Various news organizations are reporting that Osama Bin Laden is dead. President Obama is expected to announce the news. Bin Laden was reportedly killed in Pakistan by an operation involving Navy Seals but the story is still unfolding. YahooReports indicate that he was shot in the head after he and his bodyboards resisted an attack by the elite unit.
The fact that he reportedly went down fighting will likely add to his image as a martyr — though people who follow him need little encouragement or reason.
Bin Laden was a murderous fanatic who used religion to spread hate. His passing from this Earth would be welcomed news and, even for the most agnostic or atheist among us, there is a lingering wish that there is place for the damned to greet men like Bin Laden after the untold harm that he caused not just to his country but to many countries. Hundreds of thousands of dead can be credited to his dark legacy and beliefs.
While liberals and conservatives differed on the means used to fight Bin Laden, there was never any division on the commitment to fight terrorism or the shared loss from his crimes. On September 11th, the plane that hit the Pentagon struck just after I passed the building on my way to work. I made it about a mile away after blowing my tire on the curb and changing the tire as huge columns of smoke filled the air.
In the end, Bin Laden remained the authentic symbol of radical Islam — an extremist filled with hate living with fellow troglodytes in caves and crevices.
Bin Laden’s death will force some accounting of what has been gained and what has been lost since his infamous wave of terror began. Too much of the damage of 9-11 proved to be self-inflicted, including our use of torture and the launching of two wars that have cost thousands of more American lives and hundreds of billions as the nation sinks into debt and economic distress.
There is no indication that our continued loss of money or personnel in Afghanistan will decrease in any way as a result of the news. While the Afghanistan war seemed personality driven with Bin Laden as the face of evil, it has taken on a type perpetual war due to a lack of political courage to end it.
The world is far better without the likes of Osama Bin Laden. However, he left an ample legacy (and legions) to guarantee that religious hate will continue to shape the future of that region and the world at large.
Is Ahmadinejad next?
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I seriously doubt it. He is a pimple on the butt of humanity, but not worth risking lives to get. He will self-destruct soon enough.
I got an email this afternoon that alleges this really happened. Maybe it did, maybe it didn’t, but it is funny, at least to this old aviator.
Rumsfeld Exclusive: There Was No Waterboarding of Courier Source
Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld tells Newsmax the information that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden was obtained through “normal interrogation approaches” …
Is Ahmadinejad next?
Hey, raff. You are right. I just turned on the telly to see Billo and Bret Hume having a discussion. No, not really a discussion. It was more like, “Who in the administration can we bash now.” They started in on Hillary Clinton so I turned the thing off as an alternative to throwing a shoe at it.
I worked all day today and came back to see a very strange thread indeed. I am tired this evening, burned out and more than a little irritable. I did nine interviews this afternoon. That is an energy sucker if there ever was one. I have no time for the cheap shot specialists. Larry, as usual, ignores the important stuff to focus on typos and old links. It is sad when one’s reasoning ability is so simple they cannot tell the difference between a typo and an attempt to mislead. There has been a huge amount of speculation and precious few facts. We can speculate all we want, but in the end it is just that. Speculation and guessing. The intelligence community is not about to give up its secrets. Let ’em guess, will be their attitude. Some of us have more knowledge than others, but the ones that do are not going to compromise intelligence techniques in order to score cheap points.
I did find the runaway deposition thread amusing.
OS,
Seems good to me too – if anyone would like to make a pilgrimage to his grave, I’m sure that the US Navy would be happy to take them to Osama’s graveside and give them some lead weights so they can go see for themselves…
OS,
I agree that how he was buried was not a concern to me. The Right is trying to do whatever they can to denigrate the successful operation.
I see the latest manufactured outrage is the fact OBL was buried at sea. Some Muslim scholars are professing horror and outrage the monster was committed to the deep instead of being buried with his head toward Mecca. I can understand to a degree, but have a lot of trouble mustering much sympathy for a man who masterminded the murders of thousands of men, women and children on a clear September morning ten years ago.
In short, I am rather like the Honey Badger, I don’t give a shit.
The secret team that killed bin Laden
From Ghazi Air Base in Pakistan, the modified MH-60 helicopters made their way to the garrison suburb of Abbottabad, about 30 miles from the center of Islamabad. Aboard were Navy SEALs, flown across the border from Afghanistan, along with tactical signals, intelligence collectors, and navigators using highly classified hyperspectral imagers.
After bursts of fire over 40 minutes, 22 people were killed or captured. One of the dead was Osama bin Laden, done in by a double tap — boom, boom — to the left side of his face. His body was aboard the choppers that made the trip back. One had experienced mechanical failure and was destroyed by U.S. forces, military and White House officials tell National Journal.
Were it not for this high-value target, it might have been a routine mission for the specially trained and highly mythologized SEAL Team Six, officially called the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, but known even to the locals at their home base Dam Neck in Virginia as just DevGru.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_exclusive/the-secret-team-that-killed-bin-laden
Jane Harmon on Lawrence O’Donnell just a moment ago gave credit to Clinton, Bush and Obama for the successful operation that was carried out. Good grief, can a black man do something and get full credit for it. Why does he always have to share that “victory” with the two other presidents that failed to bring this man to justice. And folk wonder why black folk get angry. Both Bush and Clinton dropped the ball. Obama made the hard decision to follow through on the leads given to him by intelligence. He and those who followed his lead on this deserve the credit. Those are the facts.
Group that Killed Bin Laden was Smeared as Dick Cheney’s ‘Assasination Ring’
It’s been reported that bin Laden was killed by SEAL Team Six, officially known as Naval Special Warfare Development Group or DevGru. Marc Ambinder has a good report that fills in some of the particulars:
DevGru belongs to the Joint Special Operations Command, an extraordinary and unusual collection of classified standing task forces and special-missions units. They report to the president and operate worldwide based on the legal (or extra-legal) premises of classified presidential directives. Though the general public knows about the special SEALs and their brothers in Delta Force, most JSOC missions never leak. We only hear about JSOC when something goes bad (a British aid worker is accidentally killed) or when something really big happens (a merchant marine captain is rescued at sea), and even then, the military remains especially sensitive about their existence. Several dozen JSOC operatives have died in Pakistan over the past several years. Their names are released by the Defense Department in the usual manner, but with a cover story — generally, they were killed in training accidents in eastern Afghanistan. That’s the code.
Under Bush, JSOC was routinely smeared by the left and placed at the center of many Bush/Cheney conspiracy theories. Specifically, New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh alleged it was Dick Cheney’s personal assassination squad:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/reminder-group-killed-bin-laden-smeared-dick-cheneys-assasination-ring_558593.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Mike A.,
I am with you on this one…. So far there have been many conflicting reports as to the time of death, date of death etc…. but hey call me a skeptic… maybe he is really in the Witness Protection Program….
Mike A,
Hopefully the closure that we achieved by killing bin Laden will allow us to more objectively examine our behavior during ‘bin Laden’s war’ or whatever we end up calling this mess, but right now I think that the country is justified in letting out a sigh of relief and feeling good for a bit – whatever the reason for it (and even if it isn’t wholly appropriate to rejoice at killing someone) this is a needed balm for our national psyche (which has been brutalized over the last decade – and maybe a step back towards a less polarized country.
marcy wheeler aka empty wheel aka ew
she posts at firedoglake
Mike S.:
You caught me. I do agree with you that his death is a decidedly positive event. But I am concerned that it will be used to justify what we’ve been doing the past ten years.
I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Sorry Ms. Blouise. I’m juggling three loads of laundry, trying to prepare dinner and accommodate a very demanding 81 year old woman who knows every time I put my but in the chair in front of the computer even though she can’t see me 🙂
Got to get busy be back later.
Oh shit my five year old, I left her in the tub 🙂
The financial cost of bin Laden: (At least) $1.3 trillion
Over a trillion dollars have been appropriated for post-9/11 wars — and that’s almost certainly an underestimate
BY JUSTIN ELLIOTT
Salon
http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/05/02/cost_of_bin_laden_wars/index.html
Excerpt:
Amid the celebration today, a sobering note from a recent congressional study: Since Osama bin Laden’s organization launched the Sept. 11 attacks, Congress has appropriated $1.3 trillion on wars, extra security measures and veterans’ healthcare.
The March 2011 Congressional Research Service study (.pdf), flagged by Sam Stein, found Congress has OKed “$1.283 trillion for military operations, base security, reconstruction, foreign aid, embassy costs, and veterans’ health care for the three operations initiated since the 9/11 attacks” — Iraq, Afghanistan and the initiative to secure military bases. The lion’s share of that has gone to the Iraq war, which, of course, was justified in part on the basis of a nonexistent connection to al-Qaida and bin Laden.
CSI bin Laden: Commandos Use Thumb, Eye Scans to Track Terrorists
By Spencer Ackerman May 2, 2011
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/05/csi-bin-laden-commandos-use-thumb-eye-scans-to-track-terrorists/
Excerpt:
The U.S. forces who killed Osama bin Laden in his Abbottabad compound were more than expert marksmen. Some of them were forensics experts as well, using sophisticated tools to ensure that they got the right man.
Speaking at a White House briefing, counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said he had “99 percent” certainty the commando team killed bin Laden, thanks to “facial recognition, [his] height, [and] an initial DNA analysis.”
The initial DNA analysis appears to have been done far from the scene, by “CIA and other specialists in the intelligence community” on Monday, according to an intelligence official who briefed Pentagon reporters, and it returned a “virtually 100 percent DNA match.”
Press reports say the DNA used to identify bin Laden may have come from one of his sisters, who allegedly died at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital. (However, hospital spokeswoman Katie Marquedant wouldn’t confirm this, telling Danger Room, “We have no information at all.”)
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/05/levin-bin-ladens-death-paves-way-for-swifter-troop-drawdown-in-afghanistan.php?ref=fpb
Elaine,
All the more reason to restore the rule of law and the Constitution; those two things that made us truly exceptional in contrast to just exceptional in the jingoistic sense of the term.