, his courier, Abu Ahmed al- Kuwaiti,
four bodyguards and a number of children. At 56 minutes past midnight the
compound came into sight and the code Palm Beach signaled three minutes to
landing. Razor 1 hovered above the main house, a three-story building where Bin
Laden lived on the top floor. Twelve Seals roped the 5ft-6ft down onto the roof
and then jumped to a third-floor patio, where they kicked in the windows and
entered.
The first person the Seals
encountered was a terrified woman, Bin Laden’s third wife, Khaira, who ran into
the hall. Blinded by a searing white strobe light they shone at her, she
stumbled back. A Seal grabbed her by the arm and threw her to the floor. Bin
Laden’s bedroom was along a short hall. The door opened; he popped out and then
slammed the door shut. Geronimo, Geronimo, Geronimo, radioed one Seal, meaning
eyes on target. At the same time lights came on from the floor below and
Bin Laden’s son Khalid came running up the stairs towards the Seals. He was
shot dead.
Two Seals kicked in Bin
Laden’s door. The room, they later recalled, smelt like old clothing, like a
guest bedroom in a grandmother’s house. Inside was the Al-Qaeda leader and his
youngest wife, Amal, who was screaming as he pushed her in front of him. No,
no, don’t do this! she shouted as her husband reached across the king-size bed
for his AK-47 assault rifle. The Seals reacted instantly, firing in the same
second. One round thudded into the mattress. The other, aimed at Bin Laden’s
head, grazed Amal in the calf. As his hand reached for the gun, they each fired
again: one shot hit his breastbone, the other his skull, killing him instantly
and blowing out the back of his head.
Meanwhile Razor 2 was
heading for the guesthouse, a low, shoebox-like building, where Bin Laden’s
courier, Kuwaiti, and his brother lived. As the helicopter neared, a door
opened and two figures appeared, one waving an AK-47. This was Kuwaiti. In the
moonless night he could see nothing and lifted his rifle, spraying bullets
wildly.
He did not see the Stealth Hawk. On board someone shouted, Bust him!, and a
sniper fired two shots. Kuwaiti was killed, as was the person behind him, who
turned out to be his wife. Also on board were a CIA agent, a Pakistani-American
who would act as interpreter, and a sniffer dog called Karo, wearing dog body
armor and goggles.
Within two minutes the Seals from Razor 2 had cleared the guesthouse and
removed the women and children. They then ran to the main house and
entered from the ground floor, checking the rooms. One of Bin Laden’s
bodyguards was waiting with his AK-47. The Seals shot him twice and he toppled
over.
Five minutes into the
operation the command Chinook landed outside the compound, disgorging the
commanding officer and more men. They blasted through the compound wall and
rushed in. The commander made his way to the third floor, where Bin Laden’s
body lay on the floor face up. Photographs were taken, and the commander called
on his satellite phone to headquarters with the words: Geronimo Echo KIA - Bin
Laden enemy killed in action.
This was the first time the
White House knew he was dead and it was probably 20 minutes into the raid, said
Pfarrer. A sample of Bin Laden’s DNA was taken and the body was bagged. They
kept his rifle. It is now mounted on the wall of their team room at their
headquarters in Virginia Beach, Virginia, alongside photographs of a dozen
colleagues killed in action in the past 20 years.
At this point things
started to go wrong. Razor 1 took off but the top secret green unit that
controls the electronics failed. The aircraft went into a spin and crashed
tail-first into the compound… The Seals were alarmed, thinking it had been shot
down, and several rushed to the wreckage. The crew climbed out, shaken but
unharmed.
The commanding officer ordered them to destroy Razor 2, to remove the green
unit, and to smash the avionics. They then laid explosive charges.
They loaded Bin Laden’s
body onto the Chinook along with the cache of intelligence in plastic bin bags
and headed toward the USS Carl Vinson. As they flew off they blew up Razor 2.
The whole operation had taken 38 minutes.
The following morning White House officials announced that the helicopter had
crashed as it arrived, forcing the Seals to abandon plans to enter from the
roof. A photograph of the situation room showed a shocked Hillary Clinton, the
secretary of state, with her hand to her mouth.
Why did they get it so
wrong? What they were watching was live video but it was shot from 20,000 feet
by a drone circling overhead and relayed in real time to the White House and
Leon Panetta, the CIA director, in Langley.
The Seals were not wearing helmet cameras, and those watching in Washington had
no idea what was happening inside the buildings.
They don’t understand our
terminology, so when someone said the insertion helicopter has crashed, they
assumed it meant on entry, said Pfarrer.
What infuriated the Seals,
according to Pfarrer, was the description of the raid as a kill mission.
"I’ve been a Seal for 30 years and I never heard the words 'kill
mission'", he said.
It’s a Beltway [Washington
insiders] fantasy world. If it was a kill mission you don’t need Seal Team 6;
you need a box of grenades. Hooyah!
As Paul Harvey would say:
You now know the rest of the story!
14 hours ago
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