U.S. Team's Mission Was to Kill, Not Capture Bin Laden - U.S. Security Official

[Hissyspit]

Source: Reuters

@Reuters
Reuters Top News
FLASH: U.S. team's mission was to kill, not capture bin Laden - U.S. security official
2 minutes ago via web Favorite Retweet Reply

U.S. team's mission was to kill bin Laden, not capture

WASHINGTON | Mon May 2, 2011 8:24am EDT
(Reuters) - The U.S. special forces team that hunted down Osama bin Laden was under orders to kill the al Qaeda mastermind, not capture him, a U.S. national security official told Reuters.

"This was a kill operation," the official said, making clear there was no desire to try to capture bin Laden alive in Pakistan.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/02/us-binladen-kill-idUSTRE7413H220110502

[Ineeda]

1. I think that's smart....'due process' being what it has become. n/t

[L. Coyote]

25. Make sure the entire planet knows we are no longer a nation of laws and all that.

Besides, their was no evidence to convict, right?

[johnroshan]

2. Of course, who would want all the secrets he holds?!

:sarcasm:

[msanthrope]

3. Good. n/t

[Ikonoklast]

4. Works for me!

[titaniumsalute]

5. No way you capture him

What do you do with him? To hold him would be worse than if he were dead. Guantanamo Bay? No way. Here in the US? No way. The Saudis said they didn't want his body.

Killing him was better than anything else they could have done with him.

[RobinA]

32. Gotta

agree on this. The celebrating makes me a little uncomfortable, but what do you do with him once caught? Plus, if we detain him we've got hostage takings all over the world in an attempt to exchange him. The last thing we need is hijackings, kidnapped world leaders, etc, in an effort to make a deal.

[Odin2005]

6. Like he would let himself be captured alive, anyway.

[leveymg]

7. This is why I hate Twitter. Where's the link to the longer article?

[Hissyspit]

8. Here you go:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/02/us-binladen-kill-idUSTRE7413H220110502

Nothing wrong with Twitter if used properly.

[leveymg]

10. Thnx. Where did you get the link? Anyway, here's the Reuter's blurb: Hosenball has an anon source

WASHINGTON | Mon May 2, 2011 8:24am EDT http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/02/us-binladen-kill-idUSTRE7413H220110502

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. special forces team that hunted down Osama bin Laden was under orders to kill the al Qaeda mastermind, not capture him, a U.S. national security official told Reuters.

"This was a kill operation," the official said, making clear there was no desire to try to capture bin Laden alive in Pakistan.

(Reporting by Mark Hosenball, writing by Matt Spetalnick)

[Hissyspit]

11. Just went to Reuters.com

and the headline and link was there.

Twitter stuff usually precedes it and I post it and then go looking for the article. OCCASSIONALLY the article doesn't show up within the hour edit limit.

[leveymg]

12. Thanks again. What do you make of this?

I've grown very skeptical of the firm of Isikoff, Hosenball and Anon, LLC.

As a practical matter, if the Seals got within headshot range, they also had UBL within stun grenade range. Entirely possible, of course, that everyone was just spraying machine gun rounds all over the place, and one of the shots got Osama between the ears.

Don't like the body being dumped at sea without a fully documented independent autopsy - if only to dispel the inevitable rumors and theories generated.

[Hissyspit]

13. I don't know. We really need WH to confirm it.

And they may never.

[leveymg]

14. Likely not.

Do you think this makes an inquest into Bush-Cheney's actions leading up to 9/11 more or less likely. Or, unchanged?

Seems to me that a take no prisoners approach would mitigate in favor of opening up that book regarding culpability, especially since the 9/11 Commission expressly avoided dealing with those issues.

[Hissyspit]

15. We're looking forward.

[leveymg]

16. At least they're consistent.

[No Elephants]

21. An inquest into Bush-Cheney's actions by whom?

We're not doing it. Neither is anyoone we can lean on, like Spain. So, by whom?

Remember, Obama called Bush to give him the news before announcing Osama's death to the rest of the U.S. Also asked him and Bubba to go to Haiti. We're treating him like a President Emeritus,not a war criminal. Guess why.

[No Elephants]

23. Why do we need WH confirmation?

That's like saying we can never convict anyone unless s/he makes a full confession.

Obama said he gave the order, and, after a firefight, Osama was dead. If Obama had ordered the troops to bring Osama in alive, if at all reasonably possible, I think Obama would have said so.

[madmax]

9. That's what I thought

too much trouble to deal with a trial and all that. May be wrong but, I bet they said, screw it - kiill the bastard and it'd done.

[leveymg]

17. 5th rec. for visibility

[Imagevision]

18. Where's the pictures? M$M displays Hussein's sons dead!

[Name removed]

22. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[No Elephants]

19. Why should Osama get treated better than the U.S. citizens the U.S. murders?

[FourScore]

20. That was the best way to handle the matter. Good job! n/t

[HopeHoops]

24. Like he would let himself be taken alive? Besides, they didn't want a show trial.

[Xithras]

30. The show trial itself wouldn't have been the first part.

As long as Bin Laden was sitting in a U.S. prison, American citizens would have remained a target for every two-bit wanna-be jihadist trying to make a name for himself by "freeing" him.


"Free Bin Laden or we'll blow up this schoolbus full of children."
"Free Bin Laden or we'll set off a car bomb in Times Square."
"Free Bin Laden or we'll start kidnapping any American who leaves your country on vacation."

Or worse. They'll try to make America look foolish for imprisoning him by proving that they don't need him in order to be effective. That could get really ugly.

It's better to simply remove him from the playing field and be done with it.

[plumbob]

26. A single picture?

Anyone?

Now can we admit that thousands of Americans and untold millions of Afghans and Iraqis have died for no reason, since all we had to do was trail a single courier to the spot?

Who can we sue to get back the trillions spent on this now admittedly useless double war?

Burial at sea? REALLY?

Weakest psy-ops EVER!

[tabasco]

27. "U.S. security official"

Whoever believes this type of unsubstanbtiated report is a bit gullible.

[Kelvin Mace]

28. That has been the plan from day one

The last thing the U.S. would want would be a trial where bin-Laden would have a chance to reveal how deeply involved he had been with CIA back in the 80s.

[frickaline]

29. Putting him in prison in the US would have been a death sentence also

There was no alternate option here.

[coalition_unwilling]

31. So much for Executive Order 11905, now firmly in the dustbin of history as

'quaint and obsolete'.

"In 1975 and 1976, the Church Committee published fourteen reports on the formation of U.S. intelligence agencies, their operations, and the alleged abuses of law and of power that they had committed, together with recommendations for reform, some of which were put in place.

Among the matters investigated were attempts to assassinate foreign leaders, including Patrice Lumumba of the Congo, Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, the Diem brothers of Vietnam, Gen. René Schneider of Chile and President John F. Kennedy's plan to use the Mafia to kill Fidel Castro of Cuba.

Under recommendations and pressure by this committee, President Gerald Ford issued Executive Order 11905 (ultimately replaced in 1981 by President Reagan's Executive Order 12333) to ban U.S. sanctioned assassinations of foreign leaders."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee

[RobinA]

33. I'm Betting

the argument would be that bin Laden isn't a "foreign leader." I wondered about this myself. I'm not in love with the celebrating, but I also think that bin Laden knew what he was getting into when he started down this road.

[coalition_unwilling]

34. Yeah, I think that would be how they'd skate around ordering

Osama executed extra-judicially. But the fans of extra-judicial assassinations really need to stfu about how OBL was 'resisting arrest' and therefore deserved his summary execution. OBL was doing no such thing if the team sent in was sent in with orders to kill him and not to arrest him.

Even without the Executive Order 11905, though, murder is still against the law.