Stars and Stripes’ Rumor Doctor(the U.S. military has just about as many rumors as it does secrets, and believe me — the rumors tend to be more interesting) Jeff Schogol was told that the military doesn’t award secret commendations. Does that mean the SEALs who took out Osama bin Laden — in addition to not being able to …
Terrorism
The Outing of the SEALs Has SecDef Ticked Off
Remember when then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld got that question about “hillbilly armor” in 2004 from a soldier in Kuwait complaining about lousy protection for troops in the war in Iraq? And Rumsfeld’s timeless response: “As you know, you go to war with the Army you have.”
It turns out the question, from a member of …
Bin Laden’s Secret Communications Plan: Use a Thumb Drive
The Associated Press has details on how Osama bin Laden managed to email his terrorist colleagues and avoid detection by the United States. The AP piece has a relatively breathless buildup, suggesting bin Laden had an ingenious secret plan:
WASHINGTON – Despite having no Internet access in his hideout, Osama bin Laden was a prolific
…
Damn.
Dear Diary: Which bin Laden Scares You Most?
The U.S. government can’t make up its mind when it comes to Osama bin Laden. Last Saturday, it held an unusual press conference where it released a snippet of video showing a feeble, aging terrorist staring at his flickering image on a small TV screen. On Wednesday, government officials were whispering about bin Laden’s bloody diary …
Counter-terrorism beats nation-building? Are we going to bury COIN all over again?
My old classmate Fareed Zakaria recently made the argument that counterterrorism beats nation-building when it comes to winning the war on terror. Taking Osama Bin Laden’s killing as a point of American pride, he says that sort of military/intelligence operation is what we’re good at, and so we should stick with it versus pursue the …
“Under The Sea” With bin Laden
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dDtRnstrefE]
OK…so it’s juvenile. But it includes a nice shot of our X’ed-out Osama bin Laden Time cover, so it can’t be all bad.
Osama Is Dead, but ‘bin Ladenism’ Endures in Southeast Asia
So is Osama bin Laden’s death likely to end his brand of terror in southeast Asia? Unfortunately, according to Maria Ressa, an expert on the topic, no. Check out her interview with colleague Emily Raulala on Time’s Global Spin blog.
The Vexing U.S.-Pakistani Relationship Heads South, Post-bin Laden
Pakistan is a recipe with all the ingredients for disaster: start with an engineer who steals blueprints for nuclear weapons, and succeeds in constructing the Islamic world’s first atomic bomb. Then he peddles those schematics to pretty much anyone will to pay. The country, a fragile democracy, is actually run by the army, part of …
1 in 11,800,000,000,000,000
DNA samples collected from his body were compared to a comprehensive DNA profile derived from bin Laden’s large extended family. Based on that analysis, the DNA is unquestionably his. The possibility of a mistaken identity on the basis of this analysis is approximately one in 11.8 quadrillion. I’ll let you count the zeroes.
— Senior …
The Lessons of bin Laden
After a decade of Osama bin Laden, the lessons he taught us crystallized over the weekend, a week after his death at the hands of the U.S. military. They became clear when the Obama Administration released some of his homemade videos. Administration officials said they showed bin Laden to be a hands-on leader of al Qaeda, still in …
The Woman Who Tried to Save bin Laden From the SEALs
Fascinating piece by Time vet Tim McGirk on Osama bin Laden’s fifth wife — and clues she offered about her husband that U.S. intelligence might have missed:
With the benefit of hindsight, it seems that U.S. counter-terrorism experts spent years trying to decipher the name and the whereabouts of bin-Laden’s elusive courier when
…
The Man Who Got bin Laden: The Most Deadly Would-be Journalist in the World
The man who commanded the SEAL team that hunted down and killed Osama bin Laden studied to be a reporter. If the Pulitzer Prize board establishes a new category — for killing the world’s most wanted terrorist — it’s a safe bet Bill McRaven will win it next spring.
Vice Adm. William McRaven, himself a SEAL, was on the ground in …