The breaking news on the morning of May 02, 2011 (Pakistan Time) of the US Seal Team 6’s daring night raid inside Pakistan that eliminated OBL, the most wanted terrorist of USA, had the Pakistani public in a state of shock and utter disbelief. In the beginning a significant majority in the country refused to accept that Osama could have sought refuge or was given shelter by the ISI at a spot which is merely at a stone’s throw from the Army’s prestigious military academy, Kakul. As the narrative unfolded the truth finally dawned on a deeply humiliated nation about the presence of Osama in Abbottabad and his elimination by the US Seals but they still remained highly sceptical about the official American version of the raid.
The recent exposé by Seymour Hersh in his article ‘The Killing of Osama’ published in the London Review of Books has categorically rejected the American claim about the mission ‘being an all American affair and the senior generals of the Pakistan Army and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) agency were not told about the raid in advance’i and a sizable section of the Pakistani public agree with his diagnosis, igniting a fresh debate in Pakistan with the doubters gloating ‘I told you so.’ Seymour Hersh is a highly respected and renowned investigative journalist who had earned world acclaim for some of his earlier works that had exposed the My Lai massacre in Vietnam and Abu Gharaib prison scandal. His latest piece on the OBL raid, therefore, cannot be dismissed off hand but at the same time his past reputation on investigative journalism does not guarantee an automatic acceptance of his viewpoint.
Before embarking on a critical examination of the narrative on the OBL raid as pieced together by Hersh, a brief assessment of one of his basic assumptions on which the edifice of his narration is apparently based would help. During a talk show in a reputable US news channel Hersh had stated that it was utterly inconceivable that the helicopters carrying the Seal team 6 could have ingressed so deep inside the Pakistani airspace undetected – hence the failure of the Air Defence of Pakistan to react could only be explained by their complicity with the raiders.ii If the Hersh narrative is based around this conjecture and if this belief is faulty it would appear his entire story is built around dubious and weak foundations.
Those familiar with the intricacies associated with detection of very low flying intruders by ground based radars and sensors especially in a hilly terrain know and understand the enormity of the task. On the night of May 1, 2011, in the ingressing sector only about a couple of low level radars between Peshawar and Abbottabad were deployed primarily to facilitate and monitor local flying by the PAF. Since friendly NATO and ISAF airpower operating across the border in Afghanistan had full control of the airspace, no serious threat was envisaged from the western front – hence comprehensive low level radar coverage of the western front was not considered necessary.
The PAF does have airborne sensors in the shape of AEWC platforms which can enhance low level detection capability manifold when employed in a given sector. There were no AEWC aircraft in the air when the raid materialised on the fateful night as these very expensive systems are primarily meant for use during actual war or war exercises. With the aid of the Electronic Surveillance and Electronic Countermeasure capability that the USAF possess, it could easily plot the range of the handful of low level radars actually deployed in the sector and select a route well beyond their detection capability. Employing a combination of stealth technology, nap-of–the earth flying (terrain masking, flying under the radar) and selecting a route in the shadow of the hills for them to have flown in undetected, to use a cliché, was ‘a piece of cake.’ It is believed that despite all these precautions a contingency plan to spoof and jam the PAF radars if they still managed to pick up the intruders was on hand. (In the event spoofing and jamming was not necessary as the raids progressed to the destination undetected. It may also be noted that Abbottabad, the target was not under low level radar surveillance as perhaps it was not considered a Vulnerable Point or Vulnerable Area during peace.)
For Seymour Hersh to base his entire narrative on the assumption that the PAF had the necessary wherewithal to guarantee hundred percent detection of four ultra low flying helicopters (two with stealth-based technology) even if the ingress was over a hundred kilometres displays his naivety about the working of air defence system. In any investigation when certain assumptions are accepted as absolute truth, there is a tendency by the investigator to cherry pick the evidence that support the assumptions even if these are from sources which are considered unreliable and would normally be unacceptable. A chronological sequence of key events leading to the final raid, as portrayed by Seymour Hersh, is tabulated below:
Osama’s presence in Abbottabad was disclosed by a walk-in senior ISI retired officer in Islamabad in August 2010. The officer revealed the presence of OBL in an isolated compound in Abbottabad where he was kept by the ISI in protective custody.
General Kayani, the powerful Army Chief of Pakistan and Lt. General Pasha the head of the country’s premier Intelligence Agency the ISI, initially denied any knowledge of OBL’s presence in the country but eventually had to concede that he was in their custody. They were forced to cooperate with the CIA conceived raid plan to kill or capture OBL from Abbottabad.
Kayani and Pasha were kept in the loop about the air raid and were made responsible for ensuring that the Pakistan’s army and the air defence command would not track or engage with the US helicopters used in the mission.iii They were also told in no uncertain terms that any efforts to relocate OBL from his Abbottabad hideout would have serious consequences for the Pakistani Generals and their country. Kayani and Pasha insisted that the US raid can’t have a big strike force. You have to come in lean and mean. And you have to kill him, or there is no deal.iv
The two sides jointly agreed that only after a week the elimination of OBL through a drone strike in the hilly region of the Pak-Afghan border would be formally announced by USA and subsequently confirmed by Pakistan. The crash of one of the Blackhawks as it attempted to drop the Seals on the rooftop made it impossible to keep the raid a secret any longer. The backroom argument in the White House after it was clear that the mission had succeeded was, ‘should Obama stand by the agreement with Kayani and Pasha and pretend a week or so later that bin Laden had been killed in the mountains, or should he go public immediately. The downed helicopter made it easy for Obama’s political advisers to urge the latter plan. Obama had to get out in front of the story before someone else in the Pentagon did.v
Much to the dismay of his own Secretary of Defence Robert Gates,vi Obama eventually acted on the advice of his political team, taking all the credit for the mission and categorically denying any involvement of the Pakistan army. Kayani and Pasha were coerced to accept the official US version refuting any involvement with the US plan or prior knowledge of Osama’s presence in the country, choosing incompetency instead of complicity as the lesser evil.
Hersh maintains that the sea burial of Osama’s remains cannot be verified and according to his undisclosed source such a burial never took place. In his opinion, the remains were either strewn over the Hindu Kush Mountain Ranges or were interred in some undisclosed location.
On the subject of the ISI walk-in as postulated by Hersh, while such a possibility cannot be ruled out, he has failed to provide any credible source to support his story. On the other hand, the US administration has provided a slightly different version. In the initial briefing of reporters after the bin Laden raid, a senior intelligence official had actually confirmed, in guarded terms, that Pakistan had provided crucial information that intensified the CIA’s focus on the Abbottabad compound. “The Pakistanis did not know of our interest in the compound,” said the official, “but they did provide us information that helped us develop a clearer focus on this compound over time…. They provided us information attached to [the compound] to help us complete the robust intelligence case that … eventually carried the day.”vii Michael Morell, the deputy director of the CIA has reported to have revealed in Panama that the ISI had given the CIA a mobile phone number without knowing its significance and that US surveillance of that number eventually led to the courier and finally to bin Laden.viii This was apparently the extent of cooperation of the ISI President Obama had briefly referred to in his triumphant announcement.ix
The initial denial of OBL’s presence in Pakistan by Kayani and Pasha and their subsequent admission that indeed Osama was in their custody begs a number of questions. Assuming as Hersh maintains that Osama was in ISI’s custody in Abbottabad since 2006, Musharraf was ruling the roost in Pakistan then – hence it must have been in his knowledge and with his consent and approval. What stopped Musharraf from using this priceless asset to save his sinking ship in 2007? An offer by Musharraf to the then US President George Bush the opportunity to eliminate America’s most wanted terrorist with or without officially admitting the role of Pakistan would have been a God sent and too good to pass for both. For George Bush especially the elimination of OBL would have been a crowning glory in his otherwise lacklustre second term, while giving a significant boost to the Republican Party and the election campaign of the Republican Party candidate McCain in the 2008 US Presidential election. When questioned on this issue by the US TV networks General Musharraf has repeatedly denied any knowledge of OBL’s presence in Pakistan clearly stating that had he known he would have extracted maximum benefit for himself and his country by offering to hand over Osama dead or alive, overtly or covertly to the US administration.
Conceding that Musharraf missed the trick, what prevented Kayani and Pasha to relocate OBL in a much heavier guarded environment when they were initially confronted with his presence in Abbottabad? They must have been blackmailed, coerced or bought off, cynics would argue. To begin with for the ISI to hide a priceless asset like OBL in such an undefended and vulnerable spot is simply bizarre – that is not how it is known to operate. Even far less valuable assets than OBL are guarded very heavily when in their custody. And finally once Kayani and Pasha were forced into accepting the US raid plan, could they not have suggested a better alternative which would have still made the US administration come out smelling of roses without discrediting the entire Pakistani nation – since (as stated by Hersh) OBL was in the custody of ISI, it could have moved him physically, dead or alive to a remote region of its inaccessible Afghan frontier from where the brave Seals could have staged a heroic raid. The failure of the top Pakistani generals to do so would paint them as dim-witted at best or traitors at worst. While one may disagree with many of the policies of the top leadership of the Pakistani armed forces, considering them as dimwits or traitors is something not even their harshest critics would accuse them of – the Hersh version just does not gel.
Did Kayani, Pasha and Robert Gates honestly believe that two fully laden Blackhawks could unload heavily armed Seals, conduct a fire-fight in a fairly well built-up area of Pakistan for over thirty minutes at the minimum, and hope the entire incident would go unnoticed by the local public? Given the level of cooperation between the ISI and the CIA, as suggested by Hersh, would it not have made more sense to preposition a helicopter and a small team of CIA operatives in cooperation with the ISI inside the compound and after taking over possession of Osama (dead or alive) fly off to Afghanistan and then claim as agreed that he was eliminated in a drone strike elsewhere. Was Obama so naive that he gave his blessings to the delayed announcement scheme or he had planned to double-cross the not so bright Pakistanis and his own Secretary of Defence to begin with?
Hersh admits that Obama was able to extract tremendous political mileage from the OBL raid, to a degree where it was touted as one of his crowning overseas achievement that helped him win the re-election with relative ease. If according to Hersh he had blatantly lied to the American public about the raid background, were the Republicans so simple minded that they did not see through the Obama farce and expose him. A charge of such a magnitude if proven was bound to have led to Obama’s subsequent impeachment and conviction. Does Hersh want us to believe that like Kayani and Pasha the Republicans are also morons?
The subject of the ceremonial sea-burial of OBL’s remains has been questioned by Hersh. His undisclosed sources suggest that the sea burial never took place and Osama’s remains may have been either tossed over by the helicopters in the Hindu Kush Mountains or buried elsewhere. While his assertions are within the realm of being possible, he has not given any verifiable or credible source to back up his claim. Besides, for the Obama administration to announce a sea burial that never took place makes little sense.
For the general public in Pakistan and the international audience abroad the failure of the ISI, renowned the world over for their professionalism in the murky world of espionage, to detect the presence of Osama so close to the army’s prestigious military academy for nearly half a decade, is very hard to swallow. While the hunt for Osama had the highest priority in USA, the mere possibility of his presence in Pakistan was a nightmare scenario for both the ISI and the national leadership – apprehending Osama and handing him over to USA or killing him by the ISI could have had major fallouts in the country because of his cult following by a section of the public. Harbouring him was equally dangerous as the west led by USA was likely to view it as an extremely hostile act and besides using the economic and political clouts to punish Pakistan, the country could have come directly in the crosshairs of the American military. The world is a witness to the destruction of Afghanistan and the Taliban-led Afghan government when they had dared to refuse handing over Osama to USA in 2001.
Besides the helicopter crash that woke up the neighbourhood, the shooting and blasting of doors by the Seals had continued for the next forty minutes. According to Jane Corbin, neighbours had alerted the local police about the crash of a helicopter but they were told to stand down by the Abbottabad army high command. The possibility the Americans had warned the Pakistanis at the last minute about a raid on a high value target without specifying who and the local authorities turned a blind eye is a theory security analysts in Pakistan favour.x
Given the shadowy history of rogue elements sympathetic to the Islamic militants within Pakistan’s military and intelligence, the support to Osama and his motley group during their hideout in Abbottabad by such elements cannot be ruled outxi – for some it is almost a given. There is, however, no conclusive proof yet if the presence of Osama was known by the country’s top intelligence and military commanders or indeed he was in their custody. The one possible explanation for the failure of the ISI to detect OBL’s presence is its firm belief and fervent hope that Osama was either dead or most likely barely surviving in the fringes of the Pak-Afghan border – it never seriously hunted for Osama in country, thus falling victim to its own canard.
In conclusion, the broad contours of the US account of the Osama hunt appear plausible but ‘there are parts of the US account the world may never be told – not a hundred percent of the story is out there.’xii Exaggerations in the tactical details of behind the scene intelligence work and the actual raid that was depicted in the film Zero Dark Thirty, on the other hand are at best a propaganda tool very commonly employed by the victor.
Seymour Hersh needs to take a closer look at his sources and revisit his monograph on the real story behind Operation Neptune Spear (OBL raid) if his latest work is to be taken seriously by the academia.
Endnotes
i Seymour M. Hersh, the killing of Osama bin Laden, London Review of Books, p 1, http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n10/seymour-m-hersh/the-killing-of-osama-bin-laden, accessed on 12 June 2015
ii This statement by Seymour Hersh (or words to that effect) was personally heard by me most likely in a CNN interview.
iii Ibid page 6
iv Ibid page 5
v Ibid page 8
vi Ibid
vii Gareth Porter, Truthout/Report, Exclusive Investigation: the truth behind the official story of finding bin Laden, Thursday May 03 2012, recovered from http://pakistanthinktank.org/the-true-story-of-zero-dark-thirty-isi-tracked-down-bin-laden-cia-took-the-glory accessed on June 16 2015.
viii Retrieved from an article by Jane Corbin, Have we been told the truth about Bin Laden’s death, courtesy BBC News, published in Daily Times June, 18, 2015.
ix Ibid, “it is important here to note that our counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound he was hiding in.” is the extent Obama had acknowledged the Pakistani cooperation in his post OBL raid speech.
x Ibid.
xi Ibid.
xii Ibid.
