American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden tells us that having the power to shape narratives and influence preferences is the key factor to becoming a superpower. The fact that the US forces were able to eliminate Osama bin Laden not only served as proof of their military prowess but also gave us an idea about the nation’s soft power. It showed how the US crossed several roadblocks and made sure that nobody questioned its authority or its way of doing things. So, let’s go through the events that led to the death of Osama bin Laden and find out how US intelligence agencies were able to pull it off.
What happened after 9/11?
On 11 September 2001, a dastardly act by an infamous terrorist organization, Al-Qaeda, shook the foundations of American society. Two planes had been intentionally crashed into the World Trade Center, and a plane had even targeted the Pentagon. From John McLaughlin, the CIA deputy director, to Michael Morell, who at that time was a CIA analyst and the daily briefer of President George Bush, everybody was in a state of shock. I would like to say here that everybody looked up to Bush for directions, as nobody knew what the right course of action was. I have to give it to George Bush, in the wake of such a national crisis, he proved why he was made the commander in chief in the first place. Bush knew that the eyes of the entire world were on him, and he wanted to lead by setting a precedent. A war was declared on the terrorist organization, Al-Qaeda, and from that day onwards Osama bin Laden became the number one enemy of the United States of America. To date, that footage where George Bush was informed about the attack while he was sitting in a classroom reading to children makes me curious. A million thoughts must have crossed his mind, probably the most stressed mind in the world at that particular point in time. But the way he responded truly defined the kind of leader he was. As I stated earlier, I will give credit where credit is due, but that does not mean that I will refrain from criticizing the actions of the regime if need be. Bush knew that he needed an aggressive police force to tackle the problem, and so Cofer Black, the CIA counterterrorism director, was put in charge of the entire operation. Soon, Cofer Black was joined by the likes of Gary Berntsen, the field commander, and Henry Crumpton, who became the operations chief of the mission codenamed Jawbreaker. After the 9/11 attack, there were many things that the intelligence agencies got to know about Osama bin Laden. The man was against liberal democracy, equal rights for women, and everything else that the USA stood for or symbolized. That is why Osama joined forces with the Taliban and fought against the Northern Alliance during the Afghan War. Also, 9/11 wasn’t the first time Osama Bin Laden had tried to wage a war against the US regime. In 1992, US servicemen in Yemen were attacked and killed by his forces. Similar attacks happened in 1996 and 2000 in East Africa, Yemen, and other countries. Osama bin Laden was interviewed by John Miller, and the former couldn’t have been more explicit about what he was planning to do. Osama had explicitly stated that he wanted to destroy the US completely. He stated that when he launched an attack, he wouldn’t distinguish between a civilian and armed personnel. He believed that every US national and those supporting progressive ideology deserved to die.
The American intelligence agencies, after conducting in-depth research, came to the conclusion that they would have to join forces with the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan and wage a war against Al-Qaeda. It was obviously not going to be an easy mission because the US forces were heavily outnumbered. But they had one advantage that they knew could turn the odds in their favor: the US forces had air support, which the Taliban and Al-Qaeda forces lacked. So the plan was set into motion, and the forces reached Afghanistan to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and give back control of Afghanistan to the Northern Alliance.
What happened during the Khost mission?
The US forces reached Afghanistan, and together with the Northern Alliance, they were able to overpower the Taliban and Al-Qaeda forces. But even then, Osama bin Laden was nowhere to be found. There was a cave system in the mountains of Afghanistan where it was practically impossible to find anybody who didn’t want to be found, so they bombed a significant span of the mountains. There was speculation that Osama might have been killed in the bombings, and the US forces even tried to locate his body or DNA that could give them some sort of evidence. But nothing was found, and later it came to be known that Osama had been able to successfully escape. The US officials knew that they had missed out on the opportunity and probably wouldn’t get such a chance in the future. Actually, what happened was that the on-ground troops asked for reinforcements, as they knew that after the fighter jets bombarded a particular area, the soldiers would need to go and deal with the survivors, i.e., either capture them or eliminate them. But the reinforcement never came, and so it wasn’t possible for them to go to a particular area and find out the status quo. Many believed that it was because of this slip-up that Osama was able to make a narrow escape. Nonetheless, the US agencies kept on investigating the matter in an attempt to find one credible source that could lead them to Osama bin Laden. The capture of the Saudi citizen Abu Zubaydah in Pakistan, who was the right-hand man of Osama bin Laden, was a big breakthrough. Through him, the US forces got to know that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, aka Mukhtar, was the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks. Another breakthrough was made when the Jordanian government informed the US about a man who could prove to be a valuable asset in the war against terror. A medical professional named Abu Dujana al-Khorasani, who was an extreme right-winger, was chosen for the mission. It was decided that the man would try to become a member of Al-Qaeda and get information about the location of Osama bin Laden. It was a risky move, as the US forces didn’t know if Abu Dujana was a reliable man or not. Their worst fears came true when Abu Dujana turned against the US forces and leaked information to the Al-Qaeda chiefs. The CIA officers were supposed to meet Dujana at the Afghanistan military base near Khost, where the latter was apparently supposed to give them valuable intel. Instead of Abu Dujan, a suicide bomber named Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi came into the military camp and killed 7 CIA officers. That incident changed a lot of things, and it probably pushed the US government to its limit, where they knew what they had to do. For the next two years, the US intelligence agencies went to extreme lengths, and in the end, they succeeded. They were able to locate the most dreaded terrorist, who was hiding in Abbottabad, Pakistan, just a few kilometers away from a Pakistani military base.
How did the US agencies track down Osama bin Laden?
The US intelligence agencies tracked down Osama bin Laden with the help of some excellent spy work. Mukhtar, aka KSM, aka Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, was captured by the US forces, also in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. The man was tortured in Guantanamo Bay, and there came a point when he started giving out information very easily. But still the man kept certain things to himself, and the US officers understood that he was pretending to be cooperative when in reality he was making sure that he hid the most important intel. The American officers realized that the man who worked as a courier in the terrorist organization was probably the key to reaching Osama bin Laden. The Americans came to know that Abu Ahmed was the courier who had close ties with Osama bin Laden, and he was probably the person who knew his exact location. There was a huge win when, through years of good work, the intelligence officers and analysts were able to locate Abu Ahmed. They got to know that he lived in Abbottabad together with his brother’s family; on further investigation, it came to be known that a third family was living in the same mansion. It took some real investigative work, but the CIA analysts were able to figure out that the third family was that of Osama bin Laden, who had been hiding in that mansion in Abbottabad. On 2nd May 2011, the US Army and the intelligence agencies created history and executed a mission that became one of the most significant incidents in the history of the modern world. Rob O’Neill, a member of SEAL Team 6, was the one who came face-to-face with Osama bin Laden in the mansion and shot him dead. Later, Osama’s body was put in a body bag and taken by the members of the armed forces, who made sure that they took all the evidence they could find in the house with them. The United States of America finally took its revenge. A proud Barack Obama addressed the world from the White House and said that the man responsible for the 9/11 attacks had been killed by the US armed forces.
Why Didn’t the Pakistani Military Shoot Down The American Helicopters?
American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden, apart from telling us about the lesser-known details of the mission that spanned a decade, also gave us a lesson in world politics. The fact that the US media houses have worked day and night to increase its soft power cannot be denied. They have made sure that their narrative overrides anybody else’s, even if it is highly absurd or implausible. Don’t get me wrong, I do not want to take anything away from the US forces, but I want to say that if any other nation would have wanted to do the same, then things wouldn’t have been so easy. Firstly, let me point out certain fallacies in the narrative put forth in this documentary. The documentary told us that when the US forces were trying to escape Pakistani airspace, they were chased by a Pakistani fighter jet that belonged to the F-15 series. The narrator said that they were lucky to reach Afghan airspace just in time, as otherwise the Pakistani jet would have shot them down. So basically, Pakistan, which is massively dependent upon the United States of America on the international stage, would have shot down an American helicopter using a jet that was given to it by the US. To any prudent man the narrative would sound absurd, because things are not so simple and the politicians of any nation aren’t so naive. US Navy SEALs, one of the deadliest special forces in the world, tracked down Abu Ahmed on Pakistani soil, captured KSM in Rawalpindi, and were conducting all sorts of operations on Pakistani soil, but still the Pakistani intelligence agencies had no clue about what they were planning to do. Either the Pakistan secret intelligence consisted of a bunch of buffoons, or they were working together with their American counterparts and were ordered not to interfere in the matter. I mean, at the end, Pakistan said that it was clueless about what the CIA and the special forces had planned to do in Abbottabad, and that, I believe, is just ludicrous. The Pakistani government also stated that it was unaware that the world’s most wanted terrorist had been hiding in the country, a few kilometers away from one of their army bases, and that too for years.
This is how narratives are set. I applaud what the US government was able to do, but they surely would have intervened if any other nation had tried to do the same. The documentary stated how torture techniques were used in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba to extract information from the likes of KSM and other Al-Qaeda chiefs. Tell me if I am wrong in assuming the UN Human Rights Council would have intervened and made sure such activities were stopped had it been any other nation that would have been running such a facility. And again, applaud the US government for what it has been able to achieve. That said, it also tells us how important it is for a nation to have soft power in today’s time. If you need your narrative to prevail, if you need to hunt down the enemy of your nation, if you need to carry out your will, you need to find a way where your narrative prevails and you are able to override the one put forth by your nemesis.
