Navy SEAL on Fox: I met Osama bin Laden 'for a second'
| WASHINGTON
Former Navy SEAL Robert O鈥橬eill on Wednesday said he met Osama bin Laden, alive, for perhaps one second. Then he fired three quick shots at the architect of 9/11, who fell by the side of his bed.
鈥淚 very quickly recognized him and then it was just pop, pop, pop,鈥� .
The SEAL told Fox鈥檚 Peter Doocy that he stood over Bin Laden and heard him take his last breath.
Others have told a different version of this final encounter. In the book 鈥淣o Easy Day," written under a pseudonym by another SEAL from the assault team, Matt Bissonnette, the lead man up the stairs at Bin Laden鈥檚 house in Pakistan fires a shot which fells the Al Qaeda leader. Following team members then pour more fire into the body.
鈥淲ar is foggy," said O鈥橬eill on Fox, and that may explain the different stories.
鈥淚 think the author is telling the story as he saw it, and based on the debrief he had,鈥� said O鈥橬eill.
The SEAL said he can鈥檛 be 100 percent sure that Bin Laden had not been struck before he fired. But he added that he was sure Bin Laden was upright and standing on his own two feet at the start of their brief encounter.
鈥淚鈥檒l take 10 lie detectors [tests] on that one,鈥� he said.
The first part of the Fox News special based on O鈥橬eill鈥檚 testimony was broadcast Tuesday. It took the story of the assault right up to the stairway leading to Bin Laden鈥檚 door.
O鈥橬eill gave a vivid account of the raid, from the crash of a US helicopter at its beginning, to the quick assault on the compound, with SEALs peeling off inside the building to clear rooms and floors as they climbed up the stairs.
At one point, he took a small girl by the hand and led her to a woman for safety, O鈥橬eill said. As they reached the second floor, a SEAL whispered in Pashto, and Bin Laden鈥檚 son Khalid, confused, leaned over railing to see what was happening. He was shot.
As the SEAL team took off, mission completed, a SEAL from New York City asked O鈥橬eill who had shot their primary target. 鈥淚 said, 鈥業 think I did,' 鈥� said O鈥橬eill.
The New York City native then thanked him.
鈥淭hat was the kind of point where it hit me, 鈥榃ow, this is a big deal,鈥� 鈥� said O鈥橬eill.
The decision by O鈥橬eill to go public with his story has roiled the secretive community of US special operations forces. SEALs are expected to remain silent about their missions. They sign nondisclosure agreements. Selflessness is supposed to be part of the special operations ethos.
But Pentagon officials cooperated with the producers of the Hollywood thriller about the Bin Laden raid, 鈥淶ero Dark Thirty," and some have written memoirs detailing some aspects of the event.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 think I鈥檓 saying anything that hasn鈥檛 been confirmed,鈥� said O鈥橬eill.
Mr. Bissonnette, for his part, says he dislikes being linked with Robert O鈥橬eill, a SEAL who鈥檚 broken the code of silence. He tried to keep his identity secret, he said, so as to not distract too much from the team, he pointed out .
That distinction may not matter much to critics.
Vice Adm. Sean Pybus, a SEAL and deputy commander of US Special Operations Command, talked obliquely about the controversy during a Veterans Day event in Tampa.
鈥淭here are some issues with humility today . . . in special operations there are some challenges that we have currently and this is a fine balance between being loud and proud, self versus team, sharing versus security concerns,鈥� Admiral Pybus said, .
