The much-anticipated firsthand account of the Navy SEALs raid that killed Osama bin Laden reveals the terrorist leader was unarmed and was already dead with a bullet to the brain when the SEALs entered his bedroom in the compound at Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Osama bin Laden's compound from outside surrounding wall (Click Image To Enlarge)
Click Image To Enlarge
As the SEALS ascended a narrow staircase, the team's point man saw a man poke his head from a doorway, wrote a SEAL using the pseudonym Mark Owen (whose real identity has since been revealed by Fox News as Matt Bissonnette, a 36-year old retired Chief Petty Officer from Alaska) in “No Easy Day,” a copy of which was obtained at a bookstore by The Huffington Post.
Owen writes,
"We were less than five steps from getting to the top when I heard suppressed shots. BOP. BOP. I couldn't tell from my position if the rounds hit the target or not. The man disappeared into the dark room."
Original account of Osama bin Laden raid from inside the compound as reported by Defense Department (Click Image To Enlarge)
Team members took their time entering the room, where they saw the women wailing over Bin Laden, who wore a white sleeveless T-shirt, loose tan pants and a tan tunic, according to the book.
Despite numerous reports that bin Laden had a weapon and resisted when Navy SEALs entered the room, he was unarmed, writes Owen. He had been fatally wounded before they had entered the room.
Owen writes,
"Blood and brains spilled out of the side of his skull and he was still twitching and convulsing. While bin Laden was in his death throes."
Owen writes that he and another SEAL trained our lasers on his chest and fired several rounds. The bullets tore into him, slamming his body into the floor until he was motionless.
Then the SEALS repeatedly examined his face to make sure he was truly bin Laden. They interrogated a young girl and one of the women who had been wailing over Bin Laden’s body, who verified that it was the terror leader.
The shots fired inside the room appear to contradict the mission they were given. Own writes, who recounted the instructions:
"During a meeting with top commanders, a lawyer from either the Pentagon or the White House made it clear that this wasn't an assassination. I am not going to tell you how to do your job. What we're saying is if he does not pose a threat, you will detain him."
Searching bin Laden’s neatly organized room, Owen found two guns -– an AK-47 and a Makarov pistol -– with empty chambers. He said.
“He hadn’t even prepared a defense. He had no intention of fighting. He asked his followers for decades to wear suicide vests or fly planes into buildings, but didn’t even pick up his weapon. In all of my deployments, we routinely saw this phenomenon. The higher up the food chain the targeted individual was, the bigger a pussy he was.”
The book calls out inaccurate accounts of the assault. Owen writes.
"The raid was being reported like a bad action movie. At first, it was funny because it was so wrong."
Contrary to earlier accounts, Owen says SEALs weren't fired upon while they were outside the gate of the compound. There was no 40-minute firefight. And it wasn't true that bin Laden had "time to look into our eyes."
Owen, a 36-year-old SEAL who also took part in a previous 2007 attempt to get Bin Laden and was involved in the heroic 2009 operation to free Captain Richard Phillips from pirates off the coast of Somalia, also had harsh words for President Barack Obama.
Though he praises the president for green-lighting the risky assault, Owen says the SEALS joked that Obama would take credit for their success. On his second night in Afghanistan waiting for final orders, sitting around a fire pit and joking about which Hollywood actors would play them in the bin Laden movie, one SEAL joked,
“And we’ll get Obama reelected for sure. I can see him now, talking about how he killed bin Laden."
Owen writes:
“We had seen it before when he took credit for the Captain Phillips rescue. Although we applauded the decision-making in this case, there was no doubt in anybody’s mind that he would take all the political credit for this too.”
Later, while watching Obama’s speech announcing the raid, Owen writes:
“None of us were huge fans of Obama. We respected him as the commander in chief of the military and for giving us the green light on the mission.”
When one SEAL jokes again that they got Obama reelected, Owen asks,
“Well, would you rather not have done this?”
He writes:
“We all knew the deal. We were tools in the toolbox, and when things go well they promote it. They inflate their roles. But we should have done it. It was the right call to make. Regardless of the politics that would come along with it, the end result was what we all wanted.”
Later, when they meet Obama at the White House, Owen says he was reluctant to sign the American flag presented to the president because it would disclose his identity. So, at least one SEAL scribbled a random name on the flag. While going through the metal detector to meet the president, Owen’s pocketknife set off the alarm.
After listening to Obama’s speech and enduring Biden’s “lame jokes that no one got (He seemed like a nice guy, but he reminded me of someone’s drunken uncle at Christmas dinner)" the president invited the team to return to his residence later for a beer.
But Owen writes a few weeks later:
“We never got the call to have a beer at the White House.”
Joking with a fellow SEAL,
“Hey, did you ever hear anything about that beer?”
Walt cracks:
“You believed that shit. I bet you voted for change too, sucker.”
Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the White House National Security Council, said in an email:
"As President Obama said on the night that justice was brought to Osama bin Laden, 'We give thanks for the men who carried out this operation, for they exemplify the professionalism, patriotism, and unparalleled courage of those who serve our country.'"
COMMENTARY: In a blog post dated September 30, 2011, I commented on the Seal Team 6 raid of Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. If you haven't already done so, checkout this prior post about the Osama bin Laden raid.
Fox News Discloses Identify of Author of "No Easy Day"
According to Fox News, the true identity of the author of the book "No Easy Day," the true story of the U.S. Navy SEAL Team 6 that broke into Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and killed Osama bin Laden, is Matt Bissonnette, a 36-year old retired Chief Petty Officer from Alaska. Bissonnette was not only in the room when bin Laden took his last breath, but wrote his book about it less than 500 days later.
Matt Bissonnette, the former U.S. Navy Seal who wrote "No Easy Day" during an interview for CBS' 60-Minutes television program (Click Image To Enlarge)
Matt Bissonnette dressed in his U.S. Navy Seal outfit (Click Image To Enlarge)
His intent was to publish this book under the pseudonym Mark Owen, but leaks revealing the author's real identity began almost from the time that Bissonnette's pen hit the paper.
What Other Navy Seals Are Saying About Bissonnette
Don Mann, a former SEAL famous not only for his reputation as a ST6 member, but also for authoring many books including Inside SEAL Team Six: My Life and Missions with America’s Elite Warriors, said it would have been smart to get the book vetted first, a common practice for authors with security clearances.
Mann said.
"I had every one of my books vetted first, by both the military and the government."
But he added that he wanted to give Bissonnette "the benefit of the doubt" that he had not included any information that would not have been approved by the government.
Mann also said the compromise of Bissonnette's identity was inevitable.
He said.
"But maybe he didn't know. I could see someone falling into that sort of coercion. You talk to a few people, or somehow they find out who you are, and suddenly everyone's offering you money. Lots of money. They made me three offers when I left the teams, big offers, and I turned them down. [I said] I would take those secrets to the grave."
Mann continued,
"But then I wrote a book. And at first I thought, 'maybe I'll leave my name out of it,' but I knew there was no way—the publisher definitely knows who you are, and there are other people, they don't have clearances. We're kind of disappointed in Fox—we have friends there, but it's too hard of a secret to keep in today's world."
Milo Afong, a Marine sniper and purple heart recipient, an author of two books, including Hunters: U.S. Snipers in the War on Terror, said no one really knows Bissonnette's situation, other than that he's retired, which means he may require income.
Mann also said that no one really knows the whole truth yet, and that the real leak started as soon as Obama identified the specific team who got bin Laden. Afong said he understood why someone in Bissonnette's position would write a tell-all. Afong said,
"He's completely responsible—once you put pen to paper, there's going to be repercussions for doing that, but I can understand a man needs to make money."
Afong continues,
"If Obama's going to invite Hollywood producers to the White House to make a movie about it, why can't he tell his side of the story? That movie, it will make hundreds of millions of dollars. Will those guys see any of that?"
Scott Taylor, ex-Navy Seal
Scott Taylor, co-creator of the controversial "Dishonorable Disclosures" anti-Obama, anti-leak ad, said in an email:
"While it would be fundamentally wrong to comment on a book I have not seen, if the book has not been properly cleared before release and includes details about tactics and capabilities, then it’s no less detrimental to future Special Operations missions and personnel than similar leaks by the Obama Administration.
It’s also representative of what Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Maryland), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, called the ‘culture of leaks’ that has been allowed to develop under this Administration. Operation Security rules apply to everyone, from the top of the chain of command to the bottom.
The response from the limited amount of guys from the community I have spoken to today has been negative."
"Negative" is right. But the word doesn't do justice to the last community member Mann interviewed, a guy named "Ben" who has intimate knowledge and many close friends in the "Black Ops" community. His identity is not disclosed for obvious reasons.
When Mann broke the news of the Fox leak to "Ben," all he heard was a flurry of expletives. No joke. Eventually he calmed down.
"Ben" said,
"Well first of all he better have dotted his i's and crossed his t's, man, because they'll come and arrest him."
Who, Mann asked—the government?
Ben responded,
"Yeah, in or out of the Navy, doesn't matter, there's just certain stuff you don't talk about. Justice Department will come and take him."
I couldn't believe it—that a guy could go from killing our worst enemy to incarceration.
Ben said,
"It could get worse. He better have protected his brothers. Because his comrades will come and (beat him down)."
Really? I asked.
"Yeah, they'll rough him up, definitely. But more importantly, I hope he's moved his family. That's even more important. SEALs are brothers, they take care of each other in the end. I just hope he's taken care of himself as well."
Ben touched on how some SEALs have made money consulting for video games and movies, and that he found the practice less than admirable. But servicemen don't get the best retirement packages, and if they have families, doing private contracts in South America or Africa doesn't really make sense, he said.
Ben said,
"Hopefully he didn't say anything, because he'll make America look stupid, he'll make us all look stupid. SEAL Team 6, they're doing the type of stuff, tactics, that are so sought after—secret helicopters, secret tactics—even other SEALs want to know what they do."
When Mann asked Ben if he was still going to read the book? Ben said.
"Definitely."
I respect the service to their country and many sacrificies that Navy Seals and black ops guys have made, but all this bullshit about honor, country and brothers will go out the window if you put a bag of money in front of them. Matt Bissonnette could not resist that temptation, and I have a feeling that more will follow.
Justice Department To Investigate Matt Bissonnette About Security Violations
According to The Atlantic Wire, Justice Department privacy lawyers believe that Matt Bissonnette, the author of "No Easy Day," the story of Seal Team 6's raid of Osama bin Laden's compound violated security.
Only the government knows for certain which details in "No Easy Day" are considered classified in Bissonnette's book, but based on the Justice Department's previous legal efforts to conceal all photographs and video pertaining to the raid, lawyers say it's very likely Bissonnette crossed the legal line.
Dan Metcalfe, the Justice Department's former director of the Office of Information and Privacy says.
"The odds are very high that such a person personally involved in such an operation -- who has so brazenly breached his obligation to submit his manuscript for pre-publication review -- has included at least some classified detail. Consider, by comparison, that the CIA effectively claimed that every last bit of the 52 'death photos/video' is classified."
In that particular case, the CIA fought the disclosure of every last shred of raid imagery requested in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Judicial Watch, a conservative legal group. In April, a federal judge sided with the CIA to keep the images concealed on grounds of national security. Considering the CIA's broad definition of classified materials, Metcalfe said
"It would be extremely surprising if Bissonnette's disclosures were not also considered classified."
And Metcalfe isn't alone.
Kel McClanahan, the executive director of National Security Counselors, a law firm that specializes in litigating secrecy cases says, after reviewing ssome of the disclosures appearing in No Easy Day.
"I have a hard time believing that a book-length first-hand account of such a sensitive operation would not contain a single piece of classified information. [Just one] piece of classified information is what will cause the problems, even if it’s not in this particular section."
Attorney Mark Zaid, who has provided legal services on some 20 military-related books during the classification review process, says the case against Bissonnette is a "slam dunk." He said.
"There's a high, high likelihood that officials with the U.S. government would render a determination that there is classified information within the book."
As an example of the mundane details often considered classified, he said the government argued that the NSA's nickname "the fort" was deemed to be classified in Anthony Shaffer's 2010 memoir Operation Dark Heart. In addition, the government even demanded the name "SEAL Team 6" be removed from one of his client's books. He said.
"It's ridiculous but until I get a judge to reverse it, it's classified."
If any such disclosure were found, Bissonnette could be subject to prosecution under the Espionage Act. In addition, the Justice Department could claim all the proceeds from the book for Bissonnette's failure to submit his manuscripts for approval, a condition he reportedly agreed to in a non-disclosure agreement. Scott Hodes, a FOIA attorney and former DoJ official said.
"I have no idea why this guy and his publisher didn't do a pre-publication review. He's not being targeted. It's a term of employment and they will [pursue] anybody."
All four lawyers interviewed by The Atlantic Wire said it would be unusual if the Justice Department didn't go after Bissonnette for not submitting his book for review. McClanahan said.
"The government has a strong (and in my opinion legitimate) interest in the prepublication review system, and no person can ever be allowed to think that they can substitute their own judgment for the government’s when it comes to classified information. For every person who actually is right and did not reveal any classified information, there are ten who are not, and those people are the reason the government has to go after anyone who violates the nondisclosure agreement."
In a precedent that should worry Bissonnette, Frank Snepp lost the proceeds to his book and was vigorously prosecuted in the 1970s for failing to submit his book Decent Interval for pre-publication review. "I can remember seeing on my first client visit to Langley a photocopy of his $188,000 check hanging like a trophy on a wall," said Metcalfe. "The Carter Administration CIA aggressively sued him, and the case even went to the Supreme Court. But could the result be different here due to any other perspective especially in an election season? I doubt it."
Conclusion
It would not surprise me if Penguin Books asked Matt Bissonnette to change the part about how Osama actually died to create controversy. Afterall, this is an election year, and this book will definitely stir up that controversy. I am assuming that the Department of Defense reported their account to the news media based on post-mission interviews with the Seal Team 6 personnel who were involved in the raid and inside the compound and witnesses to the killing of Osama bin Laden.
What really pisses me off is that Bissonnette wrote in his book that one of the Seal Team 6 members sat on top of Osama bin Laden's body while it was being transported back to the base. If this is what actually happened, it will only inflame Al Qaeda and jihadists further and increase the hatred of the U.S. We certainly don't need to give them further ammunition.
I was also very disappointed about some of the things that members of Seal Team 6 said about President Barack Obama and Vice-President Biden. This shows a complete lack of respect for their Commander-in-Chief. Barack Obama personally visited and thanked members of the Navy Seals and invited Seal Team 6 members to the White House. That demonstrates acknowlegement and respect for what these brave Navy Seals did, but for these guys to claim that President Obama took all the credit is disingenuous and disrespectful. President Obama took a huge risk when several of his senior advisors, including some members of his cabinet advised him against the raid, until it could be absolutely confirmed that Osama bin Laden was in the compound. If the raid had failed or resulted in U.S. casualties, Obama would've been blamed. Thankfully, the mission was a complete success except for the crash landing of one of the helicopters. As Commander in Chief, President Obama made the right call, and it worked, so he is entitled to take some of the credit for the raid.
I take humbrage in knowing that Matt Bissonnette's former Seal team buddies are very pissed off at him for writing the book and putting them in possible harm's way. Al Qaeda already has a bounty on Bissonnette, and should their identies become known, they too could become targets, or maybe even their wives, girlfriends and loved ones.
I am not surprised to hear that the Justice Department is now investigating Matt Bissonnette for possible security violations. You can bet that they will interview all individuals Bissonnette spoke to about the book, especially the folks at Penguin Books, the publishers. They have all the original manuscripts and notes. It will be very interesting how this will all pan out. Matt Bissonnette definitely fucked up when he failed to have the book properly vetted by the Justice Department before its publication. If he comes out of this clean of any charges, he will be a very luck many indeed.
Courtesy of an article dated August 28, 2012 appearing in Huffington Post and an article dated August 28, 2012 appearing in BusinessInsider
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