A comprehensive new book about U.S. special operations reveals that the mission to get top terrorist Osama bin Laden was “a kill mission, not a capture mission,” and that SEAL Team 6 members handpicked for the assault were ordered by President Obama to fight it out, not surrender, if caught.
“Bin Laden was the first time [were were told], ‘This is a kill mission, not a capture mission, unless he was naked with his hands up,'” a Team 6 source is quoted in Relentless Strike, due out September 1.
“They [the CIA] were adamant: Kill him. That message came from [former CIA Director Leon] Panetta,” the source told author and defense journalist Sean Naylor, whose 540-page book details the post-9/11 formation of the effective Joint Special Operations Command.
The well-sourced and researched book from St. Martin’s Press provides a fuller account of the May 2, 2011, OBL killing and other details on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. A copy was provided in advance to Secrets.
Naylor turns over a full chapter to the bin Laden raid and quoted insiders on Obama’s view of what to do if the Americans were cornered by Pakistani forces as they hit bin Laden’s fortress in Abbottabad.
Naylor cites several published reports that they were told to negotiate a settlement with Pakistani forces, or even surrender. But Obama rejected that.
“Thankfully, the president said, ‘No,’ they’re not going to surrender, they’ll fight their way out and we’ll go in and get them if we have to,” said the SEAL Team 6 source in the book. “The guys were thankful for that. They would not have surrendered anyway,” added the source.
The book also gives new details about why one of the two super-secret helicopters used to fly SEALs into the bin Laden compound had trouble and crashed.
Naylor quotes insiders saying that the plan all along had been for a parachute drop but was changed when officials demanded that two specially fitted and stealthy Blackhawks be pulled from mothballs and used.
During training, the helos “proved unstable,” but top officials refused to return to the much-practiced airdrop.
Naylor also revealed that while the U.S. military practiced the landing at a model of bin Laden’s home, a key element at that facility that would cause the crash was missing.
“The cause of the crash was a phenomenon called vortex ring state, or settling with power, which occurs when the helicopter’s rotors cannot get the lift required from the turbulent air of their own downwash,” said the book.
“The problem resulted in part from an oversight in the construction of the mock-up compound at Harvey Point [N.C.]: Whereas the Abbottabad compound was surrounded by a brick wall, the Harvey Point replica made due with a chain-link fence. ‘That air bled out through that chain-link fence’ in North Carolina, said the Team 6 source. ‘But in reality, the compound had those solid walls and that bad air just came right back up into the rotor blades and that thing just lost power.'”
A final detail: While it crashed, those inside said they didn’t even notice the impact because of skillful handling by the pilot.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected].
