Killing of
* Osama Bin Laden *
Mission success culmination of years of complex, thorough, highly-advanced intelligence operations and analysis led by CIA with support from partners across Intelligence Community
Thursday, May 05, 2011
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The Operation that Killed Bin Ladin
Originally posted on CIA website May 4th, 2011
.Image credit: DoD Press Briefing 5/02/11 - Illustration of Bin Ladin’s Compound
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In the early morning hours of May 2nd, a U.S. military raid of an al-Qa’ida compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, killed America’s most wanted terrorist, Usama Bin Ladin.
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The mission’s success was the culmination of many years of complex, thorough, and highly-advanced intelligence operations and analysis led by the CIA with support from partners across the Intelligence Community. U.S. agencies had been collecting intelligence about the compound since it was discovered in August, 2010. Multiple streams of intelligence led to the assessment that Bin Ladin was hiding there, protected by two of his closest facilitators.
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The strike on the compound, authorized by the President on April 29th, was a surgical raid by a small team of special operations forces. The raid was designed to minimize collateral damage and to pose as little risk as possible to non-combatants on the compound or to Pakistani civilians in the neighborhood.
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* The Compound
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The compound where Bin Ladin was hiding is in Abbottabad, a town in Pakistan’s Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province (formerly the Northwest Frontier Province), about 35 miles north of Islamabad. The compound and its main residence had extensive security features: high walls topped with barbed wire, double entry gates, opaque windows, no apparent Internet or telephone connection, and the residents burned their trash. It was valued at $1 million, but the two al-Qa’ida facilitators who owned it had no apparent source of wealth.
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* The Impact
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The death of Usama Bin Ladin marks the single greatest victory in the U.S.-led campaign to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al-Qa’ida. It is a major and essential step in bringing about the terrorist organization’s eventual dissolution.
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Bin Ladin was al-Qa’ida’s founder and only amir, or commander, in its 22-year history. He was largely responsible for the organization’s mystique, its ability to raise money and attract new recruits, and its focus on the United States as a target for terrorist attacks. As the only al-Qa’ida leader whose authority was universally respected, he also maintained the group’s cohesion.
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Although al-Qa’ida may not fragment immediately, the loss of Bin Ladin puts the deadly organization on a path of decline that will be difficult to reverse.
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- SITUATION ROOM -
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About photo: President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and members of the national security team, including Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, far right, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, standing, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House, May 1, 2011. A classified document seen in this photograph has been obscured.
White House photo by Pete Souza
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Check out DoD’s Special Report at link below...
Lots of reports, videos, photos and more at above link
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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gives remarks on the killing of Usama bin Ladin on May 2nd, 2011...
Read full transcript/watch video HERE
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* Fox News brings us this troubling report today and it goes in part like this... Pakistan is calling for cuts in the U.S. military personnel inside the country after U.S. Navy SEALs killed Usama bin Laden in his Pakistan compound -- without Pakistan's help or prior knowledge. ... In a statement Thursday, Pakistan's army fired back, saying U.S. military personnel inside the country would be reduced to the "minimum essential" levels to protest the American commando raid that killed bin Laden early Monday local time. The army also threatened to cut cooperation with Washington if it stages more unilateral raids on its territory...
Read this report in full at link below...
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* The Guardian had the following photo gallery posted up on their website Wednesday... but I wouldn’t recommend viewing it if you’re one of those that are weak at heart. Click it out HERE... (Warning though... Several gruesome photos within, with the first showing an unidentified VERY Bloody Body of a Dead Man after the US Navy Seal Commandos raid on Bin Laden’s compound)
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Navy SEALS Offer Some Insight Into Elite Group
About Video: Some fellow and former Navy SEALS talk about their training and what it takes to become part of the group that brought down Osama bin Laden.
This News Video posted on YouTube by AssociatedPress
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More to come...
AubreyJ.........
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