McRaven liked the CIA director. He thought Panetta was a real leader, “the consummate team player, gregarious, bawdy at times, with a laugh that was contagious.” More important, Panetta never made things about himself—he was always about doing the right thing for the nation. With his deep connections to the Washington establishment, he proved he could get things done.
In Panetta’s office, they’d once again discussed their options, including the possible CIA “snatch-and-grab.” It was a frank discussion. No one held back. Even Panetta’s aides believed the military should handle the mission—not officers from the CIA’s covert action division.
They’d all agreed they shouldn’t say a word to Pakistan. “That option should not even be on the table,” one advisor said.
Another said he believed that Pakistani authorities knew Osama bin Laden was hiding in plain sight. “The ISI must know bin Laden is there. For God’s sake, he’s a fucking mile down the road from their West Point,” the analyst said.
Finally, Panetta had turned to McRaven. “I think the only real option here is the special forces raid.” It was exactly what the admiral had been thinking, for weeks.
Now, in the Situation Room, McRaven walked the president through what the raid might look like. After dark, a select special operations team would fly one or two helicopters for nearly an hour and a half from Jalalabad, Afghanistan, to the compound, landing inside the high walls. They would secure every perimeter entry point, door, and window before breaking into the three-story main house.
Once inside, they’d search the premises and “neutralize” any residents they encountered. They would apprehend or kill bin Laden, then fly back out, stopping to refuel somewhere inside Pakistan before returning to the base in Jalalabad.
Panetta jumped in. “Mr. President, Bill is looking into the use of some special helicopters we have that may be able to get past the Pakistani air defenses.”
McRaven nodded and pulled up on a big screen in the Situation Room a picture of a stealth Black Hawk, a chopper that had been modified to mask heat, noise, and movement. “Sir, it’s possible that these helos can avoid radar detection and make it to the compound,” he said. “There’s still a lot I don’t know about their reconfiguration.”
When Obama asked McRaven to elaborate, he said he didn’t know how many men the helicopters would be able to carry.
“How many do you need?” Obama asked.
“At a minimum? Twenty men and their equipment,” McRaven said.
Obama examined the picture on the screen as McRaven continued. A lot goes into determining the lift capacity of a helicopter, including fuel and altitude.
“For example, sir, if the temperature is one degree different than what we forecast, it could change the entire load and fuel requirements. If the time on the ground is longer than anticipated, then the helo will have to refuel. That is another element of risk,” McRaven said.
McRaven’s words echoed in Gates’s ears. Gates knew bad shit happened on dangerous missions. Hell, he was right here, in the Situation Room, that night in 1980, when he learned the mission to rescue fifty-two American hostages at the U.S. embassy in Tehran had turned into a disaster. So Gates knew they had to be certain that bin Laden was in the compound. Otherwise, it wasn’t worth the risk.
McRaven could feel the enthusiasm draining out of the room. He knew he had to be stark. Truth, no bullshit. They had to know everything—pros and cons. McRaven said he still needed to nail down precise details. But to do that, he said he had to bring in experts to help with the air and ground planning phase.
“How many more people do you need?” the president asked.
The admiral felt a flutter of excitement. “Five,” McRaven answered. Obama approved the request. And when McRaven was finished, Obama looked at him and asked, “Do you think you can pull it off?”
McRaven could have said yes. No problem. Special forces are badasses who can do anything. But McRaven wasn’t going to bullshit the president. That wasn’t who he was. He was going to lay it all out there—the good, bad, and ugly.
He said he’d only “sketched out a concept.” He wouldn’t know the answer until he picked a team, put together a game plan, and ran through some rehearsals. “What I can tell you is if we get there, we can pull off the raid. But I can’t recommend the mission itself until I’ve done the homework.”
Obama smiled. “Let’s do the homework then.”
Before they adjourned, Donilon reminded the president their next meeting was March 29. When everyone got up to leave, McRaven bounded from the room. He wanted to get started. He knew he didn’t have much time to complete his assignment.
COUNTDOWN: 35 DAYS
March 27, 2011
Jalalabad, Afghanistan
McRaven had been working around the clock putting together a plan for the raid. After the meeting with Obama, he knew he had to act fast. There were a lot of moving parts to any major operation, but McRaven knew he’d first have to decide who would carry out the raid: Navy SEALs or Army Green Berets.
Either of the elite special operations units could get the job done. Hell, collectively they had conducted thousands of missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were well-oiled machines. And while McRaven had been a SEAL, his decision would ultimately depend on availability.
Most of the units were stationed in Afghanistan, and McRaven couldn’t simply pull an entire active Special Forces unit out of there without raising suspicion. The country was full of Taliban and Al Qaeda spies, and his own officers would start asking questions, too.
McRaven would have to spend a lot of time away from Afghanistan, putting together the mission and training the team. (He already had a cover if anyone got suspicious about why he was traveling so much to Washington, D.C. People would assume he was going to Bethesda Naval Hospital to get checked out for his cancer. He’d write on digital travel logs: “Commander going into Washington.” No one would ask personal questions of a commanding officer.)
But if McRaven and an active unit suddenly disappeared from the radar, his command center would suspect a big operation. People would start talking and snooping around. He didn’t want that.
McRaven checked the deployment schedule. A Green Beret squadron had just landed in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, a Navy SEAL squadron had just returned to the United States. They were on leave for three weeks. Perfect. SEALs it would be.
He called Captain Rex Smith and Colonel John “JT” Thompson, two trusted officers. Smith was cool and poised, a dead ringer for tough-guy 1950s movie star Robert Mitchum. Thompson commanded the special operations aviation unit and knew everything about helicopters. Both were “extremely experienced in combat, superb tacticians and consummate team players.” This kind of high-profile mission always created plenty of drama and interpersonal tension. The admiral wanted officers who could build teams and thrive under the pressure.
During his late February visit to Washington, McRaven had briefed Smith on the bin Laden operation. He swore him to secrecy and asked him to help the CIA agents plan a mission. He said they had developed several COAs, but only one involved a raid.
“So what do you want me to do there?” Smith asked.
“Nothing. Just listen. The last thing we want is for the agency to think we’re taking over the mission,” McRaven said. “Only speak up if they ask for your insight. Then be totally honest with them… and stay away from implying that we could do it better.”
McRaven was back in Afghanistan the following day. But over the following weeks Smith called him almost every day with an update. He proved invaluable. And now, following the Situation Room meeting with the president, McRaven called on Smith for another kind of help.
He asked him to gather several key SEALs and get them to Washington by the next day. Then he called Colonel Thompson and requested air planners. He wanted the most experienced warrant officer to lead the tactical part of the air planning, and the lead pilot from the special Black Hawk unit to provide technical informa
tion about the aircraft.
McRaven didn’t disclose the details of the mission or even say who the potential target was. But as Thompson listened, he sensed something big was up. He understood not to ask too many questions, but whatever it was, he wanted a piece of it. He jokingly asked if McRaven needed a personal assistant—someone to tag along. McRaven laughed. He knew what Thompson was up to—and McRaven would have made the same offer if the tables were turned. The admiral knew he’d need a superb helicopter pilot soon, however….
“Not now,” McRaven told him. “But stay around, JT. Don’t go anywhere soon.”
The following day, Smith brought four people to the sprawling CIA complex. Smith hadn’t told them a thing about the mission. But they suspected something was up when they didn’t go in the agency’s main building. Instead, they headed to the printing plant, a small building that produced phony documents—birth certificates, passports, driver’s licenses—that agents used on secret missions. McRaven greeted them at the door. When they walked inside, Smith and his men viewed the model of the compound in the middle of a long table. A few minutes later, several members of the CIA team arrived. After a round of introductions, the analysts gave Smith and his men a rundown about the compound, The Pacer—all of their intelligence.
When they finished, McRaven took over. He told them about the options before Obama.
“Gentlemen, in less than two weeks the president expects a fleshed-out concept for the raid option. Your job is to tell me whether or not we can do it,” he explained.
He said that he had explored several options to get to the target. They included starting the mission from several jumping-off points inside Pakistan instead of Afghanistan, and parachuting in just outside Abbottabad and driving to the compound. McRaven said he quickly dismissed the ideas as unfeasible. He’d give them a day or two to look at his analysis, “but then we have to decide on one course of action and start planning.”
Smith spoke for the team. “OK. You know what the boss needs. Let’s get to work.”
For the next two weeks, Gary, Sam, and other CIA officers and analysts worked with the SEALs. They reviewed every bit of intelligence. They brought in experts on Pakistani air defense and radar systems. Image analysts answered every question about the compound: the height, the thickness of the walls, the outdoor lighting, what they could tell about The Pacer’s living conditions. They discussed the possible number of women and children in the compound, and the location of Pakistani military and police units.
It wasn’t only about Abbottabad. Analysts provided information about how the Pakistani military would respond if American forces were detected over the border. In the past, when the U.S. military chased insurgents into Pakistan, the military there activated and engaged American helicopters and ground forces as invaders. Intelligence analysts provided answers to every one of the SEAL planners’ questions except one: Was it bin Laden in the compound?
After all the analysis, they came to one conclusion: Their only raid option was a direct path from Afghanistan to the compound. Now they had to determine if the right number of helicopters could get the right number of SEALs into the compound without being detected.
McRaven knew the only way to do that was to practice the plan in simulated Pakistani conditions. That meant bringing in a lot more people. He needed more time to chase down all the little details that would help them avoid disaster.
And time was running out.
COUNTDOWN: 33 DAYS
March 29, 2011
Washington, D.C.
McRaven was back in the Situation Room and ready to go. Since his last visit, he had devoted hundreds of hours to putting together a mission plan. Now, all he had to do was wait his turn.
Obama had been thinking a lot about The Pacer, the compound, Pakistan. But it seemed that every day there was another crisis somewhere in the world or at home that needed his immediate attention. Civil war had engulfed Libya. It was unclear if Gaddafi would survive. In Syria, protesters marched in Damascus and Aleppo, demanding democratic reforms and the release of political prisoners. President Bashar al-Assad responded by cracking down on the protesters, leading to widespread violence.
At home, the newly emboldened GOP majority in the House and Senate tried to repeal Obama’s flagship achievement, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare. They didn’t have enough votes to override a presidential veto, so some two dozen states filed lawsuits, arguing that guaranteed health care for all Americans was unconstitutional.
But now, sitting in the Situation Room, surrounded by his national security team, Obama shut out the noise and zeroed in on the subject at hand: the compound.
Almost the entire national security team was in the room, including Secretary of State Clinton, Defense Secretary Gates, and Admiral Mullen. This was serious.
Panetta knew that despite their best efforts, two questions remained: Who was inside the compound? And if they determined it was bin Laden, how would they get him?
Since the last meeting with the president, Panetta had been refining their options, adding more details. They had looked even closer at bombing the compound.
He’d brought in a group of “flyboys” to CIA headquarters, specialist airmen from the 509th Bomber Wing at Whiteman Air Force Base near Kansas City. They made a great impression with their short haircuts and leather jackets, and they wasted no time in describing how they could conduct a mission to kill The Pacer: Two B-2 bombers would leave Whiteman and fly halfway around the world to the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. There they’d “stealth up,” switch on their radar-blocking technology, and bank right. Minutes later, they would be over their target.
Each bomber would drop sixteen JDAMS (joint direct attack munitions). Each bomb weighed two thousand pounds.
Jeremy Bash had a few questions for them. What would they see after the bombs dropped?
“Nothing,” one of the flyboys responded.
“Nothing? What does that mean?” Bash asked.
The compound would be reduced to rubble within moments, he responded.
Bash wanted him to elaborate. Would anything be left over? A flyboy shook his head.
“Would we be able to collect DNA from the bodies?” Bash asked.
That was highly unlikely because all the bodies would be nothing more than “dust,” a flyboy said, adding that they wouldn’t be able to contain the damage to just the compound and a few “rows of houses across the street.”
“Everything would be blown to smithereens,” he said.
So, if bin Laden was there, he’d be killed, along with everyone else in the compound and the surrounding neighborhood. Panetta and Bash knew that would create another problem: They’d have almost no chance of ever proving they had killed bin Laden. It was unlikely that the Pakistanis would invite U.S. officials to the smoldering ruins to search for DNA.
The flyboys were confident they could successfully carry out the mission. Panetta talked to John Brennan about it. They shared misgivings. “It’s a bad plan,” Brennan said. “There would be too many casualties.”
While the bombing wasn’t off the table, General Cartwright, an old naval aviator, had plotted out what he called a more “surgical option for an air strike.”
Why not use a drone? It would fire a small, thirteen-pound missile directly at The Pacer while he was strolling in the courtyard. Collateral damage would be minimal. The U.S. military regularly used drones to kill terrorist figures. He was positive they could take out The Pacer, and that would eliminate all the inherent dangers associated with a ground assault.
Panetta had problems with that plan, too. They only had one shot. What if the drone missed? If The Pacer was bin Laden, he’d vanish again. If the missile took him out, they’d be facing the same problem they had with the bombing option: They wouldn’t have a way to get DNA. And the Pakistanis would still be angry as hell.
Anti-American sentiment in Pakistan was on the rise. The public was outraged that more and more
U.S. drone strikes were taking place inside Pakistan along the Afghanistan border. The Raymond Davis case certainly didn’t help.
After two months, America had finally paid his way out of jail. He was released in the middle of March after the victims’ families received several million dollars as compensation. Many in the community, though, believed it was a miscarriage of justice fueled by “blood money.” Add a United States bomber attack with noncombatant victims, and U.S.-Pakistani relations could be damaged beyond repair.
In the Situation Room, Panetta laid it all out for Obama. He told the president that he was taking the CIA-led raid off the table. He doubted they could carry out that kind of operation.
They discussed the proposed B-2 bombing mission. Obama examined the plan closely, then eliminated it, too.
General Cartwright described his drone attack plan.
Obama said he’d consider it. The president then turned to his national security advisors and widened the focus.
How would this military action serve the overall goal of defeating Al Qaeda? It simply wasn’t enough to kill bin Laden to settle a score. A mission so costly and risky would have to measurably advance U.S. strategy, or make Al Qaeda less effective. The president wanted a full analysis. He needed the full policy underpinnings to make a good decision, he said.
The room fell silent.
The president turned to Panetta. “Are you ready?” he said. “The raid. Tell me what you’ve got.”
Panetta looked over to McRaven. He wanted the admiral to explain the details to Obama. So McRaven stepped up, ready with the “homework” he’d been assigned at the end of their last meeting. The admiral respected Obama. He had the strong leadership style McRaven would expect from somebody who’d spent years in the military, which Obama hadn’t. The president had confidence as well as a level of humility—he admitted when he didn’t know something—and a deference to the experts around the room. Obama asked the right questions. More important, he stayed calm. He had a sense of humor.
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