That is one way, though surely not the only way, to read this story. The gist: the administration is now admitting that it had no video feed during the most crucial 20-25 minutes of the bin Laden raid. But take note of a detail that’s hanging in the new new new version of events.
A photograph released by the White House appeared to show the President and his aides in the situation room watching the action as it unfolded. In fact they had little knowledge of what was happening in the compound.
Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.
In an interview with PBS, Mr Panetta said: “Once those teams went into the compound I can tell you that there was a time period of almost 20 or 25 minutes where we really didn’t know just exactly what was going on. And there were some very tense moments as we were waiting for information.
“We had some observation of the approach there, but we did not have direct flow of information as to the actual conduct of the operation itself as they were going through the compound.”
Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president. (emphasis mine)
It’s that last line that puts some distance now between the White House and the raid. The WH wasn’t actually watching, and the SEALs made the call to kill. Put that together with the information that came out yesterday about the disposition of the enemy within the compound.
Several other details from the raid support the narrative that bin Laden felt a certain sense of security in his walled compound in northern Pakistan—there were no guards on site, and he was unarmed when the CIA-led Navy SEALs team dropped in Sunday to capture or kill him.
The circumstances surrounding his final minutes are still a bit blurry. A senior U.S. official said that while he was unarmed, he appeared to be reaching for a weapon before being fatally shot.
Other accounts said one of the guards was armed, but the others and bin Laden were not. Of course, we’ll never see the actual order that sent the SEAL team in, so we’ll never know if it truly was a kill order. Most Americans wouldn’t care either way — bin Laden was one of that rare breed of thug who just needs killlin’. But this administration isn’t composed of “most Americans,” it’s composed of people who hold a skeptical view of American power, to say the least. And it’s not as if Obama hasn’t made a habit of throwing anyone and everyone under the bus as soon as they become inconvenient to him. And let’s face it: Obama’s voting base hates the military and has spent the entire war decrying every tactic the military and our intel agencies have used over the course of the war.
The Obama administration would be making a colossal mistake if it goes anywhere near turning on the SEALs who got bin Laden. But they have been making mistake after mistake since the successful raid. So I’m no longer confident they can manage to dodge making this one. And if your agenda of frittering away American power and influence remains in place, it’s not a mistake at all.
Plus: The New York Times Magazine suffers from a case of bad timing…and worse judgment.
Had bin Laden’s clothes/belt/whatever been wired for explosives, a single flick of the thumb could have killed everyone in the room. Not an unreasonable expectation. Talk of his being “armed” or not needs to consider this.
I am amused at the problems that these intellectuals (presumably English majors, or some such) at the Telegraph seem to have with the English language. Perhaps the SEALs “made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president” because, at the time, bin Laden was in Pakistan, where the SEALs were, and the President wasn’t.
Good one.
It was a tough decision, I’m sure. It’s not clear which one posed a greater threat to our nation. lol
I’m sure the Seals had a VERY tought decision:
Head or torso?
I would have gone with a gut shot or two and watched him bleed out, but I guess there wasn’t time for pleasantries.
Exactly.
Tattler is stretching again…
“Mr Panetta…told…that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president”
Duh.
This is suprising?
We may indeed have preferences, but once the door opens, whatever HAS to happen to “get” the target is a foregone conclusion.
And, no surprise here, the guys doing the mission are expected to make that call. It simply cannot BE pre-ordained by the Manager.
Basically, no raid by armed men on a wanted asset ever holds that the are not ALLOWED to kill the subject, if need be. On very high profile targets (think: Rommel, Mussolini) its “hope not, but may have to” simply kill anyone who gets in the way, as well.
Thats the way it goes.
Raids are fast, there are no re-enforcemments….The plan is set, options are few, and now the subject KNOWS you know where he is. The Team Leader will naturally HAVE to make the call, AS the circumstances dictate. Nothing strange about it.
Also, the fact they were NOT watching a live feed “helmet cam” of the operation, AS IT OCCURED, is also no surprise. There is no need, or possible benefit added, to having “the boss” micromanaging things to that level.
Read General John Singlaubs take on the conduct of the Mayaguez raid, and how distracting it was for the ground commander to hear Kissenger himself blabbering in his ear from the Oval Office.
Are we to suppose that Mr. Biden, or The One Himself, would add to the chances for mission success, by having the ability to suddenly shout to the team:
‘No! Not that way! The OTHER way!….LOOK OUT!!”
As if they could even comprehend what they were seeing
Get real.
My money says “the story” of the Raid has not changed at all…
My money says the guys have told it exactly as it occured, consistently, several times by now.
The problem is, people who WERENT there, and DIDNT see it, and HAVENT spoken to the guys who were, are repeating to the press every hour, second and third hand anecdotal shreads of information they have no independent knowledge of.
When you talk before you know, you always have to “fix”.
‘“Mr Panetta…told…that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president”
Duh.
This is suprising?’
Precisely. What did they think in the WH? That the SEALS have the time or operational requirement to have the POTUS micro-manage the event from 10,000 miles away?
I wouldn’t be surprised if the SEALS turned off any long-distance communication to Washington for exactly that reason.
I would’ve.
Not to mention the fact that ANY electronic communications with the outside would have give their enemies a pathway for discovering their activities.
Superb comment and analysis Root ’83
“Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.”
What misplaced freudian slip modifier. the Telegraph is usually a little better than that on editing…
Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.
It hadn’t occurred to me to read that as a Freudian slip but, now that you mention it….
I know that some here would suggest that the Seals made the wrong decision and should have taken the President out instead of Bin Laden.
Nope. Obama is a sure guarantee of 8-12 years of conservative presidents with a likely GOP majority in both chambers for at least half that time. Let everyone have a good hard look at the misery that comes from a true believer leftist in power and they will run the other way for decades.
lmao!
My esteem for Leon Panetta has grown in the last week.
He showed great wisdom in keeping most of the White House staff in the dark about what was happening until the SEALS were beyond the point of no return.
I can’t imagine anyone, even in this White House, could be politically suicidal enough to do anything to the men that killed OBL besides pin medals on them.
They can’t possibly be THAT stupid… can they?
Yes they can.
Oh yeah they can. If it panders to the base, they will hang these guy out to dry quicker than you can say “stick em up”.
I’m not convinced the current administration is stupid enough to throw the SEALs under the bus. But I do suspect they’re perverse enough to do itl
After all, these guys might have trained under McChrystal . . .
wow. Blinding flash of the obvious, the ultimate decision to pull a trigger rests with the person whose finger is on it.
You could make the same statement about any weapon ever used in wartime, including the atomic bombs.
… the USAAC bombadier made the final decision to release the weapon rather than the president.
Point is, the trigger puller was put there, just like the bombadier on orders of the president to conduct a specific mission.
I don’t see what the brouhaha is all about. The Obama White House’s explanation of the raid is as clear and honest as their explanation of Obamacare, the budget, border security, energy policy, etc., etc.
As this administration attempts to micromanage every aspect of the narrative to benefit Obama, they’ve also shown a despicable willingness to invent “details” out of thin air. At this point, I’m not sure I trust anything they say about the operation.
Nice going Obama. You’ve turned one of the biggest American PR events in history into a series of pathetic revolving lies… What an ass-hat.
Ayup.
Once the Intelligence and Military aspects of the mission were complete the level of competence went to hell very quickly indeed.
Seldom will I assign the word “brilliant” to a comment. However, your assessment is “brilliant”. I do intend to plagerize it as often as I can.
if it becomes politically beneficial (even if to save obama’s political life) then it could easily be done
but, again, to do so would only satisfy a small portion of his lunatic left loyalists– and, it needs to be asked again, where would these voters go if obama didn’t throw them this bone?
i dont see it happening (to do so would demonstrate such a disconnect with the american people that even some dems would sense it)
this incident is the perfect example of this administration’s only ability– to divide the country; they cant help themselves even if they wanted
it also demonstrates that obama is not the lead cowboy on the ranch
the death of bin laden would have enabled obama to secure even more leverage over the rest of his thinly knit coalition of victims; obama could have left everyone “in the loop” OUT of it by maintaining the operation’s COVERT nature (leaving him with all the cards to play) but so many people foreign and domestic were in on this operation that the deflation of the obama image is becoming glaringly apparent
Never interrupt your enemy when he’s in the middle of making a strategic mistake.
One reason the US has the world’s best military is that control of battlefield operations is exercised by the guys on the ground.
Autocratic regimes like the Soviets and many Arab armies put control in the hands of a micromanaging Lord High Gospodin, far removed from the necessary real-time decision-making. Such remote-control direction is a guarantee of disasters to the ground troops, since the LHG cannot ever have full information for split-second decisions, and the time lag while He ponders His decisions gives the advantage to the enemy.
Unfortunately, the inexperienced Obama appears to believe in the LHG principle, rather than in framing clear concise mission orders which will produce the desired results at the hands of the ground troops. Does he think they’re such doofuses that they simply can’t comprehend all the lordly thoughts that bounce around in his noggin, conflicting with one another?
In a word, yes.
My EOTS is that The One believes that LBJ’s repeated failures at playing Squad Leader In The Sky, notably with B-52s over Hanoi, was only due to the relatively limited C3I capability of the 1960s. With our super-fast real-time call-response of today, I’m sure he saw it as a chance for him to play Halo with real shooters.
That is, until somebody at the other end pulled the plug on his XBox.
As for the idea that politicians understand that a raid means live fire and dead tangos, no, they don’t. When Carter and Vance were planning the (failed) Operation Blue Light Iran hostage rescue, the officers planning it explained to OPLAN to them. When they got to the part about using suppressed weapons to neutralize the guards, Carter and Vance freaked. “Can’t you just, you know, knock them out?” POTUS and SecState asked.
The answer “No” did not please them at all.
Even politicians with some military experience can’t make the intuitive leap that in a combat zone, the enemy needs to be neutralized ASAP, and permanently (meaning terminally, for the most part).
Ones with not only no military background, but also an utter and all-consuming hatred for the military derived from their dogma, pride themselves on their ignorance of same. It’s something they don’t need to know because they are so enlightened and above all that, and if they had such knowledge, it would somehow stain and pervert their superior consciousness.
Once you understand this, the nonsensical orders that emanate from such “leaders” become, if not understandable, at least comprehensible. Because you realize that this is just one more area of their psyches in which reality is never permitted to intrude.
If it tries, they’ll have it shot.
clear ether
eon
The military isn’t the police. A really successful mission is one where you catch the enemy off guard, unarmed, with no means to resist, and then kill them. Preferably by shooting them in the back. Mission accomplished with no friendly casualties is a perfect mission. If you are in a fair fight, you didn’t plan it right.
Give Robin a Cigar!
Same goes for Hollow Points verses Full Metal Jackets…
The “geneva convention” supposedly bans Hollow Points in war because they’re “cruel and painful?”
Uh….no…
They dont like Hollow Points in the Infantry because they tend to STOP inside just ONE person…in stead going right on through and richocheting all over the place, like good old FMJ.
Its not “humanitarian” reasons we use FMJ on the Battlefield……over-penetration and lots of nasty richochet are a soldiers best friend when its “Enemy front! Open fire!”
OOPS!
Went right through BOTH car doors AND the sandbag, THEN through his HELMET? AWESOME!
Its a little bit different with cops and robbers on a city street.
Folks need to keep that in mind with a war going on
On the contrary: Hollowpoints expand, ie, “blow up” on contact, tearing large holes on exit, and killing effectively. FMJ tend to pierce and pass, wounding, rather than killing, unless a vital organ is hit.The intent of the Geneva convention was to reduce deaths in favor of woundings. The effect was to enable wounded enemy to continue as combatants. The obvious counteraction is to order every man to shoot every sighted enemy, whether apparently dead, wounded or whatever. Dead enemies can’t kill anymore.
It was actually the original Hague Convention of 1898 that prohibited expanding bullets in warfare. Specifically, the reference was to the British “Manstopper” type bullets, which we would today call jacketed soft-points, in the 0.303 inch Enfield round. This was the successor to the genuine hollow-nosed .577/.450 Martini-Henry round, often referred to as the “dumdum bullet”, due to having been made at the British Indian Army’s Dumdum Arsenal outside of New Delhi.
The Convention specifically states that such projectiles are “too inhumane for civilized warfare”. The accord did, however, permit their use against savage tribesmen, on the grounds that they were somehow not sufficiently “civilized” to stop fighting and head for an aid station when hit.
Since the 1970s, the Hague Convention has often been used to “prove” that expanding bullets are illegal for police use, on the grounds of being “inhumane”. The usual result being that a department forced to use non-expanding bullets sees an upswing in lawsuits, when the inevitable happens and the duly-Hague-authorized round-nose slug goes through a perp and hits an innocent bystander on the far side of same.
CTW forces routinely use expanding bullets for this exact reason. The old saying in CTW/hostage rescue ops is “It Sucks To Be A Hostage”, but using expanding bullets reduces the chances of a through-and-through on a tango hitting said hostage(s).
The failure of the “enlightened” types to understand this is less one of ignorance than of a desire for CTW ops to fail. After all, if War Is Never The Answer, no military operation can be allowed to succeed, now can it?
As for the hostages- well, sacrificing innocents to The Cause Of The Week is another popular pastime with Our Betters, isn’t it?
clear ether
eon
If OBL was taken alive then Obama’s leftwing base would already be raving about giving him humanitarian treatment and a fair public trial. Lawyers would be lining up to represent him. It would be politically impossible to interrogate him.
OBL would have been worth more alive than dead, and the names in his head would no doubt help us greatly in the war. I have no doubt the SEALs could have captured him alive using less lethal weapons to incapacitate him and render him harmless.
But the left wing pro-terror lawfare folks made it politically difficult for Obama to order that we capture and interrogate OBL. And they are Obama’s voting base.
Jay,there are still too many unanswered questions about this raid. I expect most of those questions will be asked and answered over time but the lawyerites may have been the tipping point agains taking Osama live.
I don’t think even the WH is stupid enough to turn on the Seals.
Obama is in a box on this one. They might try to distance him from the decision to kill, but that will just make him look weaker than he already looks. If he blames the Seals the public will be beyond outraged. This is why they aren’t releasing the pictures. They may shed light on what happened, and even if they dont’, it’s going to look to the world like an assassination…with obama in the catbird seat.
They tried directly lying about what happened. That usually works, but this time the world press is involve, and they don’t coo like the US make believe press does when little lenin farts. They have already tried the haze of war cover story, but that is imploding as more reports come in, even though many are contradictory. Now they are trying the no video cover story, and the “they were on their own” cover story. It’s getting down to the nub, and the Seals are the nub.
If he goes there, 2012 is a lock for any Republican, so the moronistration will stonewall rather than do that.
>>I don’t think even the WH is stupid enough to turn on the Seals.
I agree. This is just wishful thinking. Obama has needed his defense creds for a while. The only people he could please by turning on the SEALs are the basest of his base — and they’re not going anywhere in 2012 anyway.
Mmmmmh.
Every time that a drone kills a terrorist or a group of terrorists the President is the sole responsible for the hit.
And a drone usually kills people who are in houses or cars, not an immediate danger for anybody (accent on IMMEDIATE).
The President pulls that trigger, with his orders.
It’s a war and it is legal.
Comment #12 is correct.
But if the President wants to say anything against the Seals, he will have a lot of answers to give about…HIMSELF.
And if he wants to say anything against the Seals we can even skip the Republican primaries, we will elect anyone, even me.
By not releasing the photo, Obama has allowed UBL the maintain his image. Thus allowing him to become an icon. This has given the jihadist movement a great tool that they can use forever. If the world had been allowed to see UBL’s bullet ridden body, the image of UBL would quite literally have been destroyed. So Obama has by this decision harmed American interest. The claim that not releasing the photos somehow is beneficial is bogus and is not backed up by any evidence what so ever.
With that out of the way, I think the real reason they don’t show the photos is because the power elite are snobs and for them to have seen the photos while others have not separates them from normal people. They the elite have seen the photos and are therefore above the “unimportant” masses. It’s like owning a Lamborghini. They enjoy the fact that they are part of that elite group that has access to classified information. By releasing the photos they make themselves less special. The real massage is: You are the sheep and we are the rulers.
Preston is a complete and utter moron. What drivel!
By the way do you know how the US thanked the original CO and creator of SEAL Team Six? They threw him in jail. His crime: He bought some hand grenades that cost to much.
I bet he is one proud man today anyway.
Will Pajamas Media ever give this administration any credit it is due or will this forum continue on a witch hunt with the likes of Sarah Palin? Finding a way to damn this administration regardless of the end results? Being ignorant is one thing but having total bias is another. This website continues on and on with the bashing of this administration and with the president especially and I wonder where all the objectivity is. Does it exist with this forum? Just look at all the story titles in this website. It’s all bashings of this president. Is it safe to call this forum an internet version of Fox News?
What is it about the narcissistic marxist that sends you into rapture? Blowing people’s heads off? Claiming credit for things he didn’t do? Bankrupting the country? Encouraging racial conflict? Hating his country? Violating laws? Castigating his opponents to their face when they don’t have the ability to respond? Making up stuff to “defend” his redistribution?
What exactly is it?
If he ever does anything creditable, he’ll get the credit.
While you scold us from in front of the TV tuned to MSNBC news and toggle back to KKKos?
I can only speak for myself, but being I remember a film being made with George Bush being assassinated while he was still in office, I’m not terribly concerned with the Left’s cries of “bias.”
“Being ignorant is one thing but having total bias is another.”
Which are you, ignorant or biased? Or can you not be honest and admit that YOUR mainstream media would be screaming “Cowboy!” had Bush done this? Since it’s their Boy, he’s “gutsy” and “decisive.”
I have read interesting speculation that Obama gave Panetta a weak, general “it’s your fault if it goes wrong” permission. Not imagining that, unlike he and his useless idiot cronies, non-political types actually have the cojones to make the hard decisions and assume responsibility. It is possible that he was not made aware that the mission was a go until it already went.
Pretty bad when a Commander-in-Chief is at the top of the Doesn’t Need to Know list.
I think Rapture proved the point with all the replies here. I’m sure most of you even believed that this president was completely kept in the dark with this entire mission – the tactical planning, strategy, and execution. I’m sure most of you believe President Obama was asleep when the mission took place and was woken up with the information that the mission was a complete success. Keep your beliefs and never let it go, it’s good to live in an alternate universe sometimes. It keeps you safe and warm in your comfort zone.
Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.
I’d be very curious to see/hear the orders given to the Seals before they started the mission. Were they told to kill Bin Laden only as a last resort? Or as a primary imperative? But I suppose those orders are Top Secret and will never be released.
I’m not taking much of what Panetta says in this matter anyway seriously. Remember, just yesterday he announced that the administration would release the death photo, and now the President is saying no. And regardless of everything else, is anyone here credulous enough to believe that you could send a team of heavily-armed Seals into Osama bin Laden’s compound, and be surprised when they returned with a dead body? Though I’ve never been that impressed with President Obama’s intellect, I doubt he’s that dumb. Frankly, I’m surprised there were as few guns involved as there were; regardless, pretty much everyone here is happy he’s dead, and trying to parse this as something somehow bad for the administration is going to start looking desperate pretty soon. I’ll agree they hosed the aftermath (with the one official contradicting Hilary and saying that the Pakis had to know OBL was there) but the operation itself was an incredible risk, and Obama took it, and should get the benefits of the success.
Oh, I keep repeating this joke: if Obama was hiding in Abbottabad, is al-Zawahiri in Costelloabad? Who’s on First?
obi thought he’d sent the SEALs to personally deliver an invitation for a beer summit at the WH.
Panetta has actually stood up to the WH before. He has said many things that were truths. He has far more credibility on this. I think the WH communications staff, specifically Valerie Jarrett, just has the ear of the President more than anyone else. They do not coordinate their messaging, which is what is leading to all this criticism.
The Right would be happy to acknowledge this victory, but Obama and Co. seem to be unable to make it possible. It’s the politicking over this, and the ridiculous posturing and lying. They just need to handle this right. Do it in a straightforward manner. The problem is they are now paying the political price for their political rhetoric in the campaign. They are trapped by their own words.
Bush did the right thing, the necessary things. Obama has had to acknowledge that fact since he became President, because now the responsibility is his, and he needs these tools. Every time he does the right thing now, though, he runs smack up against the hypocrisy which got him elected.
Ain’t no sech thang as a free lunch.
somehow – I don’t believe the WH didn’t give a kill order before the SEALS ever went in . . . . .
*I* ordered this. *I* made the decision. But… umm…. the SEALS made the decision to kill all on their own.
Really?
Transmission cut off for 20-25 mins. Approximately? You cannot tell us exactly how much time was cut out? What, has it not yet been decided how much of the record will be “lost”.
Really?
The transmission was cut off? The radios stopped working, too? The moment they went into the compound? What was our response then? Did we send in the backup team to extract them? After all, when all transmission ceased, perhaps they had all been killed. What was our response to that? Wait and… HOPE for the situation to CHANGE?
Really?
This statement of theirs to cover their butts politically just raise more questions. These idjits just cannot stop themselves from lying. The politics have to be perfect. They simply cannot make themselves take a principled stand. “I ordered a hit on the bastard. He had to die for what he did. I do NOT apologize.” End of story. Popularity soars. But… they have the wrong principles.
Jackasses. They never learn to stop digging the hole deeper.
He’s dead lets move on and get the others involved.
Osama Bin-Laden’s Facebook Page:
http://i962.photobucket.com/albums/ae106/LastAngryMan/OBLFacebookPage.jpg
In a society that wasn’t devolving into insanity, Panetta would be forced to resign immediately for that statement, which is a shameless obscene lie. Military personnel who pull the trigger are at the end of a legal chain of command. As long as no clear order is ever directly violated anywhere along that chain, then those at the top bear the ultimate responsibility.
I should also have said, “..any clear legal order..”
>Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.
what ELSE did the WH think a heavily armed SEAL team would do when finally face to face with bin Laden after a 10-year hunt?
Sweet weeping Jesus- I can’t believe the idiots we sent to the White House
I’ve been praying for just one, p***ed off Seal, for two and a half years, to end this misery of Obama.
All that one does must be legal and moral.
And what shall we do with the 60 million irresponsibles who made him the most powerful man on the planet?
And will certainly do it again in 2012, assisted by the votes of the insane, retarded, criminal, dead and ficticious he will certainly receive.
Should we modify the qualifications for exercise of the franchise?
Or continue to commit constitutional suicide utilizing the Chicago voting plan?
We can count on zero help from the GOPhers, who, at this very moment are busy selling us out to the Demonrats- raising the debt limit in return for a miniscule reduction in the current deficit.
When their perfidy results in chaos in the streets, they will be among the first to fall- victims of their their own greed and duplicity. Witness the simultaneous rebellions all over the Mideast and the subsequent brutal disposition of the ousted leadership by, in each and every case, the islamic jihadist group which emerged, SURPRISE!, triumphant. Who would ever have thought it?
This administration’s intent was to fail. They broadcast, to senators like Feinstein, as far back as December, the probable location of the target. He had five months to hit the trail, but failed to do so. They used a helicopter rigged to fail mechanically, a la Jimmy Carter. They can’t tell the same story twice in a row. The body disappeared and the photos are withheld. And all this from the Prince of Lies. Now watch them reveal the identities of the shooters. And when Bin Laden makes post mortem appearances will they attribute it to his resurrection from the dead by ficticious, demonic, allah?
Celebrating a Death?
While the vast majority of Americans are intensely proud of Navy SEAL Team 6 for its successful mission last Sunday and happy, if not universally ecstatic, over its results, Europeans have been largely mute over the mission’s success or demonstrably angry over American impertinence in what they consider a violation of the air space and territorial integrity of a sovereign state and which many contend involved a summary execution of an un-armed man.
There’s no question that Team 6 did indeed infringe on Pakistan’s national boundaries, which boundaries are more porous than America’s southern border, and that nation itself is less a nation than it is a sanctuary for terrorist enemies of the United States–and of Europe.
Whether Osama bin Laden was in fact un-armed or had an AK47 or other weapon in easy reach is still unclear, and irrelevant. What is known is that he was a declared, vicious enemy and his compound was a virtual fortress with high walls topped by barbed wire and that he had armed guards protecting him.
It’s easy to second guess what the SEALs should have done in the heat, the fog, of battle, to Monday-morning-quarterback a perilous military operation since none of us were there, on-site, with those brave men. All volunteers in the service of their country, they were risking their lives to execute a mission deemed critical to America’s–and Europe’s–interests and safety.
Europeans, however, feel free to do just that, to judge the propriety of the assault and to condemn Osama’s killing. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=4338)
Of course the administration is now in CYA mode. They want to have it both ways, as usual. Parade around in New York like a hero but come back to DC an say “I didn’t know nothin”bout nothin’”. He takes us for a bunch of fools.
Does the phrase “modified limited hangout” from the Nixon days ring a bell with anyone else?
Would the WH prosecute the seals? They’ve already done it once.
IMHO Panneta and Hillary would have tag teamed Obama had he failed to do this. Hillary sees blood in the water and I don’t believe she is all that fond of dear leader. Whatever the orders were, I don’t think UBL was ever going to live through this. Obama was in a corner. He was manipulated into authorizing a raid he didn’t support, with an outcome in contradiction to his probable orders. If the rest of the world and Obama have a problem with what the seals did, they can kiss my grits.
Amen.
I can imagine the SEALs being prosecuted for murdering Bin Laden. When they are arrested, the arresting masters-at-arms “forget” to read them their Miranda rights. Then they search their homes while “forgetting” to get a warrant. Then they “forget” to cease questioning the suspect when they ask for a lawyer.
Lots of interesting comments and I was not the only one to take note of the grammar.
“Mr Panetta also told the network that the US Navy Seals made the final decision to kill bin Laden rather than the president.”
It may have been a hard choice since both have put our country at risk. Both seem to be politically motivated and both may fall from the same stone.
Timing seems to be important here, making it a political decision rather that tactical. It sounds like Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts were known far enough ahead to make tactical plans but was launched on a political expediency. Not enough facts at this writing for me to draw a conclusions yet.
This administration, not just Obama, has been far less than candid with the county so we have unanswered question that are popping up all over with each explanation generating far more questions than are answered. It is these questions that, like upwelling water in quicksand washes the sand away from your feet and you begin to sink. As soon as you try to pull your foot out of the sand it pack around the foot creating a vacuum so it is difficult to get out of quicksand. Therefor the more the struggles the deeper you sink. The free pass is likely to get lost in the ensuing turmoil.
This seems to happen when we leave principle and latch on to personality. Our new crop of candidates need to understand that what they stand for is more important that who they are or what they are against. There is still a lot of dust to settle and there is a lot of pollution in that dust.
We have to thank the “I, I, I, I” speech of Sunday night. Because with Panneta’s declaration that the SEALs made the actual decision to kill OBL, it will not take long for this PC administration to hang the SEALs out to dry in the open for anybody to demand having them charged with murder.
And since actions in the war front are now reviewed by the press from the safety of their editorial desks, BHO’s claim of responsibility for this successful war action, will shield our brave SEALs from any PC infushed political/legal action. This may not have been BHO’s original intent, but who cares? What counts is that our brave SEALs are protected from the far and twisted reach of a mad PC world.
If obama would throw the Seals under the bus, it would be his end. You do not screw with the people protecting you. It only takes one pissed off special forces personnel, plus CIA or FBI to repeat what happened to osama. Obama would not be the first egotistical taken out by his own people, all hail the EYES of March!
If you haven’t, I enjoyed Vince Flynn’s very first book. Kinda on topic.
I got to meet Vince Flynn when I was producing the Ingraham show. He rocks.
My opinion: The only way they could get Obama to sign off on the order to kill bin Laden was if he got to turn it to his political advantage i.e. the ‘I, I, I,’ speeches, the timing of the hit wrt his campaign, etc. I’m betting Obama was a very unwilling participant in the whole operation, and Panetta and Hillary knew exactly where to target him in order to get his go-ahead.
Re the ‘live feed’ – no way this was broadcast live or was ever going to. SEALS don’t transmit over the airwaves when it’s going down. They might have had a closed circuit recording going on, but they would have communicated only with their op control when necessary, and nobody else. The pic in the WH was staged. In probability Osama was already dead when they were supposedly watching it all happen. Hillary’s expression is just reasonably good acting.
Obama has been deeply damaged in all of this and so has Jarrett. Panetta, State and Defense worked together to get him to the table, and thereafter everything came undone because there are deep divisions within the WH and everyone is trying to save their assess and their bacon. The leak about the safe house came from the CIA also.
Oh i hope he does try to throw the seals under the bus. Why? because no real american is gonna let thoes seals fall. there is not a single one of us who does not wish he/she could have put a slug in OBL head, no matter what circumstances there were. OBL could have been walking hatian orphans to school and carrying a puppy and we would still kill him on sight. If obama does that will seal his fate as president. he will loose so many voters. even a great deal of the hard left would leave. thats how much OBL is hated.
Yes! I would not be at all surprised if obama tries to throw the SEALS under the bus and I would be one of the thousands who would be protesting. I have trouble walking and throwing but I would certainly do my best and would bring my loyal but small wire-haired dachshund to add to the protest. He THINKS his bark scares everyone. I would like nothing more than Spenser sinking his tiny teeth into a scrawny presidential shin. And woe unto anyone who tried to impound him.
Those SEALS have more courage in their little fingernail than obama has in his whole body and, if there is anything obama knows, it is that he has no guts. He may be a dumb opportunist but he’s not going to get himself killed.
The seals were given orders to be followed EXACTLY. They did not take it upon themselves to capture and murder a prisoner. The had room on the chopper for a live or dead body. Plans were already made to dump the body in the sea with a cover story that it conformed with muslim sharia law which of course it did not.Obama cannot throw these men under the bus, because they would tell the rest of the story if he did, whatever it is, and we sure as hell have not heard it.
Way to go SEALS!
It’s always refreshing to hear some good news for a change, however the real threat to the US and to Europe is the stealth jihadists. Ubl doesn’t come close to the danger that the adherents of multicult and their pet islamists pose. So let’s roll up our sleeves and show the liberal zealots that we ain’t gonna be pushed around.
Congratulations and good wishes from Sweden.