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This is an archive article published on September 10, 2012

US planned airstrike to level Osama Abbottabad hideout

The US was initially planning a massive airstrike using B-2 Spirit bombers to level the Abbottabad hideout of Osama bin Laden but chose an assault by its elite commandos who killed the worlds most wanted terrorist a year ago

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The US was initially planning a massive airstrike using B-2 Spirit bombers to level the Abbottabad hideout of Osama bin Laden but chose an assault by its elite commandos who killed the worlds most wanted terrorist a year ago.

In his tell-all account,Matt Bissonnette,a Navy SEAL who participated in the raid,says that President Barack Obama and his advisors discussed different options till the last moment. The president still had not signed off on the ground-assault option. All we had been authorised to do up to now was to start planning and conduct rehearsals. The White House was still considering an Air Force option,a massive airstrike using B-2 Spirit bombers to level the house, writes Bissonnette in No Easy Day: The Autobiography of a Navy SEAL using the pseudonym Mark Owen.

He says Defence Secretary Robert Gates backed the airstrike because it kept US ground forces out of Pakistan. The airstrike option required 32 2000-pound smart bombs. The barrage would last for a full minute and a half and the crater would penetrate at least 30 feet into the earth in case the compound had a bunker system. The possibility for collateral damage was high,and the possibility of finding identifiable remains after that kind of destruction was low.

He writes Osama perhaps knew we were coming when he heard the helicopter. Osama had more time to prepare than the others,and yet he still didnt do anything. Did he believe his own message? Was he willing to fight the war he asked for? I dont think so. Otherwise,he would have at least gotten his gun and stood up for what he believed.

 

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