It has been an over 9 year search that President Bush started to find and bring to Justice the master mind of the 9-11 attacks and it is what he set in motion that brought him down. Also we have to thank President Obama for acting like a Commander In Chief and approving the raid.
Since 9-11 I have been active and on the ground in the Middle East and Arabian Gulf and the main problem we always used to discuss was getting into the mountains where he was thought to be hiding. Any one who didn’t fit in including other Muslims didn’t have a chance of getting close. I think they took a page from the USA series In Plain Sight when they decided to go to the Middle of the Country of Pakistani and not just any location but 1’2 mile from the main Military Academy.
You will have to stretch the imagination to think that high government sources weren’t aware that he was there. Experience tells me that the big reason he was in this city near the Military Academy was for his protection and easily warning him of pending raids.
It doesn’t matter where you are in the world when you build a house and compound this large and with all the fortifications that people from all walks of life ask questions, just as we would if it was in our neighbor. The police agencies are much more aware of what goes on in their communities in that part of the world then we are here. In a country such as Pakistani where government overthrow can spring up at any time if a fortified compound with high walls, razor wire and security gates goes up, if they don’t know who is there they will find out.
I think several things drew him from the mountains to the city and I believe the changes in our political structure here affected that. President Bush was known to be a hawk on using the military to find Bin Laden and it was known that they were trying to develop intelligence to get into the mountains to take him down. He felt very secure in the Americans not being able to do that. What changed some of the landscape was when President Obama came into office, he was viewed as being weak in the military area and that he would pull back on the drone attacks and the efforts to authorize raids into Pakistani to find him.
But what happened was Obama actually started more drone attacks and increased the chances of a lucky hit on Bin Laden. I think they thought that it would be safer in closer to populated areas and where we probably wouldn’t do a drone attack. I suspect we will find as the facts come out, if they ever do. that it was in recent times the last year or so that he was living more constantly at this property. Keep in mind that for years Bin Laden, like many other wanted terrorist moved frequently to avoid being targeted by enemies from without and within.
No one really knows how much the death of Bin laden will really change the actions of Al-Qaida for he had worked to spread out the operation side. The big test for the U.S. and other Western powers is to keep our eye on the ball and go after the rest of the organization with the same zeal as Bin-Laden. If we let the death of Bin Laden slow us down in the war on Terror then we will lose.
You have to admit for Bin Laden to hide in plain site was pretty smart and he tried to cover his tracks by not having phone or Internet service to eliminate electronic tracking. But he needed access to the world and his network so he had to use “Carrier Pigeons” or “Human Couriers”. He chose the human courier and their detection led to his down fall. You have to wonder if he really thought that the couriers would avoid detection for ever or if he knew it was a matter of time. But he always said he was willing to die for the cause.
As I said at the beginning we need to be thankful that President Bush was committed to giving the tools to our intelligence and military so they could detect and track the couriers. It was in one of the foreign CIA holding areas that the information came that led to May 1, 2011 being the day Bin Laden was stopped from killing more innocent people.
Remember stay informed and let your elected officials know how you feel and what you want them to do.
Until next time BE SAFE.
Phil Little
