So we finally killed Osama bin Laden.
My feelings are mixed. I do not rejoice in anyone death, especially not a killing, But bin Laden terrorized the world, was responsible for thousands of deaths, American, Muslims, among others. The world is better off without him.
But here is the irony of the date:
It was exactly 8 years ago, May 1, 2003 that George W. Bush put on his aviator costume and flew onto an aircraft carrier that had been turned around so the TV view wouldn't show it to be in the San Diego harbor but would look like it was out to sea. Because actually the carrier was within helicopter range and could have deposited him on deck without all the heroics of our warrior president bringing in a carrier landing of a fighter jet.
There, under the banner "Mission Accomplished" Bush gave his declaration that major combat operations have ended in Iraq.
That was a little off too -- we could almost claim it now 8 years later.
Obama looked every bit the commander in chief in making his announcement tonight. This should quell -- for a bit, anyway -- talk of him as too weak to handle our foreign affairs.
Not so.
Ralph
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I referred above to Osama bin Laden's death as a "killing." It is now clear that it was a planned "assassination." The Navy Seal team had orders to kill, not capture, him.
ReplyDeleteOf course, it is much simpler this way. A lengthy imprisonment and trial would have created a worldwide nightmare.
Still, I'm not comfortable with my government being in the business of assassination, regardless of what such a person has done, just as I strongly oppose capital punishment as a matter of principle, regardless of the crime.
I don't know what I would have done in Obama's place. It's not an easy decision by any means. Does this now make it easier for us to sanction the assassination of Gaddafi?
Clarification: reports now say that the mission orders were "kill or capture." Because Osama was firing at the Navy Seals, it was OK to kill him. This report also said that it was Osama himself who used a woman as a human shield; she too was killed.
ReplyDeleteThis seems the more authoritative report: John Brennan, Obama's counterterrorism adviser spoke openly, said they would have taken him alive if that had been a possibility; but he went down firing at the Navy Seals and was shot and killed "in a fire fight."
ReplyDeleteBrennan further says that the woman he was using as a shield was one of his wives.
But no, another official has contradicted Brennan's report about the woman. Says she was not his wife and that she was not used as a shield. But a woman did get killed, and his wife did get wounded.
ReplyDeleteGetting the story straight: The White House has corrected the earlier misinformation from counterterrorism adviser John Brennan. They are now saying that bin Laden was not armed when he was killed, nor was the woman killed with him his wife. His wife was in the room and was wounded, but she was not being used as a shield for him.
ReplyDeleteThe details aren't really that important -- except that my unease about assassination is heightened when an unarmed man is shot and killed, whether it's the police and a robbery suspect or a leader of a terrorist group.
I take their word that the changing story is due to their effort to get information out to the public as quickly as possible about such a momentous event; and they are now checking out the initial accounts with others for accuracy.