The al-Qaeda chief was targeted and killed in less than 45 minutes, writes TOM CLONAN
THE ASSAULT on the bin Laden hideaway in Abbottobad, just 50km (30 miles) from Islamabad, happened under cover of darkness between 1am and 2am local time (between 9pm and 10pm Irish time).
At that point bin Laden’s entourage would have been at their most vulnerable – in the deepest phase of the sleep cycle. The reaction times of those still awake at that hour would have been slower than normal.
US officials have indicated that US navy seals carried out the operation. Specifically, navy seal team six has been identified as the principal unit involved. Given that the assault happened deep within Pakistan, the troops involved were seconded to the Central Intelligence Agency for the operation and placed under direct command of agency director Leon Panetta.
While details of the assault remain sketchy, it appears that the seals were deployed to Abbottabad aboard four helicopters. These were most likely Sikorsky UH-60 Blackhawks. Each Blackhawk helicopter is capable of carrying about 12 fully-armed troops. US officials have indicated that up to 24 seals were involved in the assault.
Two helicopters landed at the compound with the remaining two hovering in close proximity to reinforce if necessary. In addition to these aircraft, the US air force would have provided further reinforcement at higher altitude throughout the operation.
The attack on the compound is reported to have lasted about 40 minutes. This approximates to the amount of time it would require to forcibly enter and clear a building of the size occupied by bin Laden.
The dozen or so seals who entered the building would have been armed with M4 assault rifles, MP5 submachine guns and an array of shotguns, stun grenades designed for house clearance and urban combat.
In the heat of such an engagement, there would have been little time for extensive verbal warnings or negotiations. As seals entered rooms they would have shouted orders in Arabic but it is likely that anyone who failed to comply immediately would have been shot at point blank range. In such circumstances, it is unsurprising that bin Laden was shot dead during the assault.
It is reported that he and others offered resistance and may have been involved in a brief firefight.
While three men and a woman are reported to have been killed in the exchange, these fatalities would represent relatively light casualties in the context of such a sensitive operation.
Navy seals are an elite special forces unit trained for maritime and ground operations. The seal acronym itself is based on the term “sea and land” forces.
Since its inception in 1981, navy seal team six has been involved in a number of major international operations involving key personnel or VIP-targeted actions.
In 1983, the newly formed unit extracted governor general Paul Scoon from his residence in Grenada. In 2004 the same unit, under CIA direction, extracted Jean Bertrand Aristide and his family from his residence in Haiti. Both operations took place at night and in hostile operating conditions. The actions involved the insertion by air of a small number of troops into a landing zone.
The navy seals unit – along with their army special forces counterparts in Delta Force – were also used extensively during the first Gulf War in Kuwait and Iraq in 1991.
Navy seals were also deployed to track down suspected war criminals and other VIP targets in the Balkans in the mid-1990s. Since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, navy seals and Delta Force members have been deployed against important VIP targets within Afghanistan and Iraq. In this regard they were crucial in identifying, locating and killing Uday and Qusay Hussein in Mosul, Iraq, in 2003 and the killing of al-Qaeda’s Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Baqubah in June 2006. In both operations images of the dead men were widely published following DNA confirmation of their identities.
In October 2010, navy seal team six was deployed to Kunar Province in Afghanistan to rescue Scottish aid worker Linda Norgrove who had been taken hostage by an armed Taliban gang.
The operation was mounted under cover of darkness with the seal team deployed by helicopter.
However, Norgrove was killed accidentally during the rescue attempt when a grenade was thrown by a member of the rescue team.
As a consequence of their extensive involvement in sensitive overseas VIP-target operations, navy seal team six have had an ongoing relationship with the CIA for almost 30 years.
The seals have played a vital role in several agency special activities division operations over that period of time. This is likely to have been the principal reason they were chosen by the agency to take the lead role in the attack on bin Laden.
Despite the loss of one US helicopter, the seals managed to extract themselves – and bin Laden’s body – from the compound with no US casualties. The CIA and navy will regard this as a spectacular success.
If and when photographs of bin Laden’s corpse are published in the coming days they will make for uncomfortable viewing for his successor, Ayman al-Zawahiri.
They will also make for particularly uncomfortable viewing for others, such as Col Gadafy in Libya, given the existing international security environment.
Tom Clonan is the Irish Timessecurity analyst. He lectures in the School of Media, DIT.