My only problem with killing OBL is the loss of intel

[Taverner]

Granted, it would have been a hard call. Kill OBL, or risk having him escape again.

But if they had caught him, we might have been able to get intel on other Al Queda cells. Then again, we might not have.

President Obama made the most prudent, ethical (yes I went there) and intelligent decision. If it were Bush, IF he even cared about getting OBL, most likely they would have carpetbombed the city.

However, just because a decision is the most prudent, doesn't mean there aren't downsides to it.

OBL had a chance to turn himself in. From what I've read, he was even given the chance that night - although he might not have as well - the accounts of that night were soaked in adrenaline so who knows.

But even if they went in, and gunned him down, it was on the right side of ethics. He was a mass-murderer. He was known to be armed and dangerous. When police in the US face an armed, dangerous mass murderer, they do not hesitate to take that person down with a sniper. Same difference.

[shraby]

1. They'll probably get more off the computers, flash drives and

notes then they ever would have out of Bin Laden.

[Taverner]

10. Yes - I hope we do

[fivepennies]

30. We won't,

unless you believe Bin Laden was busily documenting proof of his own guilt on those ten computers. Not likely. But what if he was naming names and providing evidence against collaborators besides al qaeda operators? Getting those computers and destroying the data on them would probably be worth killing unarmed people for, at least to any outsiders whose names might appear on them.

Think for a minute, what if Bin Laden (or whoever got mowed down in that raid) was planning a huge public data dump of the contents of those computers documenting clandestine and illegal dealings of foreign agencies and agents for the world to see. It could make the wikileaks cables read like the minutes of a boy scout meeting. I'm not saying that's how or why it was done, but getting those computers out was a major part of the mission.

And it wouldn't even be necessary for Obama to know what was going on behind the scenes other than what he was allowed to know by the planners. But he gets the rave reviews for it. And if the whole story goes into the crapper, he'd also get the blame and 2012 would be a rout. What a coup that would be for the pukes, killing two birds with one stone, so to speak.

My apologies in advance if this post gets the thread deep sixed.

[fivepennies]

32. Guess we're out of .... luck?

U.S. forces recovered a wealth of computer files, hard drives, thumb drives and electronic equipment from Osama bin Laden's Pakistan compound after his killing this past weekend, but security experts say that if the files were correctly encrypted, it will be nearly impossible for intelligence experts to ever see what is stored on them.

"Correctly implemented encryption is very difficult to break," Steve Santorelli, director of global outreach at the Internet security research group Team Cymru, told SecurityNewsDaily.

http://www.livescience.com/14054-osama-bin-laden-files-impossible-crack.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29

Imagine my surprise.

Now, what if one or two of those thumb drives got into someone else's hands before the mission was complete ...

[bluerum]

17. Exactly. Between the digital data and the leads to human assets they provide

we will have just as much - more likely much more intel than could have ever been pulled from a senile way past his golden years terrorist.

[shraby]

18. Not only that, but it will be more accurate because Bin Laden

would have sent them on wild goose chases just to waste time.

[JuniperLea]

25. He sure would have!

The computers will tell much, no question.

[aquart]

2. We didn't lose any intel.

That smug bastard wouldn't have said anything but his hard drives and flash drives are talky as all get out.

[Taverner]

6. Maybe so - maybe not

I do agree that the value of killing OBL weighed more than the possible intel value

But remember, OBL was an attention whore. He loved loved loved when the cameras were pointed at him.

A year in the Supermax Federal Prison with conditions not unlike the Unabomber might have loosened his tongue. Then again, that intel would be 1 year old.

I agree with the decision, but its like your thinking when you drop a cabinet full of expensive china. You only have two hands - do you rescue the tea cup or the plate?

[Johonny]

21. isn't our track record ~80 %

Based on what our interrogators have been saying this week on the TV machine. That's pretty strong odds that he would have told us information eventually.

[coalition_unwilling]

3. Glenn Greenwald has said it best:

Once you embrace the bin Laden Exception, how does it stay confined to him?

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/05/06/bin_laden

[Taverner]

7. It is not an exception however

Like I pointed out in another post, the US Marshals, who capture or kill fugitives, will often shoot first - especially if they think the fugitive might be carrying a weapon

In some reports Bin Laden was given the choice to be captured or killed, and he chose the latter. I do not know the veracity of those reports, but he had plenty of time since the USS Cole bombing and now to turn himself in. He did not.

[coalition_unwilling]

12. Oy vey. In other reports (not the least of which are

"Reuters" and "The Atlantic Monthly"), the SEALs were sent with orders explicitly to kill and not to capture OBL. Are you saying that U.S. Marshals commit extra-judicial executions?

I seriously doubt that U.S. Marshals 'shoot to kill' upon mere suspicion that a fugitive is carrying a weapon. But, then again, I'm not an expert.

[Taverner]

13. If they feel the target is a threat, and armed - of course they shoot to kill

There is a reason why arestees 'assume the position' long before the police are next to them. Anything else could be considered a threat, and could get one killed.

[w4rma]

4. The CIA hung out on his doorstep for 9 entire months gathering intel.

It was decided to finally kill him because everyone involved felt enough intelligence was gathered from watching him for nearly a year, beforehand.

[Taverner]

8. That is true

My point is not that the right decision wasn't made - - it most certainly was

But, a "nice to have" that didn't happen was the chance that we could uncover more al Queda cells. They did secure all files from the house, so we may still get that 'nice to have.'

[TTUBatfan2008]

5. Flip side on capturing him...

is that it puts American lives at risk for kidnapping by Al Qaeda with Bin Laden's release being the ransom that our government would have to pay. Americans in the Middle East would be extremely vulnerable to this.

[Taverner]

9. Also - another downside - OBL the attention whore gets on prime time

He gets to point his finger in the air and start spewing his hateful bullshit and you KNOW the news orgs would cover that.

Hell, it would be like giving him a show on Faux!

[Shrek]

11. I wonder . . .

How tough would it be to capture him, claim to the world that you killed him, and then hide him somewhere safe and interrogate at length?

Only the people actually present during the raid would know the truth, and they're not going to talk.

Plausible?

[Taverner]

15. Interesting scenario

Sounds like a great book! I'd buy it!

[Shiver]

26. Hell... I'd write it.

I'd just have to keep myself from turning it into scifi or fantasy...

[The Magistrate]

14. It Is Not that Kind Of An Organization, Sir

It is not an inter-laced 'cell' structure where the top man knows people who trace chains down to the rank and file operatives.

It is similar to the Anarchist movement if the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The role of the prominent leadership is to inspire others to commit 'propaganda of the deed' on their own initiative. People with sufficient stature or cntacts can make the pilgrimage to the leader, and receive blessing and advice on projects he finds appealing, or even funds and a name or two to trust for expertise, but that is not the same thing as, say, the Comintern chief in Moscow giving the order for strikes in the shipping industry in Europe, duly carried out by appartchiks in the various national parties as the word reaches them though a traceable routine of interlocking contacts stretching from the Moscow office down to the docks and sailors' hostels.

[Taverner]

16. Yes - very true

And I keep forgetting that

[kenny blankenship]

19. Were you prepared to torture him to get him to talk?

Because he probably wouldn't have anything to say. There would have been no chance that he doesn't wind up facing the DP, and so no reason for him to talk. The detainees in Gitmo for the most part might hope to get out someday if they talked, because there was always somebody the US wanted to get worse than them: Osama bin Laden.

Dr. Evil doesn't have anybody to squeal on, nor in any case is there any hope of obtaining anything by squealing. That leaves only the hard and nasty way of extracting information. That's probably not going to be of much value either.

[Taverner]

22. Torture yields inaccurate intel

Time yields the most truthful, but by then it's too late

[kenny blankenship]

24. A liberal platitude that is completely beside the point.

I stipulated information obtained by torture isn't going to be "of much value." Even that is overstating the case: it can be of value. The Germans rolled up entire networks of the French Resistance through the torture of detainees, and they weren't as good at torture as the Soviets or the Chinese. Later, the French dug out the Algerian FLN guerrilla-terrorist networks through torture. Aside from ethics, the real problem with torture in a counterinsurgency/occupation setting is not that you never learn anything valuable through torture, but that it engenders so much more opposition and hostility in the occupied population, than it can neutralize in active resistance. The French eventually had to leave Algeria, even though they had succeeded in very brutally routing the FLN as a guerrilla-terror organization. But any information gleaned from torture of OBL isn't likely to be nearly as valuable as what we already possess from his data storage. So best to quit while ahead and call it a day.

But back to the point: you can't give him any reason for him to talk. I explained that he could expect to gain nothing from talking due to his unique position as the "Most Wanted" Al Qaeda figure, and his already sealed fate. There's nobody he could roll over on that could prevent him from being sentenced to death. You can't offer him any meaningful leniency -not only is he absolutely going to die, but the government will be in a big hurry to get that over with to forestall hostage taking. So you can't offer him any positive incentives. With little time remaining, that leaves only the negative incentives to loosen his tongue - ie, torture. If you want to start a conversation with him, that isn't about generalities, like why America should be incinerated, and why he went to war with us, then you will have to force him to answer questions about details he doesn't care to share. You won't get anything from it approaching the value of what you already have from his disks.

This guy tricked the world's only superpower into destroying itself in the sands of Afghanistan and Iraq. You aren't going to trick him to spill the beans by offering him a pack of cigarettes and a shoulder to cry on.

[sufrommich]

20. I doubt we would have got any usefull itel from him at all. nt

[JoePhilly]

23. We gathered the Intel.

We took the computers.

At this moment, AQ is scrambling. They do not know what info we obtained. I suspect that they will now be somewhat erratic. They will want to relocate quick.

Locations we've been watching for a while will change their activity in obvious ways.

OBL may not have known their exact locations ... but maybe he did. Dead or alive, I think the real advantage is in what the AQ folks now must question.

They have to decide to "act natural", or "run" ... which is good for us I think.

[Honeycombe8]

27. You just CAN'T be that naiive, can you? No way would he ever give up any intel.

Google OBL's biography. He would've killed himself, if his bodyguards hadn't been able to do it for him as he instructed, before he would've been captured, in the first place. Then he would've withstood any torture before giving up any intel...but of course, there would've been plenty of people to ensure that he wouldn't be tortured.

No....the intel we apparently got was way more reliable than anything coming from teh mouth of OBL or any of his bodyguards. It was OBL's handwritten notes, printed plans, communications, and tons of intel in writing.

Now that OBL has been killed, his followers will fall like dominos, seeing what has happened to the master brain, esp after the wave of independence started spreading in the Middle East.

No....it's cleaner and better the way it is. And justice was served.

[librechik]

28. sort of agree

but it's a bad precedent to set as US policy. Other presidents could misuse the new power of extra-judiicial executions, and it is terrible for our democracy and it's claim of equal justice for all.

[underpants]

29. They didn't lose anything. He had the big picture on the recovered items and that is what they need

as opposed to W who tried to play whack-a-mole

[Canuckistanian]

31. Forget it. Don't even go there

You'll be shouted down. The DU verdict is in. Blasting his head into red mist was the ONLY solution.