The death of Osama bin Laden and its aftermath

[Harlot]

Venerable lefty journalist Seymour Hersh dubbed the Joint Special Operations Command, which "supposedly" include elements such as the Special Warfare Development Group that some have claimed is "SEAL Team 6", as an "Executive Assassination Ring" that didn't report to any military authorities, but only directly to Dick Cheney.

http://www.minnpost.com/ericblackblog/2009/03/11/7310/investigative_reporter_seymour_hersh_describes_executive_assassination_ring

JSOC/ST6 has been around since the early 1980's. They are a military asset at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief. Cheney didn't create them and he certainly doesn't control them now. Were you being tongue-in-cheek? It sounded like you wanted to give Dick Cheney credit for "the capability" of carrying out the mission.

[Deaf Dick]

Venerable lefty journalist Seymour Hersh dubbed the Joint Special Operations Command, which "supposedly" include elements such as the Special Warfare Development Group that some have claimed is "SEAL Team 6", as an "Executive Assassination Ring" that didn't report to any military authorities, but only directly to Dick Cheney.

http://www.minnpost.com/ericblackblog/2009/03/11/7310/investigative_reporter_seymour_hersh_describes_executive_assassination_ring

I'd heard that Seal Team 6 somehow got a bad name within the Navy, and (amongst other things), changed their name to Special Warfare Development Group. In any case, they very similar to the Army's Delta Force in that they are a counter-terrorist unit (that doesn't officially exist) embedded into their own branches Special Forces groups. The FBI has their Hostage Rescue Team which I understand trains often with these groups, but they can act within the U.S. and of course would be under the FBI chain of command and not JSOC.

The bit about Cheney's hit squad is risible.

[Wouter]

Not at all. I equate friendly competition between athletes to getting shot in the head too.

I think the people who did what the US waited 10 years for are worth cheering for more than any athlete, no matter how extraordinary his or her performance is or how much you like him/her. That you don't like people cheering the dead of Bin Laden (and indeed, that you still question he is responsible for 9/11 and many other terror acts) is your problem. I unapologetically maintain that this is a perfectly normal reaction and justified, no matter that some try to push this as a deplorable reaction. It is not.

[Deaf Dick]

JSOC/ST6 has been around since the early 1980's. They are a military asset at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief. Cheney didn't create them and he certainly doesn't control them now. Were you being tongue-in-cheek? It sounded like you wanted to give Dick Cheney credit for "the capability" of carrying out the mission.

He might have shown the operator how to shoot someone in the face.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

JSOC/ST6 has been around since the early 1980's. They are a military asset at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief. Cheney didn't create them and he certainly doesn't control them now. Were you being tongue-in-cheek? It sounded like you wanted to give Dick Cheney credit for "the capability" of carrying out the mission.

Yes, I was being tongue in cheek.

I'm a Naval Academy grad, and the brother of my best friend/former roommate (also an Academy grad) is Deputy Chief of Staff for DevGru, and was on staff for JSOC prior to that.

And no, that's not classified because it says so right on his Facebook page.

No shit.

[Wouter]

Yes, I was being tongue in cheek.

I'm a Naval Academy grad, and the brother of my best friend/former roommate (also an Academy grad) is Deputy Chief of Staff for DevGru, and was on staff for JSOC prior to that.

And no, that's not classified because it says so right on his Facebook page.

No shit.

I hope nobody is going to say on his facebook page "I am the soldier who killed OBL"!

[Harlot]

I would totally friend that guy. :P

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

I hope nobody is going to say on his facebook page "I am the soldier who killed OBL"!

I am Spartacus!

[Prince of the North]

I hope nobody is going to say on his facebook page "I am the soldier who killed OBL"!

Actually, a great way to help protect the person who really did it would be for a few hundred thousand people to claim responsibility on Facebook ;)

[Wouter]

Actually, a great way to help protect the person who really did it would be for a few hundred thousand people to claim responsibility on Facebook ;)

True enough ;)

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I hope nobody is going to say on his facebook page "I am the soldier who killed OBL"!

Well, he's a senior officer, so I really doubt he'd have been one of the guys right there. It's usually the senior enlisted who do the actual ground work for those guys, and that's why I suspect there's no issue with him identifying himself that way in public.

Although I do know that the younger officers in the SEAL's do tend to get their hands a bit dirty as well. But I haven't talked to him since he was assigned to DevGru, so I don't know.

His brother is pumped, though.

[Ken Stone]

I think it's odd that we have gotten more than one reference to Sauron in these threads.

You do realize this is a message board visited by fantasy geeks, right?

Fair enough, but the fact is that his atrocity basically goaded the US into doing a lot more damage to itself and to the world than a band of determined terrorists could. I guess that's part of what is coloring my reaction -- Bin Laden's death reminds me of all the stupid, self-destructive shit we've done in the last ten years. He achieved his goals beyond his dreams. He had nothing left to live for.

To see his children grow. To marry that next wife. Good food shared with good company. I'm sure Osama had a lot to live for. If not he would have killed himself years ago.

ETA: I just remembered a Jesse Ventura interview not to long ago. Basically he said "Ah they killed OBL years ago and are keeping it quiet to keep the boogey man alive." It wasn't the first time I had heard that sentiment. IIRC there were even some on this board that expressed the same thing. Anyone feel like stepping up and admitting they were wrong?

[TerraPrime]

ETA: I just remembered a Jesse Ventura interview not to long ago. Basically he said "Ah they killed OBL years ago and are keeping it quiet to keep the boogey man alive." It wasn't the first time I had heard that sentiment. IIRC there were even some on this board that expressed the same thing. Anyone feel like stepping up and admitting they were wrong?

That thought did cross my mind, yes, though not exactly in that formulation. I was thinking more along the lines of the military probably not trying as hard as they could to find OBL, since his existence in a way justifies the continual reliance on the armed forces.

[snake]

Fair enough, but the fact is that his atrocity basically goaded the US into doing a lot more damage to itself and to the world than a band of determined terrorists could. I guess that's part of what is coloring my reaction -- Bin Laden's death reminds me of all the stupid, self-destructive shit we've done in the last ten years. He achieved his goals beyond his dreams. He had nothing left to live for.

An article here that sort of agrees with you DG. Artcile.

Not being an American and I can't seem to get worked up over this. I mean, sure he was a bad man and deserved to die as much as anyone deserves to die but it doesn't make a big difference to the world. Especially not to Afghanistan. The Taliban aren't gonna care that he's dead. They're still gonna fight until we leave. I guess the psychological victory is a good thing for the US right now and especially for Obama but I really cannot think of any other benefits. Again not saying that this was a bad thing, just that it was a "meh" kind of a deal.

ETA:

AFAIC that is.

[Michael Jon Snow]

I for one have more respect for Obama for the way this all was handled.

That it was supposed to have happened Saturday at the same time as the correspondents dinner, is surprising.

As for what it means going forward, I am hoping that AQ moves to the fringe and that real political and social change can move forward for that region.

[snake]

I for one have more respect for Obama for the way this all was handled.

That it was supposed to have happened Saturday at the same time as the correspondents dinner, is surprising.

As for what it means going forward, I am hoping that AQ moves to the fringe and that real political and social change can move forward for that region.

From what I have gathered from reading a few articles AQ was already on the fringes. Just look at the muted response to OBL death. 5 or 6 years ago there would have been a large outcry in the ME. Hardly any now. Political and social change were already happening as well. The Arab world has realized that terrorism wasn't going to improve their lot in life. They've moved on and people like OBL are being left behind.

[IheartTesla]

Legality!

LEGAL

U.S. at War With Al-Qaeda: Many legal scholars claim the Navy SEALs and bin Laden were enemy combatants. At the Council on Foreign Relations, legal scholar John B. Bellinger III points out that a 2001 congressional act authorizes the U.S. president to use "all necessary and appropriate force" against nations, organizations, or individuals who had a hand in the 9/11 attacks (read bin Laden, among others).

NOT LEGAL

No Due Process: Nick Grief, a. lawyer at Kent University, tells The Guardian that the attack had the appearance of an "extrajudicial killing without due process of the law," adding that even Nazi war criminals were given a "fair trial."

No Attempt to Capture: At The Daily Beast, the human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson argues that criminals should be taken alive if possible, and U.S. forces should have been able to overpower an unarmed bin Laden.

No Pakistani Consent: The human rights lawyer Curtis Doebbler states at Ahram Online that the killing of bin Laden was carried out without Pakistani authorization and "against the territorial integrity and political independence of a foreign state." CFR's Bellinger counters this argument by pointing out that "the Pakistani government appears at least to have consented after the fact to this potential infringement of its sovereignty."

Bin Laden's Leadership in Doubt: If bin Laden no longer wielded the influence over al-Qaeda that he did around the time of 9/11, then he was no longer an enemy combatant as the U.S. defines it, argues Claus Kress, a law professor at the University of Cologne, in an interview with Der Spiegal.

Raid in Pakistan, Not Afghanistan: The U.S. believes its war against al-Qaeda can be waged across the world, Kress claims, but the actual battlefield of Operation Enduring Freedom is Afghanistan. "It is in no way clear that bin Laden, at the time of his killing, commanded an organization that was conducting an armed conflict either in or from Pakistan," Kress says.

Kinda depressing to me that the arguments for the illegality outweigh the legality.

[Altherion]

I think the common term for this kind of action is "extralegal" -- it's not really sanctioned by any laws, but nobody is going to be put on trial for it. It's above the law.

[Michael Jon Snow]

From what I have gathered from reading a few articles AQ was already on the fringes. Just look at the muted response to OBL death. 5 or 6 years ago there would have been a large outcry in the ME. Hardly any now. Political and social change were already happening as well. The Arab world has realized that terrorism wasn't going to improve their lot in life. They've moved on and people like OBL are being left behind.

Agreed, however AQ always hung over the head of any movement that was lead by anyone who was Muslim. Hopefully this will settle things.

[Harlot]

Kinda depressing to me that the arguments for the illegality outweigh the legality.

In what way are the "illegality" arguments outweighing the legality arguments? Because they listed individual arguments and scholars seperately and just lumped all the "legality" scholars into one?

Having numerous arguments doesn't increase the validity of the arguments. Many criminal defendants have their convictions upheld despite appealing on numerous grounds. The single valid position, if it is so, that these are enemy combatants oversomes all of the illegality arguments.